All,

Please be advised.

Farid @ Taxi -7 is unreliable. He caused us to almost miss our flight from Bonaire.

The details are as follows:

During the week of August 15th we arranged for a pick up at Buddy Dive Resort at 6:00 AM on August 20th to make our flight at 7:30. He noted this in his log.

Several attempts to contact him on the evening of August 19th to confirm were unsuccessful. The phone message stated that the phone was turned off.

On the morning of August 20th Farid did not come. We waiting until 6:20 AM. He still did not arrive. Fortunately the Security officer at Buddy Dive Resort was kind enough to take us to the airport with people sitting on top of luggage in the bed of the truck.

I contacted him last night (August 29th) VIA cell phone to discuss this matter. He stated that he had arrived approximately 12 minutes after 6:00 and spoke to the Security officer. I told him that this could not have been true because we were waiting there at that time. He then disconnect me twice then turned off the phone.

I would recommend that you do not use this person due to his untruthfulness and lack of reliability.

I will also post this information up on the Bonaire Talk Website for future travelers to Bonaire.

(Personal information of the owners of Taxi-7 removed by moderators.)

This thread has been moved to "Getting Around Bonaire" where it appropriately belongs.

Moderator

Farid has a good reputation and it is unfortuante that the whole story can not be told, but rest assured it was a situation of errors and misunderstandings as well as a malfunctioning cell phone.

I would love to hear the "whole story". I occasionally like to listen to some good song and dance.

The bottom line is - if you say you are going to be at a certain place at a certain time you be there unless you are sick or dead. If you can't be there then you radio or call for someone else to fill in. If your word is no good you have nothing.

He said he would be at Buddy dive at 6:00 AM August 20th. We waited until 6:20. He did not show up. End of story.

Another end to the story could have been:

"After several attempts to contact him to reconfirm were unsuccessful and after hearing a phone message stating that the phone was turned off, I contacted another taxi to provide transportation. The replacement taxi arrived as scheduled and delivered us to the airport in a timely manner and we all lived happily ever after."

I guess I was hopeful that he would in fact show up since he stated that he would and also logged it in. I figured he just had his phone turned off the night before because he was busy and we wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt. Did not want to waste someone else's time by having two taxi's show up.

Not a bad suggestion though since less than about 50% of people actually keep their word these days.

Well, I'm happy Farid is not dead, and I hope he's not sick. How about jail, is that a good excuse? What if your baby is sick? How sick do you need to be? Would it be better to show up sick and keep your word? How about drunk? Would showing up drunk be OK?

It's nice to deal in absolutes, but life is much nicer when you are determined to be happy instead of right.
Be better, not bitter.

Happiness does not get the job done.

What a quote, William... I love it. It IS better to be happy than right.

Paul, for you that is very sad. The only thing that keeps people unhappy is themselves. Well, working with folks that take your worldview can be pretty dispiriting as well, I must admit.

Thanks Kelly.

Kelly/Bill,

I appreciate your viewpoint although I don't entirely understand it.

I personally am happy in my work and life partly because I know people can count on me.

Are you saying that you feel it is better to be happy yourself than keep your word to others ?

ya know 6:00 for 7:30 flight? In the US you must show up 2 hrs ahead, if you use that then 5:30 for 7:30 is still not 2 hrs ahead but gives you time.
So you wait a little longer for the flight but you are there and ready ;)