Originally Posted by
Legionayr
Beware the taxi drivers in....well, everywhere, but especially Bucharest.
A German pal and I got to drinkin' in downtown B., and decided to catch a cab back to our hotel when the bar closed. Meter rate, no problem, the cab driver assured us, before we got in. Astonished when the fare came to 48 lei (about USD$17) for a 3 km ride. Too much, I complained. My German friend was ready to pay up just to keep the peace, but even he rebelled when the driver offered him only 30 lei in change from a 100 lei note. I tried to get out of the cab, but discovered that the rear doors wouldn't open - we'd been locked in. Driver then took off, and took us on a sightseeing tour of late-night Bucharest, shouting at us all the while.
I'd been on a cycling tour for the previous couple of months, and carried an expandable steel baton in my daypack as defense against the hordes of stray dogs one finds in eastern Europe. I produced this and began banging it against the window, while suggesting to the driver that if he didn't want to be vacuuming fragments of safety glass out his car, he'd let us out, NOW. Apparently he didn't care to be in a vehicle with me at that point, stopped, got out and got onto his cell phone, presumably whistling up reinforcements. I saw no reason to hang around to meet folks, and took the opportunity to climb out of the back into the shotgun seat and out the front passenger door.
I released my German colleague, flipped a 20 note onto the rear seat (stupid of me, I discovered later that the correct fare should have been around 8) and we ran off down the street before his buddies arrived.
All this could have been avoided had we had the sense to exit the vehicle before we settled up with the driver. As it was, having been taken unwillingly for a ride, we were miles from our accommodations, at 0130, in a city we didn't know at all, and completely ignorant of our location. I'm sure that the driver was banking on that leverage, and on our vulnerability as tourists, when he decided to scam us. Took us an hour to find our way back.
Have at least an idea of what a cab fare should be before using a taxi, and what your options are should the driver try to scam you. The proprietor of our hotel, upon hearing of our adventure, told us of a couple of French girls who'd flown in from Orly just that morning and caught a cab in. The driver charged them 200 lei; the appropriate fare is 40. They didn't know that, and had paid without argument.
The cabs in Bucharest legitimately don't all have the same rates, the cheapest and most prevalent I have seeing are the 1.39 lei ones, the most expensive I have seeing is 3.50 lei which are the ones working the airport and train station also you will see a few of the 3.50 lei taxi's park at a corner around town with there doors open trying to block the rate that is printed on the side of the cab, hoping you jump in and don't notice until it is to late.
There is another problem at the airport the 3.50 lei cabs aren't even happy with that, and will try and quote a inflated fixed rate. They also tried for 200 lei from me just a few weeks ago, but quickly dropped to 30 euros(120 lei) and wouldn't go any lower, ended up going with a "gypsy" cab for 20 euros, as I was in a rush and had no time to bargain.
On a side note when I was in Bucharest a few weeks ago, coming out of a music festival at around midnight I was trying to flag down a cab, but was in a semi industrial part of town, and all the cabs that were showing up were coming as a result of being phoned, when a girl says to me and my friend that was with me in English "where are you going we share a cab" been a savvy traveler I knew it probably wasn't a good idea, but we wen't with it anyways, then in the cab she decided that we needed to go out to a club which raised just a few red flags, but I kept playing along and agreed, in the cab between talking on her cell phone in Romanian, she says "maybe you meet some people in the club, and they say lets go someplace else, you go with them OK". So the cab drops us off at the club which was in the old city and she pays for the cab(10 lei) before I had a chance, we go into the club and right away run into a couple that happen to be friends with her, and have a few drinks with them(8 lei beers) then they they decide that we all should go to a bar a few blocks away, so we all go, and have another round of drinks(the first girl bought) then the couple decides that we should go to a third pub, were an American friend of there's works, as we must meet are fellow american, only a short cab ride away, so we drop off the original girl who by this time is quite drunk back at the first bar as her sister has arrived there, and proceed to the third bar in a taxi which the couple pays for, have a few more drinks at the third bar, don't get a chance to talk to there American friend as he is quite drunk himself and busy chatting up a hot Romanian girl, but have two more rounds of 8 lei beers, and then call it a night at about 4:00 am are new friends call us a taxi and give the driver directions to our hotel and send us on our way.
So the moral of the story is even if it feels like a scam and looks like a scam it just might be a crazy drunk Romanian girl, wanting to show you a good time.