Taxi drivers in my city are notorious for, at least in my experience, attempting to swipe your credit card with Stripe on their personal cell phones. Not just for the tip, but for the entire fare. They openly commit fraud against their company by trying to steal the fare for themselves without reporting it to their company.
I've refused to pay for, and reported to their company, 4 separate drivers in the past 2 years for this practice. I have to assume that the companies somehow don't care that their drivers are going rogue, or else this wouldn't be happening so frequently. Where is the threat of dismissal, or even better, prosecution? Same thing goes for unlicensed taxi drivers moonlighting with a friend's car - taxi drivers here are required to hang their licensed ID on the side window, and the frequency with which you find someone driving "off the books" is downright reprehensible.
The worst part is, I feel my personal safety is at risk every time I report these criminals. They are likely to know it was me, and they know where I live. It's irresponsible, potentially dangerous, and unacceptable to permit them to operate in this way.
Our taxi companies are hook, line, and sinker in the pockets of our government. We have a history of corruption here, and taxi companies are definitely part of the equation.
At least in SF, I'm pretty sure the standard deal is that the drivers pay for the cab regardless of what they get in fares. Cabs were a cash business for a hundred years, after all.
I think the deal with credit card machines in the cabs is that the cab companies see it as a revenue source. I know cab drivers grumble about the cost of using them. It makes sense to me that Stripe is cheaper for the cab drivers.
That's the standard arrangement in most cities in North America, not just SF. I don't think a driver processing a credit card with Square/Stripe is shady or fraudulent either. It might be against a given city's regulations, technically. But then those would be pretty messed up regulations.
>They are likely to know it was me, and they know where I live.
Never give your actual address. Pick a house number a few down. Especially if getting picked up to go to the airport. Some rogue/criminal taxi/uber/lyft drivers will ask questions about your trip to determine if your home will be vacant and for how long to pass the info onto someone else who will come by to burglarize your house.
Depends on the arrangement they have with the taxi company. If they're supposed to share a percentage of each fare with the company, then it may not be fraud in the strict legal sense, but they're certainly violating the contract they have with the taxi company.
I use Stripe for payment processing, and I'm pretty sure vendors don't get access to customer's credit card numbers. They might be able to attempt another transaction — which would be fraudulent — but you would get an email confirmation and could easily flag any such attempts. I agree that it is wrong of them to avoid regulatory or contractual obligations to use company payment processing, but they don't get your credit card number.
Why does it really matter if they use Stripe or the machine in the car, besides that it's technically against the law? If you're worried about fraud, okay, it's possible but pretty unlikely and generally if you notice anything you can dispute it with your credit card company. 7% adds up, since it's an extra 4% on top of the usual 3% fee when using services like Stripe, which is understandably hurting a taxi driver doubly since they already pay for their car lease per day regardless of the number of fares. Also take into consideration that while there are a lot of immigrant taxi drivers, many are also citizens and it's not simply immigrants that are going to do what you consider shady. If you're worried about fraud, put some notification of activity on your phone or email when a transaction runs and if you see something weird, report it. Don't be afraid of the boogeyman that doesn't even really exist.
Meh. It may be illegal, but it's one of those technical violations where the motivation really matters.
A cab driver using a much cheaper service vs. the rent-seeking credit card processing they are mandated by law to use? That's a morally correct action. The immoral action (imo) is to continue to feed into the fraud that you yourself identified earlier in the thread.
I have very little problem with a cab driver doing this, just as I have very little problem with you reporting it for the reasons you mention.
And having a rather interesting early start to my career - I assure you "native" citizens get away with this kind of crap all the time.
Where is "here" for you? As the other commenter said, at least in the bay area, drivers rent the cars for a day or a week then keep everything on top of what they pay to rent, Using Stripe wouldnt "screw" the taxi company I dont think.
You're stating that they're not guilty until caught in the act.
What percentage of the population do you think scrutinizes every credit card statement line-by-line? Many people would not notice an unauthorized charge on their card. It's merely a matter of scale: some people will notice a single unauthorized charge for $5, while others won't even notice $500. Credit card fraud is rampant, and any company that willingly allows its employees to get away with it should be shut down. My experience shows that my city's taxi companies consider credit card fraud as something that doesn't even register on their radar. Drivers that operate in this manner should be criminally charged. It's not just fraud to the taxi company - it is a criminal act of theft for the customers.
Innocent until proven guilty is a cornerstone of the US judiciary system. So yes, they aren't guilty until caught (proven) because their innocence is assumed otherwise.
Not for employment law in most cases (uk/US derived law) you can be fired collectively i.e. if 1 person in a group is skimming but you cant find which one you can fire every one
They still can do that. The only difference is that they would then sell the numbers to be used online, instead of running as fraudulent card-present transactions.
At least in Canada, portable card readers are the norm. Specifically to counter fraud, you no longer expect to hand your plastic over to an employee who brings it behind the bar. They come to you with a wireless machine, and you insert your own card. It blows my mind how the U.S. is 10-15 years behind the rest of us; the technology behind "debit cards" in the U.S. compared to that of Canada and Europe is almost laughable. The refusal to perform a one-time upgrade to new tech, while continuing to absorb the costs of rampant fraud is completely senseless.
>Not just for the tip, but for the entire fare. They openly commit fraud against their company by trying to steal the fare for themselves without reporting it to their company.
You think the company doesn't have access to the meter records for fares if keeping a percentage is part of the deal? If the driver keeps 100% of the cash, why pay 7% for a credit card?
I know in Chicago most of the drivers who rent their cab by the hour/day/week prefer to use square because the fees are lower and they get paid in a week or less, not the couple months the cab company takes to pay them, if they ever do.
Are you a taxi driver? You are being so apologetic towards a group of criminals, I have to assume you are one of them. Since when it is acceptable to ignore your employer's rules, to earn an extra 7%? Normal companies in any other industry would be be firing you on the spot, and probably seeing you in court, for this kind of bullshit. Truly moronic.
So it's okay to refuse to pay for a service that's already been rendered to you because they don't follow the law to the T and charge your card in a different way. Get off your moral high horse, pay for the cab fare, report the driver after, and report it to your credit card company. Unless you're a cop, you really aren't in a position to enforce a law and you're also breaking the law if you walk out of a cab without paying.
So it's okay to refuse to pay for a service that's already been rendered to you because they don't follow the law to the T and charge your card in a different way.
That seems entirely reasonable. If I were paying the bill in a restaurant and a member of staff insisted I paid using some personal transfer service, I'd probably refuse too unless I was able to confirm that it was legitimate.
you're also breaking the law if you walk out of a cab without paying.
Difficult to argue that's the case if no opportunity was offered to pay legitimately.
>> you're also breaking the law if you walk out of a cab without paying
How funny, that as I leave such a taxi, not one of these drivers have risen their voice about my refusal to pay. One of them tried to retract by pulling out the official keypad, and by then I was already exiting the car as he shrugged his indignation. They are the ones in the legal wrong, and they know it.
I've refused to pay for, and reported to their company, 4 separate drivers in the past 2 years for this practice. I have to assume that the companies somehow don't care that their drivers are going rogue, or else this wouldn't be happening so frequently. Where is the threat of dismissal, or even better, prosecution? Same thing goes for unlicensed taxi drivers moonlighting with a friend's car - taxi drivers here are required to hang their licensed ID on the side window, and the frequency with which you find someone driving "off the books" is downright reprehensible.
The worst part is, I feel my personal safety is at risk every time I report these criminals. They are likely to know it was me, and they know where I live. It's irresponsible, potentially dangerous, and unacceptable to permit them to operate in this way.
Our taxi companies are hook, line, and sinker in the pockets of our government. We have a history of corruption here, and taxi companies are definitely part of the equation.