Len Gelstein’s taxi nightmare started, he said, after he slipped into a yellow cab at Kennedy International Airport. It ended after a harrowing $71 ride, he said, and a call to the police.
Mr. Gelstein said his driver got lost and ended up in a line of garbage trucks on a bridge unfamiliar to Mr. Gelstein. The cabby drove more than 70 miles per hour, Mr. Gelstein said, and even backed up on the highway. The price wound up being almost double what the trip ordinarily costs.
Outraged, Mr. Gelstein called the police to ask if he had to pay the fare. Told he would spend the night in jail if he did not, he complied. Then he turned to another agency for recourse.
“It was a remarkable ride,” Mr. Gelstein testified on a recent Monday before a judge at a Taxi and Limousine Commission hearing.
Complaints about the work of cabdrivers seem to follow the adage about the weather: Everybody talks about it, but nobody does anything. This has long been a problem for the commission, which relies on customer complaints to monitor drivers. Complaints are filed in only about 1 in every 11,000 rides, and the customers who do lodge complaints often do not follow through. In 2008, less than a quarter of those who agreed to testify at a hearing showed up.
In December, in an effort to make the process easier, the commission began allowing those who file complaints to testify by phone. This year, about a quarter of the complainants who have opted for a hearing chose to testify by phone. (Mr. Gelstein was among them.)
The commission’s chairman, Matthew W. Daus, considers the program a success thus far. Now, half of the customers who say they will testify in person and half of those who agree to testify by phone do so.
One such customer was Jane Bills, who filed a complaint in January, saying she had been forced to pay her fare in cash.
“Is the guy, the driver, there?” Ms. Bills asked over the phone during a hearing on Aug. 17. Told that he was, Ms. Bills began to tell her story.
She said she had hailed a cab after a dinner with friends. The driver, Khris Singh, insisted that she would have to pay in cash, she said, telling her the credit-card reader was broken, although she said it appeared to be fine. She said that she rolled down her window slightly and that Mr. Singh rolled it up from the front.
Fed up, she had the cab stop short of her destination, paid the fare — in cash, with exact change — and got out.
Hearings like Ms. Bills’s often feature competing narratives and limited verifiable truth. (Mr. Singh’s lawyer, M. Daniel Bach, said that his client did not remember driving Ms. Bills and that she could not prove he was lying about the credit-card machine.)
If found guilty, drivers, who must appear in person to testify, can be fined or have their licenses suspended or revoked. Those found not guilty still pay a price, because they are unable to earn fares while in court. “For a taxi driver, the minute a complaint is filed, the penalty begins,” said Bhairavi Desai, the founder and executive director of the New York Taxi Workers Alliance.
Some drivers, like Mr. Singh, hire lawyers. Others cannot afford to, including Yah Nuamah, who was accused of hitting a car with his cab and leaving the scene. When Mr. Nuamah was called by the judge, he was asked if he wanted to return with a lawyer. He could not afford one, he said. He would represent himself.
At the intersection of driver and passenger is an administrative law judge. The judge hears testimony from passengers, who are sometimes angry because drivers refused to transport them or did not take the route they requested, and from drivers, some angry as well, who sometimes must represent themselves despite speaking little English.
One of the judges, Patrick McAuliffe, said he saw the conflict as a deeper one, between the public’s right to good service and safe streets and the drivers’ right to make a living in a difficult job.
“It can get very dramatic,” Judge McAuliffe said. “How could it not?”
When witnesses testify by phone, one bit of courtroom drama vanishes: the moment when driver and customer meet face to face. A personal connection is lost, said Ms. Desai of the taxi workers alliance, as is, in many cases, the chance for an apology or explanation from the driver. “Once they see them in that environment,” she said, “it softens a lot of people, and they realize that, wait a minute, this driver could lose their livelihood over our matter.”
Ms. Bills still seemed to realize the stakes. “I know I filed a complaint,” she said, somewhat apologetically, after concluding her testimony. “I’m not trying to ruin this guy’s life.”
Most of the hearings that day resulted in fines: $900 for the cabby who drove Mr. Gelstein (he did not show up for his hearing and was found guilty in absentia), and $200 for Mr. Singh. But even with the new system, almost half of the complainants do not testify, and the complaints are dismissed.
That happened to Mr. Nuamah, who could not afford a lawyer but whose passenger, who had opted for a phone hearing, failed to answer his phone. Mr. Nuamah’s scheduled hearing time passed, and he received good news: the complaint against him was dismissed.
{ 10 comments… read them below or add one }
RadioFreeTaxi 09.09.09 at 7:46 pm
“Complaints are filed in only about 1 in every 11,000 rides,”
That is an amazing statistic to me. It speaks volumes of the incredible work drivers do everyday!
Beverly Wetmore 09.09.09 at 9:22 pm
Hello cab drivers,
I am writing a book about the funny things NYC cab drivers say and experience. It is my goal to have my book published and on the stands by August 18, 2010 or sooner. I am happy to acknowledge anyone who would like to participate in my book and give them a copy of the book to sport in their cab.
If interested please contact me at chefbev@gmail.com. Thank you
winky 09.10.09 at 10:56 am
Good, those idiot drivers deserved what they got. It never ceases to amaze me how fucking stupid drivers are. I hear from my customers everyday horror story after horror story.
If Daus was really concerned, he’s stop giving out licenses like they were candy but that revenue keeps coming in……
blunt truth 09.10.09 at 9:58 pm
there is all kind of drivers out there, not all are stupid nor super smart, but this “A-hole” who goes by the handle “WINKY” seems to be anti cab driver. I like to see him show us how to do the job. why don’t you “winky a-hole show that you can do better? i be waiting for your response!
real truth 09.11.09 at 3:03 pm
Hey, blunt truth, here’s a good way to learn how to do the job: hail a cab in London, Paris or Tokyo and see real professionals at work. New York TLC should be ashamed of themselves, it’s embarassing…
ripon 09.11.09 at 10:07 pm
after 1 hour waitng i got a fare from hilton hotel at 6th ave/53st.Time was 1:40pm. passenger want to go JFK.After 50 min drive i reach to JFK.Fare came $49.57 and she want to pay by credit card.Now her credit card shows declined and she don’t have any money with her.She spend 20 min to use her credit cards.She told me where is the ATM.I said inside the terminal.She went there and came after 14 min with empty hand.now she told me take me to nearest citybank.We went there and came back to Jfk from jamaica ave/126st with empty hand,it was take almost35min.Now she told me that give me ur address and i’ll send you money by mail.I gave her my address and she walked down to the terminal.I returned to base at 5:30 and they charged me $15 late fee.I paid $105 for taxi plus $14 for gas.people should know how much money they have in their pocket.The lady she spends lots of money in the hotel,bar and club but in the end she don’t have any money to pay YEOLLOW CAB DRIVER.It was mid july and now sep 11,and i’am still waiting for that mail.What a clever she was and What a fool i’am,which is good only god knows.
CreditCardCabbie 09.16.09 at 11:44 am
We are all working so hard, and most of us are unhappy with the result, the way this industry goes. Many drivers out there who know the problems, but very few to address it. Where is a problem, there is always a solution for it? The best solution comes when all of us are involved! So let’s do the homework! Alternatively, we could drive longer hours for less, and get more tickets with more pains …
lwilliams 09.16.09 at 1:29 pm
Why are the people making the complaints given the opportunity to do so by phone, but the driver has to actually show up in person, and lose time and money in the process?
It seems that with more and more new drivers getting their hack licenses, the worse we drivers are being treated because there isn’t a demand anymore. The minute you go to 40 Rector, you are guilty, and it’s up to you to prove your own innocence. They immediately assume the passenger is correct without hearing all the circumstances that occurred. For this reason, I typically try to limit my conversation to “where are you going, here’s your change, and thank you.” The less that is said, the less you can be incriminated for.
Any passenger that I have insulted, and there have been a few, definitely had it coming, and I would never pay a fine for defending my integrity as both a driver and a human being.
winky 09.18.09 at 10:08 am
For your information, i am not anti-cab driver. I AM A TAXI DRIVER.
I own my own taxi and i bust it everyday out there. My observations are my own and anyone out there everyday like me will agree. Drivers are their own worst enemy.
When you have the TLC (The second highest revenue generator for NYC) giving out 40,000 yellow hack licenses while there are only 13,000 yellows at any given time, you will have a problem.
Daus doesn’t give a shit, drivers certainly don’t either but as long as the revenue from tickets, fees, and taxi schools keep rolling in………
steve 09.19.09 at 9:57 pm
I owned my own tin for 26 years, biggest mistake I ever made. Now I lease out my tin, drive a school bus 3 hours a day. Get paid for a full 8 hours, no TLC,a crazy passengers, no 70 hour weeks. Wise up get out of this business it’s killing you, Just check your weight and blood pressure. Get a CD drive a school bus, you’ll think your retired.