India, anywhere north of Mumbai, with the notable exception of Punjab and Himachal Pradesh, is where I have consistently found the worst taxi (and of course auto rickshaw) drivers. They'll pull the old 'no the price is per person' trick, hunt in packs and, even if you bargain successfully, they might take you to the entrance to your destination (say a train station) which involves the furthest walk and then refuse to take you inside the station parking lot unless you pay a 'parking fee' which is equivalent to the fare again. The best defence I've found, which i learnt from the ubiquitous Israeli backpackers is to just refuse to pay and walk off. They will come around.

Melbourne has a bit of everything. I have had amazing, honest, friendly and knowledgeable drivers, and I've had absolutely terrible ones. The good and bad are split evenly along ethnic backgrounds so one can't acuse a particular group of being worse than the others, although that perception is an easy one for the media to exploit these days.

I found Toronto surprisingly bad- the Union Station rank was a nightmare, drivers would flat out refuse to take us because the fare was too short and a large group of them bullied a smaller, older, white driver into taking us. And he turned out to be a bit of a jerk. Not fun. On the way out, the fixed fare airport shuttle driver demanded $10 for driving the extra 300m to the next terminal after he dropped my parents off. Can any YYZ-ers verify if this is the norm?