According to the Korea Tourism Organization, many of the complaints they get regard shopping and taxi fares:
A recent survey conducted by the Korea Tourism Organization shows that the number of calls made by disgruntled tourists in 2009 saw a 13.4 percent increase from the previous year.
Of the complaints, difficulties while shopping and disputing costs of taxi fares topped the list with 32.5 percent and 17.5 percent of the total 468 complaints filed.
“Our experience was pleasant up until we walked out of the key attractions around the city,” Watanabe said. “It was when we hopped into a taxi and began getting around town that our trip became unpleasant. We really feel as though we spent twice the amount of our travel budget, and I hate it. In their defense, the drivers just say they don’t understand what we’re saying, but I find it personally inconvenient. It’s made me disdainful of the drivers here.”
One Seoul taxi driver took exception:
When asked about taxi scams, Baek Ki-chun, 62, a taxi driver, was quick to defend his profession.
“That was only during the old days when you saw drivers hanging around the airport looking for people to rip off,” he said. “Nowadays, we don’t do stuff like that to tourists, because we care very much about giving the best impression possible of our country to foreign guests when they visit.”
Baek, a 15-year veteran, conceded later that there might be some who take advantage of tourists. “Look, in countries like Japan, you don’t see drivers committing such shameful acts because their drivers get all the proper employee benefits and a respectable salary, regardless of how many passengers they get per day,” he said.
Miscommunication with drivers is another issue, although fortunately, some Japanese tourists have taken to printing out maps to help smooth things along.
Of course, language is always an issue… and one about which there is apparently some disagreement:
Some Koreans have been saying for years that foreign tourists should be expected to possess a minimum level of Korean. Others ask for better English education in the travel industry here, citing Europe, Southeast Asia, Africa and the Middle East as places where locals communicate with tourists primarily in English, rather than in their own local languages.
“It’s difficult to say whether we are trying too hard to cater and to accommodate foreign tourists and not encouraging them more to try and speak Korean,” said Kang Oki, the Korea Tourism Organization’s executive director of public relations.
“I know that when I travel abroad and I see a leaflet or information booklet with a section translated into Korean, I feel good and feel even welcomed. I believe there’s no harm in that,” she added.
I think phrasebooks are always a good thing to bring along when you travel — trying to communicate is part of the fun, after all, and it’s just common politeness to at least try to communicate with locals in their language — but it seems to me the KTO is in the business of making things easier for tourists (not the business of promoting the Korean language, which is the business of its parent organization, the Ministry of Culture), and that it’s in the best interests of tourism-related industries to have staff that can communicate with their customers.
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I have lived in Korea for over 9 years out of the last 14. And yet I still know that when I go to the airport to pick up an international visitor, I am going to have a frustrating time. When we make our way to the exit we are invariably swarmed on by the 비끼 (spruikers) for those overpriced taxi buses.
If I make it past them I run into the “I’ll name a price” taxi drivers who refuse to go where I am going or charge me an outlandish fee for it.
Once I got a guy to go by the meter, but he didn’t know the new Incheon Bridge, and didn’t have a navigator system (of course!) so the journey was much longer and more expensive than it need have been.
No, i am with the Japs on this one. Airport taxis are the pits, and if I had the ear of Lee Charm (if he would deign to meet me, that is) I would tell him that these things need to be fixed now! Especially before G-20.
Of the things I love about Korea, taxis are not among them. Here’s a list of things I expect from a taxi and/or taxi driver:
1. Operational seatbelts
2. Sobriety
3. Knowledge of locations in the town/city in which you work
4. Ability to perform a U-turn without bitching like an 8-year-old
5. Willingness to allow the customer to dictate the destination
6. A reasonable level of honesty
I think those expectations are fair. Nevertheless, I’ve had surprising few experiences with taxis in which one or more of those expectations were not met. Mind you, I haven’t even gotten to how they drive.
The above is phrased poorly. Apologies. I’m trying to say that those “rules” of mine are frequently broken: usually at least one, often more.
Some Korean taxi drivers are not the most pleasant to deal with. It’s almost as if they have that distilled essence of bad Koreaness of being nosey, trying to figure your life out to put you down, convert you (to Christianity), and do you for your money. I cannot think how Lee Cham would be able to tackle some of these, I would guess these people would be as difficult as some of those street stall traders.
However, I also remember my first experience in a Tokyo taxi as not a great one. The 일본 taxi 아저씨 there was gruff and angry as he took me from the Tokyo station to the building where my friend worked, even though I had a map printed out. I guess it was the fact I was just a very young Oriental girl who spoke English that put him off, but still.
I love the taxi drivers, but for these reasons:
1) Disregard of speed limit. “Faster, faster!” is the way to get there with time to spare.
2) Bullying the other drivers. Get out of our way!
3) Karaoke machine. Sing me your bongchak song whilst you’re doing 160.
Bonus for electric razor.
In my city the taxis are fine, but at the airport they’re scum.
If they want to clean up the airport taxi’s they could require taxi’s picking up there have an “airport license.” If they get a few complaints they loose their license.
One thing that bothers me is that my city, Gimhae, is a separate jurisdiction from the Busan airport. Although it is close, when the taxis’ cross the boarder the price doubles because they can’t pick up a fare in Gimhae (only in Busan).
Most taxi drivers are OK, though Some of them are complete and utter bastards! I’ve only had three really bad experiences where they’ve completely screwed up. It’s a shame that most of them don’t know the way around town, things are better now they have navigation consoles. I had one today who didn’t have a clue where he was going, I knew roughly how to get to the place, but he just ignored my directions. I think a lot of them are pretty thick, and of course most of them have appalling skills. I also don’t like the fact that they sometimes refuse to pick you up if you’re not going far enough, wankers.
My first week in Korea I had a taxi driver who managed (whether deliberately or through sheer incompetence) managed to sting me 12,000 won rather than the 2000 it should have cost.
Once some friends and I got out without paying as the guy was being such a twat just basically driving in circles around town when there is a very very direct route to where we wanted to go. He turned a man won ride into a 40.000 won ride with his venality! He could go fuck himself if he though we were going to pay that. When we stopped at some lights the four of us proceeded to get out and walk away as he starts screaming shipbal sekkis at us.
Another time a guy refused to give me my change, he said the meter was broken and told me 4 thousand won, we get to the destination and I give him ten and he refuses to give me the change and tells me he said it was 10! What a cunt.
I use taxi a fair bit and most of the guys are OK, some of them are complete and utter wankers though. The best drivers I’ve had have been female taxi drivers, they drive far better and less aggressively than the men. Koreans are generally crap drivers, but the female taxi drivers I’ve used have been very good. It’s a shame there are so few of them.
I always had great experiences with Seoul cab drivers, well sure they do not drive Swiss style and as Keith pointed out many seem completely oblivious of the city geography despite their fancy navigators, but on the other side the service is amazingly cheap, the ajoshi drivers generally are cool: one of them once almost bumped into a school bus while he was trying to scratch his foot while driving.
I always take these things in good humour, at least cabbies in Seoul don’t consider showering regularly stuff for infidels like they do in NYC
Any tourism official who is thinking that requiring tourists to speak Korean is the way to go is definitely in the wrong line of work.
Although mileage varies by individual driver, the taxi experience is seldom great in most countries — Japan and perhaps a few European countries excluded. Mainland Chinese cab drivers have traffic-stopping halitosis and grubby cars. I’ve seen Taiwan cab drivers drink booze on the job….
My take on Korean taxi drivers, in addition to the safety, area knowledge and skill issues mentioned by others, is that like so many other parts of the Korean service sector, people working in services resent their lot in life and take it out on customers in the form of shitty, resentful or indifferent service. That’s a huge cultural difference between Korea and Japan.
I always had awesome experiences with Korean taxi drivers. They’re a little wary until they get that you speak Korean but then after that they’re cool as hell. As seouldout said they’ll drive like maniacs if you ask them to step on it, and the fares are cheap as hell, probably 25% the rate in Japan, maybe even less.
The only thing worse then riding in a Korean taxi is being on the road in your own vehicle or bicycle near a Korean taxi. They’re the worst friggin drivers in the world – not a single traffic light or sign is obeyed if they can help it.
And Koreans themselves will go out of their way to keep from asking a taxi to make a u-turn. They’ll let a dozen taxis pass by to cross the street to catch one going the way they intend. Granfalloon is sooo right about their bitching if they have to make damn u-turn. What’s big deal with that? The meter’s on.
And if you can’t pronounce your destination exactly as a Korean would (forget about any of them in Ulsan understanding English) you’d better have a map.
*shaking fist*
Why you… I’ll have you know the best drivers are taxi drivers. They have the shirt to prove it. You don’t think they give a Best Driver shirt to just anyone, do you?
The scourge of the roads ain’t taxi drivers.
It’s Bongo drivers.
And remicon trucks. Dump trucks and buses, too.
Who do you see in rush hour intersections keeping control of things? The kindly taxi driver. That’s who.
Ah martypants, you beat me to the punch… +1 for their sheer ability o mis-comprehend any request… Ask for Costco, the driver curtly says “ok! yeah!” …get halfway there and suddenly end up on the freeway… Ummm… hey?
Co-sta-co!?! No Pos-co? Aiieeesh… Shipseki…
Once in Seoul, I had to catch an express bus down to Gyeongsang-do in the morning. I had a long night before that, and overslept. I woke up 15 minutes before the bus was supposed to leave. I just ran out, grabbed the first cab, and told the cabbie: “아저씨! I have a bus to catch in 15 minutes. If I can make it, I’ll pay you double.”
That cab defied the laws of physics. I swear I saw the cab bend and swerve like a fish. It took 12 minutes from Shinchon to Banpo, giving me enough time to leisurely walk to the bus.
Korean cabbies should be NASCAR drivers.
…yet another thread bashing Korean cabbies.
They are not perfect, but overall I’d say 7/10. (After midnight 6/10)
Korean taxi drivers speak the local language, fares are very reasonable, they are usually very clean, they make good time and even allow you drink alcohol in them if you ask.
I would resist getting a taxi in Tokyo, London, Sydney etc for the outrageous prices…and in Sydney (probably also many US and UK cities) very few can speak English.
I don’t ride taxis very often, but as a rule of thumb, if I have a choice – I always try to catch a privately owned taxi (with the 개인 sign on top), as opposed to a company owned taxi.
The guys in the company owned taxis are the ones who seem pissed off for having such a sorry lot in life. But the guys who own their own cabs are usually retired gentlemen and are just doing it for the extra coin and to stay out of the wife’s hair during the day. And the privately owned taxis tend to be a lot cleaner and nicer (usually they are new, large, upscale model cars) – you can see the pride in ownership. On the other hand, unless they are brand new, the company owned cars are beat to shit from being driven by guys who don’t care about them. They tend not to be as clean and are smaller.
But regardless of which one you ride – the price is the same. So always look for the privately owned cabs.
I’ve heard half of the “horror stories” above from more than a few people. For this reason, I’m inclined to think they happened once but were adopted by a number of people as their own for bitching purposes. Bitching is fun!
Taxi’s in Seoul are great, and the vast majority of the drivers I’ve had have been pleasant, friendly, and efficient in their choice of routes.
All in all, I’ve had mostly good experiences with taxi drivers. I must admit that it is in taxis that I speak my best Korean, as once they hear me say a few words, they start a conversation that requires me to go beyond my comfort zone of memorized phrases. Usually, I enjoy my rides.
Usually.
I have certainly had bad rides, and these are the ones that stick in mind years afterwords. Once, I crossed the Han River three times in a ride from Mokdong to the Hongik area. A normal W7000 fare was close to 20,000. I gave him 10,000 and when he started to complain, I said ‘Mokdong to Hongik–20,000? Really?” and he said nothing else.
Coming down from Bukhansan once four of us got into a cab at a temple. We were just going to the subway station (in a bit of a hurry). He quoted 2000 won, which was about right. But he didn’t turn on the meter. When we got to the bottom of the hill about a minute and a half later, he said W8000 (2,000 each person). One of us was Korean, so it wasn’t an issue of communication/translation problem. Being in such a hurry, we just paid it; I was outvoted.
After a few years, I started telling the drivers quite specifically where to go (literally, not figuratively) and now even include which bridge to cross. I have stopped getting worried if they go a direction I’m not familiar with. After 7 years of driving myself in Seoul, I still learn new paths and shortcuts from taxi drivers.
Ironically, the most dishonest drivers I’ve had have all been in cabs with the “Best Driver” signs.
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