A Kelowna couple is raising the alarm after being charged for a taxi ride they never took. The couple, who only wanted the husband’s first name used, said they used the app to order a taxi from Current Taxi on Saturday night. Josh tells Castanet that his wife was out with friends on Saturday when he decided it was time to go home. He ordered a cab to take her from the 1200 block of Richter St. in the 700 block of Lawrence Avenue, about a kilometer and a trip that would take two minutes according to Google maps. “[The driver] he said he is out. He was not there. It was just walking around for a few minutes and then it ended up walking and it’s still charging,” says Josh. After realizing they had been charged $41.76 for a ride they never received, the couple followed up with the taxi company on Sunday. At first, they were told that the charge was not completed, but further investigation proved that they had indeed been charged for the ride that never came. “I just wanted to shed some light on this. With the whole thing about Uber not being allowed into Kelowna because of the taxi industry, it’s just crazy to see ‘A’ you can’t ride anywhere and ‘B’ is charging $40 to go a few hundred meters,” Josh said. Castanet contacted Current Taxi for clarification. “Our management team has been in contact with this guest and has apologized and asked for a refund,” company spokeswoman Trisha Conway said. “The charge was due to a very young driver making a mistake at a pick-up location. When he stopped to check the address, others jumped into the car claiming to be the ones who booked the taxi.” Josh says he and his wife were shocked, first to be charged for a cab that didn’t show up, and then to be charged more than $40 for a two-minute ride, “why the hell is it $40 to go some hundreds of meters?” Conway says they are still looking into the incident “and have used this opportunity to further educate and engage our team in the high standards of service that Current Taxi offers”. He added that Current Taxi is also “very proud of how hard this driver and our entire team worked this weekend to provide safe transportation to as many people as they could and know that other taxi and ride-sharing companies are also feeling ditto for those on the team.”
