UAE | Traffic and Transport

New taxi drivers leave passengers in the lurch

Residents complain that drivers of the new taxis do not know routes and take them to the wrong destination, but Trans Ad, the regulatory authority, says this will soon be rectified.

  • By Binsal Abdul Kader, Staff Reporter
  • Published: 00:54 January 22, 2008
  • Gulf News

Abu Dhabi: Residents complain that drivers of the new taxis do not know routes and take them to the wrong destination, but Trans Ad, the regulatory authority, says this will soon be rectified.

Steps have been taken to improve the local knowledge and language skills of new taxi drivers following complaints from passengers, Trans Ad told Gulf News.

"We received some complaints from passengers and we are trying to improve the performance of drivers," said Sultan Mohammad Al Shamisi, Director of Customer Services and Compliance Division at Trans AD.

Some passengers told Gulf News that new taxi drivers took them to wrong destinations as they were not aware of routes and landmarks.

"I took a new taxi to go to the Immigration Department but I didn't know the direction. The driver took me to the Tourism Department after driving around," said K.N. who works with a prominent Educational institute in Abu Dhabi.

"Some of them do not say that they don't know the route, otherwise I could easily guide them, said Mohammad Ebrahim, an Indian who has been living in the city for past 15 years. "I have faced this twice and had to guide the driver to my destination when they took wrong routes," he said.

Many also complained about the language skills of the drivers.

A Syrian house wife said the driver did not understand when she requested in Arabic to reroute the journey following a telephone call from her husband. She said it took much time and effort to communicate to the driver.

A.S, a British physical trainer, said he had to struggle to know the nearest shopping mall from a new taxi driver. "He did not understand English, but I tried my best to communicate with him using simple language.

Trans Ad is focusing on languages, said Al Shamisi. "Now our representative attends the test which assess drivers' communication skills in Arabic or English." Trans Ad also added another exercise in the orientation process with 10 questions relating to routes and landmarks.

Have your say
Have you faced a problem with taxi drivers who had no clue about the routes? What do you do in such a scenario? Do you think the organisation should spend more time training the drivers? Or is it something we have to live with as development forces daily route changes? Tell us at
letter2editor@gulfnews.com or fill in the comments form below.


Your comments


I've never been in the new taxi but yet I have complaints, these silver taxi drivers are the worst drivers here, they don't know how to drive, they drive extremely fast break all the rules, take wrong overtakes and stop all of a sudden where ever they want. I wonder if these are really drivers or they are just people who have been given the taxis to give us the nightmares.
Sana
Abu Dhabi,UAE
Posted: January 22, 2008, 13:35

Keep cool guys. Abu Dhabi downtown is a small place and taxi drivers will learn everything prety soon. It will not take them more than 6 months to know each and every place in Abu Dhabi. Thank UAE government that has taken a good step in getting new taxis. My only complaint is that there are not enough taxis in the city to adher to all the customers.
Sami
Abu Dhabi,UAE
Posted: January 22, 2008, 13:17

First of all Taxi driver's should be the one who knows all the routes in the city, and its also a must that all of them can speak in clear English.
Joel
Dubai,UAE
Posted: January 22, 2008, 13:05

During the recuritment keep it must that a new taxi driver will at least 10 pass or High. And should be tested during the application. But not test only for driving, also languages English, Arabic, Hindi.
Muhammad
Ras Al Khaimah,UAE
Posted: January 22, 2008, 11:46

In my opinion companies are to be more cautious while recruiting drivers and sufficient orientation about the city landmarks and roads should be given to the newly recruited drivers, prior to start their career. More over priority should be given to the existing experienced drivers, regardless of their English knowledge.
Saleem
Abu Dhbai,UAE
Posted: January 22, 2008, 09:42

Well people in Abu Dhabi should consider themselves lucky. The taxis in Dubai have got GPS and state of the art communication devices, but most do not know how to use it. Also getting a taxi in Dubai is almost impossible. During peak hours, you are most likely to find a vacant taxi hiding in some vacant parking lot waiting for the rush hour to clear.
Brendan
Dubai,UAE
Posted: January 22, 2008, 09:27

While recruiting new drivers,make sure that they can speak, understand English. A common language all over the world, so it's easy to communicate with passengers, even with people from GCC.
George
Dubai,UAE
Posted: January 22, 2008, 09:24

Since July 2007 I have taken over 300 taxi rides. 90% of my Asian drivers know where to go in Dubai. 70% of the drivers have no "relationship" to their machinery. They are "stompers" - either they stomp the gas, or they stomp the brakes, usually in corners! I would say that 5% have no idea where they are going, but these are drivers who normally work in the City, and are clueless in say, the Marina area. It's a big big learning curve for us all, and part of the price we pay, to live in a boomtown. I wish that our drivers would learn to drive SMOOTHLY and SAFELY, as the first option, and the whole city should learn that the horn is basically a rude instrument.
Michael
Dubai,UAE/Germany
Posted: January 22, 2008, 09:19

The new taxi drivers knows nothing about Abu Dhabi Land marks and yet they are taxi drivers , I wanna ask the CEO of Trans AD "how on earth did your HR team recruit such people?" Some claim they are from Dubai and they are new, well that's not our problem, a taxi driver should know the city that he works in.
Hella
Abu Dhabi,UAE
Posted: January 22, 2008, 07:40

I am getting a lot of the "old" taxi drivers over-charging for the trip. Only last night the driver tried, but did not succeed, to charge me 20 AED for a trip from the Hamdan St Liwa Centre to the Beach Rotana Hotel.
Norman
Abu Dhabi,UAE
Posted: January 22, 2008, 07:34

Several times the new taxi did not stop at the bus stop although empty. It is not a very nice service. You should educated the "old" taxi drivers who know their ways around Abu Dhabi.
B.P.
Abu Dhabi,UAE
Posted: January 22, 2008, 06:49

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