Commuters are advised to watch out for cabbies who rig their meters with small motors to drive up fares, the local taxi watchdog warned yesterday.

The Shanghai General Team of Traffic Enforcement said its investigators caught two cabbies at the Pudong International Airport using the illegal fare boosters this month.

The cabbies confessed they had bought the motors from an underground market.

Meters on legal taxies are sealed by the enforcement authority to discourage tampering, and the two drivers admitted they had broken the seals, allowing them to secretly activate the motor by remote control after a passenger entered the cab.

Investigators found that the motor speeded up the mileage measurement, lifting a fare for 1 kilometer to between 1.5 and 1.8 kilometers.

The surge could mean nearly a 100 yuan (US$14.63) extra charge for a trip from the Pudong airport to the downtown area on the west side of the Huangpu River.

Officials believe there could be more cabbies using the same device and said foreigners and others who are new to the city and lack knowledge about local fare levels are obviously their major targets.

Reports about unreasonable fares from passengers and increased onboard checks will be used to curb these offenses, the enforcement team said.

The taxi watchdog has teamed up with police to carry out a three-month campaign to stamp out abuses in taxi service.

As the watchdog has increased undercover investigations, some drivers are working out new ways to avoid getting caught.

To keep from being recorded by undercover investigators, some taxi drivers use gestures to turn down business.

"A recording pen is a common tool to aid undercover investigations of taxi services as it can record the content of the dialogues to provide evidence against offending cabbies," said Wu Runyuan, a taxi watchdog official.

Turning down a fare is an offense that can cost a cabbie several hundred yuan, and repeat offenses can result in the loss of his business license, according to authorities.

Wu said the watchdog will adopt skills and tools used in police investigations to help tackle the new challenges posed by the increasingly clever cabbies, but he would not give away any details.

Vehicles equipped with radar, radio systems, Internet access and videotaping devices have been sent on patrols in recent months at the city's major transport areas to help gather evidence in the latest crackdown, Wu said.

(Shanghai Daily November 5, 2008)