Kelowna cab drivers speak out against airport fee

Several Kelowna cab drivers are speaking out against a user fee that was tacked onto each trip they make to YLW International Airport.

Since July of last year, Kelowna cab drivers have been charging an additional $2 fee each time they pick up or drop off a customer at the airport. While the fee has been beneficial to the operating costs of the drivers, many of them tell Global News that the extra charge isn’t sitting well with many taxi users in the city.

“They always say, ‘this is ridiculous,’ and that they’ve never seen this kind of charge anywhere,” explained Sam Bansal, a Kelowna cab driver.

“It really makes the customers angry every time we have to explain it.”

“They think that we’re actually scamming them, looking to make an extra $2, and it saddens me,” said cabbie Fred Guigue. “I don’t enjoy the fact that me as a cab driver has to be a tax collector for the city.”

They say some customers are so fed up with the added fee that they’re taking it out on the drivers themselves by not tipping.

“A lot of customers think it’s some sort of tax grab from the airport,” said cab driver Lorraine Worsnop. “The customers aren’t tipping as well because they have to pay the fee.”

1:57 Kelowna International Airport gets financial boost

Geoff Ritchie, senior airport development manager at YLW, says that added fee is a good thing for the cab drivers.

“If you are operating ground transportation, you have to come get a license,” he explained. “A license would cost you $638. Now what we’re saying is the license costs $50 and then you add a $2 trip fee onto that to recover the remainder of the cost.”

Ritchie added that the same rules would apply for any other transportation companies that receive approval to operate in Kelowna in the future.

“It’s a level playing field for all the ground transportation,” expressed Ritchie.

“Let’s say somebody that, like Uber, is a part-time driver and maybe it’s not so affordable to pay the higher front-end fee. Well now they have a cheaper option to do that, a more affordable option to do that, and still be able to recover.”

While the cab drivers in Kelowna are saving $588 dollars on their up-front cab licensing fees to pick up passengers from the airport, they’re still more concerned about the customer.

And the per-passenger fee adds up. The revenue generated by the fee is collected by YLW once a month from each individual driver.

“I know I’m paying upwards of $50 a week in airport fees,” said Guigue. “So that’s $200 just from one driver a month, and over $2,000 a year. That’s a lot of money.”