Thiඣs pedicab trip makes Uber’s surge pricing look reasonable.
A man 🦹visiting the city with his family was cheated on New Year’s Eve by a ric🌳kshaw driver who charged him $165 to ride about 15 blocks in Midtown, The Post has learned.
Ken Smith, 41, a Red Cross worker living in Haiti, was sightseeing in Manhattan with his daughter, Samantha, a🅠nd wife, Peothong, when they took a pedicab ride from Herald Square to Rockefeller Center.
The cabby hit them with a bill for $165, illegally charging per rideꦬr and using his feet to cover his sign on which prices were printed in small type, Smith said.
“It’s a rickshaw. I thouღght, ‘How much can it cost?’ ” Smith said.
The driver asked for a tip, but Smith tolꦛd🦹 him the fare itself was already too much.
“I felt like I was robbed,” said Smith, w༺ho is originally from Wisconsin but has traveled all over Southeast Asia and Africa.
“We saw and kn✤ow most of the scams all over the planet, and, sadly, we’re victims to one in our own country.”
Smith and his wife paid the driver, who claimed the way he calc🐻ulated the fare was company pol🦩icy.
“W👍e could have taken a 15-minute trip in a helicopter,” Smith said. “Then at the end, you really get socked. It’s a shame. It happened to me in New York, of all places.”
Smith 💃hᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚᩚ𒀱ᩚᩚᩚas done recovery work in Haiti after the 2010 earthquake, and his wife owns a toy company in Laos.
He has lived𝄹 abr💎oad doing humanitarian work for the past 20 years.
Still, Smith said they hope t♕o return to t🤡he city soon.
“We still love New York City,” he said.
He said that he used Square, a credit card payment app, on the driver’s crac🃏ked iPhone to pay the fare and that he reported the rip-off to 311 Thuꦆrsday.
Drivers are required to prominently display their rates and their company information. They are🍸 banned from perౠ-passenger fees.
The Department of Consumers Affairs will investigate❀ the incident, according to a spokeswoman.