Death Stalks Ras Al Khaimah

Mr. Ghulam, our regular taxi driver, knew the driver who was murdered last week in Ras Al Khaimah. He's a little sad and puzzled by it: the victim was a gentle, gentle man with a family, according to Mr. G.

Apparently taxis taking long fares like to lodge the passenger’s ID with the police just in case they refuse to pay for some reason (with a Dhs200 fare, if the passenger doesn’t give it up, the driver pays – and that’s a helluva lot of money for a cabbie here) and a Sharjah taxi, a pal of Mr. G’s, had declined the fare after the two passengers refused to lodge their IDs and were angry and threatening. He watched another taxi pick them up and never saw the driver again – his body was found the next morning, as the newspaper reports.

The man that refused the fare is currently feeling a sort of guilty relief.

Mr. G. is a little worried that people have taken to stabbing taxi drivers: this is a new and unwanted abuse being heaped on the heads of a bunch of people who already have it pretty hard. His least favourite night-time fare isn’t Ras Al Khaimah, though: it’s Fujeirah. “I won’t take the fare. Past Masafi it’s dark and lonely and if they are two and you are one, what can you do?”

Sharjah taxis are also currently doing all they can to avoid Dubai fares: it’s increasingly hard for them to make their money when they write off two or more hours on the return journey in an empty cab. They aren’t allowed, of course, to pick up in Dubai. This means that lots of people are shouting at them now.

Mr. G. remains phlegmatic…

How to embarrass your telco

The Road and Transport Authority of Dubai, which is responsible for much of the development of the city's multi-modal transport system, has today announced a new SMS-based taxi ordering system.

Hurrah!

The new service will consist of numbered location boards around the city, under which the taxi-needy can stand, texting 4777 and the location board number. The taxi will then be dispatched to the given location.

This strange and Heath-Robinsonesque workaround would, of course, be rendered totally unnecessary by the availability of any location-based service from the telcos that are meant to be providing mobile services in the UAE. Location based services allow information to be provided contextually using the GSM cell location as a cue and are implemented in other world markets, where they enable systems such as automatic location checking for taxis or other delivery based services, location-specific information services and all sorts of wonderful things.

It's a step forward from calling up and telling them where you are. But only just. The RTA's got the right idea here and obviously isn't going to wait 25 years for the telcos to bridge the growing advanced services gap.

RTA 1 Telcos 0.