Taxi association moves to curb overcharging complaints

RAD­HI­CA DE SIL­VA

Se­nior Mul­ti­me­dia Re­porter

rad­hi­[email protected]

The Pe­nal/Debe Taxi Dri­vers As­so­ci­a­tion has in­tro­duced new mea­sures aimed at ad­dress­ing per­sis­tent com­plaints from com­muters about fare in­con­sis­ten­cies along its routes.

In a pub­lic no­tice is­sued by pres­i­dent Dav­eanand Lall, the as­so­ci­a­tion ac­knowl­edged re­ceiv­ing nu­mer­ous re­ports of dri­vers over­charg­ing pas­sen­gers and said it has tak­en steps to re­store con­fi­dence in the ser­vice.

As part of the ini­tia­tive, all reg­is­tered dri­vers must now promi­nent­ly dis­play an of­fi­cial fare list in­side their ve­hi­cles. The move is in­tend­ed to pro­vide trans­paren­cy and en­sure com­muters are ful­ly aware of ap­proved rates be­fore be­gin­ning their trav­el.

Lall said the as­so­ci­a­tion has stan­dard­ised its fares with­out im­ple­ment­ing any in­creas­es but has in­tro­duced a more de­tailed break­down of charges to elim­i­nate con­fu­sion and pre­vent dis­putes be­tween dri­vers and pas­sen­gers.

The as­so­ci­a­tion al­so used the op­por­tu­ni­ty to clar­i­fy that it is not af­fil­i­at­ed with an­oth­er group op­er­at­ing un­der the name “South-West Taxi As­so­ci­a­tion,” which ser­vices sim­i­lar routes in the area.

“We want the pub­lic to be clear that we are sep­a­rate en­ti­ties,” the no­tice stat­ed, em­pha­sis­ing that the Pe­nal/Debe Taxi Dri­vers As­so­ci­a­tion re­mains com­mit­ted to main­tain­ing pro­fes­sion­al stan­dards.

The move comes amid grow­ing con­cerns from com­muters about in­con­sis­tent pric­ing with­in the pub­lic trans­port sec­tor, par­tic­u­lar­ly along busy south Trinidad routes.

Lall said the as­so­ci­a­tion is fo­cused on im­prov­ing ac­count­abil­i­ty among its mem­bers while en­sur­ing pas­sen­gers feel safe and fair­ly treat­ed.

He added that the new mea­sures form part of a broad­er ef­fort to up­hold ser­vice stan­dards and strength­en trust be­tween dri­vers and the trav­el­ling pub­lic.