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Showing posts from February 22, 2004
When you visit Vegas, wear the pants with the deep pockets The Review-Journal's intrepid Mike Kalil uncovers another Vegas scam: the long-haul cabbie. Last year, the local Taxicab Authority cited drivers taking riders on circuitous routes that boosted their fares on 174 occasions. While that's a miniscule proportion of the 23 million taxi rides offered last year, the number of long-hauls is much, much higher, because the citations reflect only the cases in which officers observed the practice, or riders were savvy enough to figure out they were being ripped off, and filed successful complaints. (Although as the story notes, cabbies who think their passengers are onto the plot are known to kick their customers out onto the streets.) Officials concede that cabbies are illegally taking in millions in extra fares from long-hauling. The most typical scheme is called "tunneling," when cabbies leaving McCarran International Airport take their Strip-bound patrons to their h