Instead of driving customers, Metro Taxi cabbies drove themselves en masse to company headquarters to confront the owner over what they call “slavery” conditions.
The cabbies included drivers like Cessi Noumouke. He said the taxi company recently made him pay $4,000 when another car smashed into his cab, even though the company also requires him to pay for insurance. Then, the company asked him to pay $700 for the days his cab was incapacitated by a snowstorm.
Noumouke (at left in photo above) and dozens of other cab drivers drove their taxis from Westville Monday morning to Metro Taxi’s West Haven headquarters to launch their protest.
Their action led to hours of closed-door meetings.
Bill Scalzi, the owner of Metro Taxi, released a brief statement Monday evening promising to “look into making changes” and touting natural gas cars.
At the end of the day, drivers agreed to return to work Tuesday. They plan to hold a meeting and discuss their next move, according to driver Johnny Hudgens. He said that overall, the drivers failed to win concessions from the company.
The cabbies work as non-unionized independent contractors for Metro Taxi and are required to pay a $133 leasing fee each day for the use of their cab. It can take as much as nine hours to earn that $133 and then start earning their own money each day, Noumouke said.
Drivers said they regularly pull 12, 16, or even 20-hour shifts just to be able to take home enough money to support themselves and their families.
That’s only the beginning of their complaints. Drivers said they are charged the leasing fee even for days when they are unable to work, including when they’re sick or snowed-in or their car is being fixed by the company. Drivers said they have to pay for company repairs to their cabs on top of paying required insurance fees to the company.
“Classical Slavery”
Just before noon Monday, several dozen taxi drivers were standing in the lot outside Metro Taxi headquarters, a single-story blue building at the end of West Haven’s Industry Drive, which was lined with orange-and-white cabs.
Antoine Scott, a former Metro Taxi driver and now an advisor to the protesters, said 52 cab drivers met at 10:30 a.m. on Central Avenue in Westville and drove in a convoy to West Haven in order to register their displeasure en masse.
At the company offices, four worker representatives went in to talk with Scazli. The rest of the drivers — men from West and North Africa and the Middle East — clustered in the lot, sharing the many ways Metro Taxi allegedly extracts money from them.
Drivers said they have to pay even for the receipt pads that the company requires them to use, and they have to pay for company business cards that don’t have their names or phone numbers on them.
One driver, Abdoulaye Adjei, said he was forced to pay a supposedly-refundable $1,000 bond when he started working for the company several years ago. After taking three months off, he was asked to pay it again. The company told him they had no record of him paying it the first time, Adjei said.
“We are all being treated like slaves,” said Solomon Okosun, who’s been driving for Metro Taxi for seven years. Drivers have to pay $133 a day to the company, even when their cars are broken, he said. On top of that, they have to pay $145 per week for car insurance, but they still get charged if they are in an accident, he said. The company has a team of mechanics to repair cars, but requires the daily lease fee even if the car is sitting and waiting for repair, he said.
Drivers said they get no sick leave and that the required insurance covers damage to the car and injury to their passengers but not injuries to the drivers or damage to the cab.
Noumouke told the tale of his $4,000 bumper: Back in September, a car ran into his cab and wrecked the front bumper. The police determined Noumouke was not at fault. But Metro Taxi started charging him additional daily fee of $27.75, telling him he had to pay $4,000 for the damage, Noumouke said. He said he’s tried to look at the company’s records to see how much money he has left to pay, but Metro Taxi has denied him access.
Noumouke also told a story about getting stuck on Ferry Street and Quinnipiac Avenue during the last big snowstorm. He waited from 1:45 a.m. to 6 a.m. for the company to send a tow truck. It never came; he walked home. The next day he couldn’t work because of the blizzard. The following day, he found that Metro Taxi still hadn’t retrieved the car, as is its responsibility and part of the weekly insurance fee, Noumouke said. He paid $138 to have the car towed, then Metro Taxi told him he owed $700 for the days he hadn’t worked or else he couldn’t get the cab back.
That was 10 days ago; Noumouke still can’t pay it. He said he hasn’t worked since then and his family is struggling to carry on under his wife’s income as a CNA.
“It is classical slavery,” Noumouke said.
“It can’t continue like this,” said Bola Fasisi, another driver. No one is taking home more than $400 a week, he said.
Mansour Salih said he hasn’t earned any money in the last two weeks, despite working.
“He is no greater than a slave owner,” Scott said of Scalzi. “These guys are living day to day.”
At around 1 p.m., Banjo Lawal (in photo, second from right), one of the drivers’ representatives, came out.
“He doesn’t want to budge on any of these things,” Lawal said. “I’m not thinking we’re going anywhere with this.”
“You guys have the numbers,” Scott (pictured) urged the gathered drivers. “We’ve got to dig our heels in.” He told the men not to pay their leases and to keep their cars.
“Do not give in to him,” he said. “He needs you more than you need him.”
Inside The Negotiation Room
Scalzi later agreed to talk to all the drivers, said Johnny Hudgen. He was one of the four representatives sent in negotiate with Scalzi.
“We all piled into the conference room,” Hudgen said late Monday evening. “He took all the guys’ questions.”
Were there any concessions on the part of management?
“Overall speaking, my answer would have to be no,” Hudgens said.
Progress was made on one of the drivers’ gripes: getting suspended for refusing to take jobs out of their zone. “That problem was remedied,” Hudgens said.
But on other demands, Scalzi was not budging, Hudgens said.
One of the issues was having to pay for damage to one’s vehicle, Hudgens said. The weekly insurance fee covers only liability insurance, not comprehensive, and Scalzi did not offer to change that, Hudgens said.
Nor did Scalzi say he could revise the policy that charges the daily lease fee even when snow prevents drivers from working, Hudgens said.
“Scalzi’s answer to all of it was: As a contractor you have to be willing to accept the loss,” Hudgens said. “If it’s snowing, is he supposed to tell you to stay home? No, it’s not going to happen.”
Hudgens said the next step is for the drivers to get together and decide if it’s worth it to them to continue to fight for changes.
Scalzi released the following message Monday evening, by way of a communications consultant: “Metro Taxi enjoys a longstanding relationship with 160 drivers. Today we met with approximately 30 drivers who expressed some concerns that they had. During the discussions, drivers understood the basis for certain Metro Taxi company policies and the company agreed to look into making changes to address some of their concerns. Metro Taxi believes that this was a positive dialogue. Metro Taxi and its drivers share a commitment to provide the best service to New Haven and related communities. Metro Taxi is the largest provider of taxi transportation in New Haven since 1987, and is very excited about bringing wheelchair-accessible taxi cabs and compressed natural gas vehicles to Connecticut next month.”
He couldn’t be reached to respond to the drivers’ specific complaints.
No wonder these guys are all cranky [and] drive like rascals.