Saturday, April 24, 2010

Cabbie Drives 2,500 Miles from Northampton to Barcelona and Back to Save Stranded Holiday-Makers, Clocks up £4,600 / $S7,000 Fare!


Hyundai UK must be very proud of itself, because it dropped a press release about a Northampton cabbie, his son, and the Hyundai i800 van (or MPV) they drive to Barcelona in order to pick up some vacationers and their baggage. I guess this recent volcanic ash situation has been good for someone...

Garry Smith, the owner, explains, "We got the call at 9.30am on Tuesday and were on the road within an hour to collect four people. I took my son Ben so we could share the driving and booked the Eurotunnel crossing on route. When the passengers heard what car we were in they asked if we could take six people which because of the car, we were happy to do."

The 2,500 (UK) mile trip took two days and would have cost the stranded family £4,600.05 or US$7,050 (DAMN), except that both parties agreed on a fixed fee of £1,850 or US$2,830 (whew). That breaks down to around £300 per passenger. Why so much less?

Garry said it was because ""it wouldn't really be fair to charge them the meter rate". So decent people still do exist.


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