free Now - "Cancelled" drivers turning up anyway - Pay attention

TheIrishGrover

Confusing situation. Bear with me. Multiple taxis cancelling and turning up anyway. I booked a taxi for myself and a friend into Dublin on Saturday evening. Driver accepted then they cancelled. They then turn up anyway. (Two other drivers accepted and one cancelled. So, at this stage, 3 drivers accepted, 2 cancelled, one of the "Cancelled" drivers has turned up). Assuming this was the car that DIDN'T cancel, I got into the car and confirmed it was for me by name. My friend then noticed that a rear tyre was flat. We didn't feel safe and got out. The driver then said "Well, I can bring you to Clonsilla station" (About 3KM away). We refused.

I then ordered a replacement. Within a couple of mins a taxi shows up. I assumed this was the replacement but it was probably the initial ordered driver that did NOT cancel. Again I confirm it was for me. It was and off we go. As I got into the car one of the other "Cancelled" drivers turns up outside my house (On the tracker) and sends the "I'm outside" message. I told them my accepted taxi had turned up and I'm already on my way.

Then three other taxis accept and two cancel and two of them turn up and send the message "I'm outside" over the next 5 mins. I'm assuming these are the replacement I requested. I had to cancel the replacement one who turned up which cost me 5 or 6 euros.

All in all, 7 drivers accepted, 5 cancelled but 4 turned up. One in dangerous condition. I spent half the journey in cancelling, monitoring all the other taxis to make sure I wasn't going to be hit with cancellation after cancellation fees. Leaving my friend to chat with the driver. A real unpleasant driver - Every outdated cliche you fear "Ah yeah, it's all the blacks doing this" etc etc etc. REAL uncomfortable journey.

So yeah, I get that some of this was me not paying attention (Specifically ordering/cancelling the replacement). But I hope this is not a trend: Drivers accepting the call, getting the details and then cancelling but turning up anyway. No doubt off the app. Then what? The driver who accepts and is the one who ACTUALLY should have the fare turns up, I'm gone and I get a cancellation fee because they did the right thing?

This never happened to me before but was very unnerving as one of the things I like about the app is that everyone knows who everyone is: Driver knows who I am, I know who the driver is and FreeNow knows that that driver is transporting me as time X from/to wherever. The taxi that ACTUALLY took us into town never actually showed an alert like "Passenger accepted" or "Passenger en-route" or similar. Mayabe it doesn't. I never noticed before but I even started 2nd guessing the driver we had because of all the shenanigans.

So yeah, up to now I'd usually get in, give my name to confirm and away we go. Now? (I had to order one home later) Now I make sure I compare the driver details before getting in. I know I should do anyway but yeah, just be careful, folks.

KLF

There seems to be a lot of messing with FreeNow these days, they are having a bit of a battle with drivers who are not taking a certain amount of jobs that come through on the app, I'd say drivers are doing the above to game the system and hopefully get paid directly from the customer.

I switched back to Uber over Christmas and found it great, it's still regular taxis but their system is very good and the rating system for driver and customer works much better, you can get very specific on your experience.

TheIrishGrover

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121689568#Comment_121689568

This was my assumption also (Without evidence. Just, that this is what it looked like: You get your taxi, get to your destination and suddenly you can't pay with the app but with a card/cash). Problem though is that the customer is then penalised:

1: You get into a "Cancelled" taxi (Either knowingly or unknowingly) and the ACTUAL taxi who turns up then cancels because you are already gone. Then you are fined/penalised (This is what happened to me). Do this enough times and your own rating goes down I'm assuming and you are likely to have issues getting a taxi

2: You have no protection/tracking. Free-Now don't know you are in a cab, don't know if anyone is in driver-X cab. Half of the appeal of the app is that you know the driver's name. They know your name. Free-Now know driver X has picked up passenger Y going to destination Z at such a time.

I know number 2 is the same as simply hailing a taxi but still.

Now I got my money back but if this is what's beginning to happen then I'll move to Uber. The only reason I didn't like Uber before is because I thought it wasn't using registered taxis and, even despite the issues above, I still would prefer to use registered taxis rather than random people doing this to pay for a holiday. I see now that I was in error and will give Uber a closer look. Thanks

KLF

Yeah it’s technically UberTaxi here, it’s our PSV licensing rules that prevented Uber operating like they do in the likes of The US where anyone can become a driver.

TheIrishGrover

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121690596#Comment_121690596

Well, taxi ordered. Taxi arrived. Taxi driver confirmed client's name and destination. Taxi same make and model (Prius of course). Raining so client didn't confirm number.

So easy mistake to make and SEEMINGLY an intentional attempt at misdirection.

Basically the point of my initial post was that there seemed to be an intentional attempt to bypass FreeNow by at least two drivers which initially lead to customer being penalised so people SHOULD be wary of this practice and pay more attention

SharkMX

We stopped using FreeNOW altogether. Its just gone to sh1t. Loads of them cancelling. Not turning up for ages. Too many issues to mention, so just stopped.

p_haugh

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121694407#Comment_121694407

Not to mention their "technology fee"

GBX

I had one similar recently. Ordered a trip, booking confirmed. Driver arrived in Prius. Then another in a merc. I said I only only ordered 1. Other driver "cancelled" the job. Grand on my way. Following day for whatever reason, I decided to check my bank and there was 2 charges for the same trip. Logged into the app and there was a 2nd trip log of the exact same route with a 3rd driver who I never set eyes on nor sat my body in his car.

I got onto Freenow and they refunded it but not without a few back and forth discussions. Definitely wise to keep an eye on the app.

Kurooi

I've been using bolt and have zero issues with it.

Just saying...

Kered Notnroth

I'm driving a year now as a taxi-driver and can tell you how it works. When you get within a very close distance of pick-up, about 300m, the "arrived" button appears on the screen. I wait until I'm as close as possible, because once you press "arrived", the sat-nav stops. There is no clicking "arrived" twice.

On top of this, there is the option to send a text within the app; there are a few preselected messages, such as; 👍🏻, and "I'm here". If there are duplicates or glitches, these aren't apparent to the real driver. Bear in mind also, when a driver receives a notification of a hail, you click it ASAP without reading it if you want to have a snappy day.

Also, drivers only have a limited number of cancellations per day without being kicked off the platform for 24hrs - obviously it's not in a driver's best interests to continuously cancel jobs once they've accepted them.

Birdie Num Num

Convinced I was scammed recently. Wife arranged the pick up, Prius showed up, dropped me to my destination and asked for payment. I told him it was through the app and he insisted I flagged him down. I couldn't reach the other half to confirm if it was paid through the app so I paid him. Received a cancellation fee from a different Prius driver. Very reluctant to use again.

Spook_ie

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121924001#Comment_121924001

Lost count of the number of times I got flagged down by people looking for 'their' taxi. FFS if you can't see the number on the roof sign to match the roof sign number on the app then keep your fecking hands down because you raise a hand the taxi is going to probably stop.

VG31

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121924001#Comment_121924001

There are important details missing here. Did you actually flag down the taxi? Did you have to tell the driver your destination? Surely if it was your Free Now the driver would know your destination. It sounds to me like you took a different taxi.

Birdie Num Num

Yes he knew my destination and said it to me after I sat into the cab.

Birdie Num Num

He knew my destination and picked me up from where he was directed to. How would he have know my destination?

Hippodrome Song Owl

I completed a taxi journey recently, booked through Free Now. The driver listed on the app arrived as expected, no issues. However, I was never charged and the journey disappeared from my Trips record on the app.

I feel bad that the driver won't have been paid and confused by what happened.

SaoPaulo41

Today I ordered a free now journey, I didn't need the taxi in end, driver arrived and said he is here, and for me to cancel trip if I didn't need it. I told him over the phone cancel.

Now what happened next has me furious , I couldn't cancel the trip on the app. I seen my booking doing the journey without me in taxi ( as j didn't need ) he then charged me the fare that I didn't take.

I tried contacting the driver he won't answer.

I have his reg, invoice for the trip i didn't make, have car model and driver name

What do I do?