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How
To Get A Taxi In Las Vegas |
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| The
owner of VegasTaxiDriver.com used to be a cab driver for Western
Cab Company in Las Vegas, and Western Cab Company is the cab company I recommend.
These are my own recommendations and opinions and not necessarily
those of Western Cab Company. I have worked for almost all of the
cab companies in Las Vegas. All cabbies in Las Vegas are
employees, and not owners or contractors. All taxis have meters
that are set and controlled by the State of Nevada. The drivers
that I worked with at Western Cab Company are decent hard-working
cabbies. All taxi drivers in Las Vegas have a permit issued by the
Nevada Taxi Cab Authority, the State agency that regulates the
taxi industry in southern Nevada. Fore more info about taxis in
Las Vegas click
here. |
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Western Cab Company - 702-736-8000
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For
a complete list of Las Vegas taxi companies click
here
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Radio
Calls: Las
Vegas cab companies take radio calls and dispatch taxi-cabs to pick up passengers who need to get
picked up throughout the Las Vegas area, including
Henderson, North Las Vegas, Summerlin, and Green Valley.
Look at the information below to see if it pertains to
you. Western Cab Company
in Las Vegas covers the entire Las Vegas metropolitan area in
Nevada, including Henderson, Nevada and North Las Vegas, Nevada.
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| BEFORE
YOU CALL: |
| Know
The Exact Address: As long as you have an
exact accurate street address, including the unit
number and gate code, the cabbie can find you.
Don't assume that there is only one place with the
same business name. |
| Have
a Phone Number: If you do not have a cell
phone with you, then get the number for the
business or home you are at, and where you can be
reached. If you do not answer that phone, and it
is a busy time, the cab driver may assume you are
not there any more and go get somebody else. |
| Maximum
Five Passengers: All of the Western Cab taxis
can carry four passengers with luggage. If you want
a taxi that can take five passengers, you need to
request that. Five passengers is the maximum amount of
passengers that taxi-cabs are allowed to take according to
Nevada State law. |
| Open
Containers: It is a illegal for you to take an
open container of alcohol in a taxi in Nevada. It
used to be legal, and it is a stupid law in my
opinion, but that is the law. |
| Wear
Your Seat Belt: It is stupid to not wear a
seat belt in a vehicle. What, are you crazy? |
| Children
and Seat Belts and Car Seats: What do you
think? Get your children buckled in. Have a car
seat for them if they are small. |
| Calling
Back To Confirm: I recommend calling
back after 10 minutes to check on the status of
your call, unless the dispatcher has already given
you the number of the taxi being dispatched to
you. It is NOT rude to
call the dispatcher back in 10 minutes and ask the dispatcher
if they have a
cab coming for you, and ask the dispatcher for the number
of the taxi that is coming for you, and ask the cabbie to
call you on your cell phone. Calling more than one cab
company is very rude, and I do not recommended it, but people do
it. Instead, I recommend calling the cab company
back. |
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| McCarran
Airport: Do not call for a cab at the airport. There
are plenty of empty cabs available at McCarran almost all
the time. (Way more than enough, or I would still be
driving.) To bypass the taxi line at McCarran Airport, get
a skycap and pay to have them get a taxi for you, and they
will be at the front of the line. Make sure their is a long
line first, because two or three chain-fulls of people in the taxi
line at McCarran Airport is NOT a long line. |
| Major
Hotels
and Casinos: Do not call for a cab at a major hotel
or casino, especially on the Las Vegas strip. Most of the major hotels and casinos in
the Las Vegas area have cab stands. If there is a cab
stand and a taxi line for passengers, then that is the only
place that the owners of the property allow taxis to pick
up passengers, UNLESS a passenger tells the person in charge
of loading cabs at the hotel property that they have a specific cab driver
picking them up with a specific cab number. But, if you
just call a cab company, and just want any cab to pick you up so
you can avoid the taxi line, the property will not allow
that. In most places, tipping a hotel employee gets you into a taxi without waiting in line. If you are
checking out of a hotel, and request a bell-person to take
your luggage from your room to the cab stand, the
bell-person will get you a taxi and you will not have to
wait in the cab line. |
| Small
Hotels, Motels, and Hostels: If there is a way for a
cab driver to access your room and if there is a place
that the property allows the cab driver to park near your
room, you can give the dispatcher the number of your room
and your cell phone number and the driver will call you.
Otherwise, tell the dispatcher you will be in the lobby
and give your cell phone number to the dispatcher. It is
courtesy to wait for the Western Cab driver that is coming
to get you, and not hop in another cab that it is dropping
off there. |
| Shopping
Malls: The big shopping malls in Las Vegas have taxi
stands, and there are usually plenty of empty cabs ready
to pick you up. If not, you can call 702-386-8000 and tell
the dispatcher that there are no cabs and request a
"call out" to get cabs. Dispatchers do not
dispatch a
specific taxi to common places that usually have empty cabs
waiting and lots of cabs dropping off passengers, because
in most cases the passengers will be gone before the cab
gets there. |
| Small
Casinos and Bars: Dispatchers usually will give a
"call out" on the radio to let drivers know that
a place needs a cab, if the place has lots of cabs
dropping people off there all the time, there are usually empty cabs staging there.
Dispatchers will usually dispatch a cab to a casino or bar
that usually does not have empty cabs staging there. |
| Restaurants
NOT on the strip: Most restaurants will call a cab for
you. If you want to call a cab from your cell phone at the
restaurant, and request that the
driver call you, then you will know that the cab is coming
and not have to track down a restaurant employee. It is NOT rude to
call the dispatcher back in 10 minutes and ask the dispatcher
if they have a
cab coming for you, and ask the dispatcher for the number
of the taxi that is coming for you, and ask the cabbie to
call you on your cell phone. The best way to get a cab at
a restaurant on the strip is to have the restaurant get
you a taxi. |
| Apartments,
Condos, Houses, and Businesses: If you are going to
work or the airport, you can probably ask the dispatcher
to set you up for a time call ahead of time. This gives
the dispatcher the opportunity to find a driver ahead of
the time that will be able to handle the call at that
time. However, I still recommend calling a hour ahead
just, even if you called before for a time call, because
drivers and dispatchers work at different times and
messages can get mixed up. If you do not want a time call
and want a cab now, then realize that it may be 10 minutes
or an hour. That is not because of how busy it is, but
whether there are cabs close to you that are available. It
might be very busy, but a cab driver may be dropping
somebody close to you. It may be dead, and that may be why
there are no cabs close to where you are because they are
all sitting in long lines on the strip waiting for the
economy to get better. How quickly you get a taxi at a
residence, or business, is more "luck of the
draw" than anything else. I have taken radio calls
for almost every cab company in Las Vegas, and I have been
a customer that has called almost every cab company in Las
Vegas. It is NOT rude to
call the dispatcher back in 10 minutes and ask the dispatcher
if they have a
cab coming for you, and ask the dispatcher for the number
of the taxi that is coming for you, and ask the cabbie to
call you on your cell phone. Calling more than one cab
company is very rude, and I do not recommended it, but people do
it. Instead, I recommend calling the cab company back. |
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|
Hailing a cab in
Las Vegas
does not usually work. The Nevada Taxicab Authority strongly
recommends that cabbies in Las Vegas should not pick up passengers
unless they are at an authorized taxi stand or they have called
the dispatcher and asked for a taxi to pick them up. On and around
the strip, cab drivers will be ticketed for picking up passengers
unless they are off the street in a safe place and are not on a
property that prohibits taxis from them from picking up passengers
except in authorized areas. Your best bet is into get into a cab
line or tip an employee on the property to get you a taxi.
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McCarran Airport
in Las Vegas is one of the busiest airports in the world, and used
to be the busiest taxi-cab pick-up stand in the world until a year
ago. There can be long lines of people waiting to get into cabs at
McCarran Airport. That does not mean that there are not enough
cabs, in fact there are usually between 100 to 150 empty cabs
waiting in line to pick up at McCarran Airport, but the Airport
is only capable of loading 30 cabs at a time, which is very
under-sized during busy times. (The regulators keep adding cabs
,and the authorities and officials have discussed spending
hundreds of millions on a monorail, but nobody thinks about
increasing the number of taxis that can be loaded at a time.) To bypass the taxi line at McCarran Airport, get
a skycap and pay to have them get a taxi for you, and they
will be at the front of the line. Make sure their a long
line first, because two or three chain-fulls in the taxi
line at McCarran Airport is not a long line.
|
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|
Western Cab Company - 702-736-8000
|
|
|
|
For
a complete list of Las Vegas taxi companies click
here
|
|
|
|
The
owner of VegasTaxiDriver.com used to be a cab driver for Western
Cab Company in Las Vegas and that is the cab company I recommend.
These are my own recommendations and opinions and not necessarily
those of Western Cab Company. I have worked for almost all of the
cab companies in Las Vegas. All cabbies in Las Vegas are
employees, and not owners or contractors. All taxis have meters
that are set and controlled by the State of Nevada. The drivers
that I worked with at Western Cab Company are decent hard-working
cabbies. All taxi drivers in Las Vegas have a permit issued by the
Nevada Taxi Cab Authority, the State agency that regulates the
taxi industry in southern Nevada. For more info about taxis in
Las Vegas click
here.
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|
|
|
|
