Taxi Fares Rise 50% By May 2010

[mike30542]

I used a shuttle service from airport to Elounda this year (booked online with HolidayTaxis.com). Cost £38.60 paid in advance. Ended up in a taxi with just myself & my wife.
Simple & efficient online booking. Worth looking into for those who don't fancy the coach transfer but feel a taxi booking is now too expensive.

[Gareth O]

I was under the impression that Elounda was approx 80k from the airport. If this is so then even the new cost, pre-midnight would be 57.60 - kind of what we've previously paid. 1.05 would be 84.00 for a late night journey. I think that a lot of folks will be arranging for hire cars at the airport and driving themselves especially if they arrive/leave on flights in the small hours.

[DazandJust]

Another advantage of driving yourself is that you can get everybody and their luggage in. There's only four of us but no-way could we get everything in a Merc unless it was an estate.

Maybe we just take too much?


DA

[tattooed andy]

and, if this 50% goes ahead it'll sting you €18 each way in a cab to Ag Nik.....looking forward to trying out the local bus service me thinks

[Jerry99]

Didn’t expect this to generate so much comment. Just a few thoughts here relating to previous posts. First, Novadavid it does seem that taxi drivers have been using the practice of charging for both legs of a journey (Herakion/Elounda) in the past if they could get away with it. Probably a legal grey area. Second, in relation to Tattoed Andy’s story about the redundant minibus, that would be about right. It reminded me of a story I heard from a smaller Greek Island with a very limited taxi service, I won’t say its name because you never know who reads this stuff. Basically this small, highly successful upmarket Greek island has a relatively small taxi fleet in relation to the number of tourists who flock there each summer. Having a taxi is a licence to print money on this island, as you can imagine – small distances, huge turnaround, big tips. Apparently some local politician came up with the idea of doubling the taxi fleet so that tourists didn’t have to wait two hours for a cab at peak times. He soon changed his mind when his wife’s car spontaneously burst into flames the next night. At the end of the day, this massive hike in the price per kilometre is bad news for any tourist who’s not on a banker’s bonus or is facing a wage freeze in the UK. I can imagine that, as the 2010 season draws near, the taxi service with the most flexible prices will be featured in this forum – to the benefit of all its readers.