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  • 3 years ago


The Division of Tourism is now investigating the circumstances under which one tourist, Christine Kesteloo from the Zaandam vessel which docked at the Scarborough Port on Tuesday, is calling out one taxi driver in Tobago, for attempting to extort extra money from her and her companion for an initial one hour tour around Tobago. The upset tourist took to her tiktok account to complain.
More in this Elizabeth Williams report.
Transcript
00:00 Tourist Christine Kestelo said there was an agreement for a set tour price before
00:06 she and her companion Pete entered the taxi in Scarborough Tobago.
00:11 Now I want to make sure that it's one hour that price for both of us not that
00:17 price for one of us but for both of us he's like oh yeah yeah good price good
00:21 price so he gets a guy to take us and he says hey this is the price for them for
00:26 the ride. Miss Kestelo said in a video which has now gone viral on social media
00:32 that the taxi fare changed suddenly not too long into their journey to Fort King
00:39 George. It wasn't even two blocks away he starts in on he turns down the music and
00:45 he starts in on yeah but I have to pay you know I have to pay taxes on that
00:49 amount of money so it's gonna be it's gonna be double and I go no it's not
00:55 gonna be double and Pete even spoke up he goes nope we agreed on a price that's
00:58 the price he's like oh you know I have to pay taxes da da da da da da and Pete even
01:04 said it doesn't matter we agreed on that price that's the price it is. She said
01:08 she decided to stay in the taxi when she overheard that the driver was going to
01:13 leave them at the fort. Our whole ride up to the top of this little cliff where
01:19 there's a fort was him talking about money so we get up to the fort and I had
01:26 heard him talking in the cab about how he's gonna drop us off at the fort and
01:29 he's gonna go back down and get more people so I lean over to Pete and I'm
01:33 like you go ahead and go outside and get photos I'm staying in here I'm not
01:37 leaving this taxi cab so Pete gets out and the guy's like oh he's like you're
01:41 not gonna get out and I said no I'm not gonna get out and he goes I need to go
01:45 get more people and I said no you're supposed to drive us around for this
01:49 amount of time for this price. Things went downhill from there as she claimed
01:55 the taxi driver went on and on about taxes to be paid. And I said I'm not
02:00 gonna play this game I'm not gonna play this game I said after he gets back in
02:05 the car I want to be taken down back to the ship right now he goes no no no but
02:10 when they get when I get back they're gonna wonder why I don't have more money
02:14 on me I go I don't care I said this is the amount we agreed on I said you're
02:19 not taking us anywhere else you're taking us back down Pete gets in the
02:23 vehicle he's like darling is everything okay and I'm like yeah I have it handled
02:25 you know but then he starts in when Pete's there too he's like I'll take you
02:30 another place but you need to pay me double we're like we're not going to
02:34 another place you take us down now well then he's slowly driving and it just
02:39 doesn't feel right and we get stuck in like a little bit of a traffic jam the
02:45 tourists later decided to pay the driver get out of the taxi and walk TV6 news
02:51 contacted president of the Tobago maxi taxi Association
02:54 Cloyd Williams on the matter if you have to go down to Plymouth it's going to be
03:13 more or double because it all has expired almost expire and there is a
03:19 convention came in and he mentioned really we have to pay tax on that kind
03:26 of thing mr. Williams told the TV6 news that the price for the tour changed when
03:31 there was a request to visit additional sites however he said the visitors
03:36 should not have been told about any port tax by the driver what I know he is
03:43 responsible for paying a port tax to the Association and she said that he
03:47 mentioned that it is true which is true also to every passenger that came off
03:52 the cruise ship we have to pay a head from an association level to the port
04:01 but I think you should not mention the port the tax that he has to pay that has
04:07 nothing to do with the lady if you arrange at a one-hour tour the
04:12 conversations stay there if you take the folks from the port and go up the
04:19 fort you cannot leave them to come back to take look for other passenger they go
04:24 back to the fort it doesn't cut the matter is now being investigated by the
04:29 Division of Tourism with confirmation from the tourism secretary Tasha Boris
04:34 who said all sides of the matter must be looked at
04:37 Elizabeth Williams TV6 News
04:41 [BLANK_AUDIO]
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