Cab woes

2 weeks ago, I had an unhappy encounter with a cab driver.

I booked a cab and had to wait 10 minutes for the cab to arrive. When I went downstairs 10 minutes later (I saw from the app that the driver was reaching), the cab has already reached and was waiting at where my lift lobby is.

Usually I’ll just walk down the stairs from the lift lobby to carpark, but that day the workers were doing painting works to my block and they cordoned up the stairway, so I had to walk to the other end of the block which wasn’t cordoned before I could walk to the cab. It would have just taken me probably an extra 1minute. But just as I reached the end of the block and entered the carpark, I saw the driver driving away. Thinking he might be driving around the carpark trying to search for me, I didn’t give it much thought and attempted to walk faster.

Sadly, the cab exited the carpark. I ran. And called the driver. But he/she didn’t pick up. (Could have been my fault as I didn’t call using the number I used to make the booking.)

Being the good tempered me, I was waiting for the driver to cancel my booking (which most drivers do by indicating a no-show). Interestingly, there was no booking cancellation but a valid taxi ride showed up instead. I was charged for a 0km ride. I thought.. “hmm ok. at least the driver indicated payment was by cash. if it had been charged to my credit card (which was indicated as payment method when I booked the cab), I’ll definitely lodge a complain!”

So I booked another cab again. To my horror, I couldn’t use my regular promo code! Turned out that the code can only be used once a day and my quote had been used up by the previous driver who “charged” me for the 0km ride.

I managed to book another cab – without the promo code. And it was another 10mins of wait.

Feeling indignant in paying the $3.30 which I could have saved, I wrote in to the cab provider telling them my encounter (but didn’t specifically ask for the waiver). Had not received reply from them for 2 weeks, I’d long forgotten about the encounter. Finally received a reply email today, informing me my incident has been recorded in his service records.

While they didn’t offer to waive the $3.30, I can only remind myself that not everything will go as planned. You always need to have a give-and-take attitude, a mindset that helps to keep you in a happier mood.