.. BAD THAI TAXI - Govt's Public App for Mobile Phones

May 27, 2015

The Thai Department of Land Transportation (DLT) launched a mobile phone app for consumers to report bad (and good) behaviors by the notorious Thai taxi drivers.

iTunes .. https://itunes.apple.com/th/app/dlt-check-in/id964296016?mt=8
GooglePlay .. https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.dltcheckin&hl=en

The Thai generals are applying greater pressure to clean-up Thailand's disreputable public transportation sector. With the Thais' views of the rule of law, seems the Royal Thai Police are incapable of doing it by simple street policing.

I live in BKK, and have grown sick and tired of the noticeable increase in their unconstrained abuses over the last year, or so. Once they all realized they could trash on passengers without repercussions (no rule of law), most all of them started doing it. Outside of the tourist zones (where there is a long Thai tradition of 'open season' on tourists), this has really only erupted in the last year.

Accountability for personal behavior is not a Thai cultural value, but it is now being pressed .. jeez, I cannot imagine what it must be like for a tourist here.

http://www.bangkokpost.com/news/transport/572299/commuter-rejecting-taxis-rampant-on-4-bangkok-streets

Commuter-rejecting taxis rampant on 4 Bangkok streets

25 May 2015 at 19:578,097 viewed21 comments

WRITER: AMORNRAT MAHITTHIROOK

A mobile phone application from the Department of Land Transport has revealed that Bangkok's Sukhumvit, Silom, Sathon and Phaya Thai are the streets where taxi drivers routinely reject commuters in need.

Chirute Visalachitra, deputy director-general of the department, said on Monday that taxi passengers who used its DLT Check-in application reported that rejection problems happened frequently on the four main streets from 5pm to 10pm. Therefore, more department officers will be deployed there to watch for drivers turning down customers.

Complaints about taxi drivers refusing to pick up passengers constituted the largest number of gripes filed via the app, he said.

Nearly 30,000 people have downloaded the DLT Check-in application and 1,832 complaints and 818 compliments have been filed through it. Users have rated taxi services 11,185 times since the software was released in February.

"The department has fined the taxi drivers and the owners of taxis facing complaints," Mr Chirute said. "Eleven taxi drivers have had their licences suspended for repeated offences."

Submissions through the application also told the department that most passengers were more satisfied with the green-yellow taxis operated by individual drivers than those of other colours, which are operated by cooperatives and transport companies. Also, taxis used for more than six years displeased commuters due to their poor conditions and dirtiness, he said.

The department plans to add features to the application to cover passenger vans in the future, Mr Chirute added.