A taxi driver allegedly cheated two passengers – a couple from the mainland – out of HK$900 on Saturday after giving the husband change of just five patacas after the wife handed the cabbie a HK$1,000 note for 95 pataca fare, Public Security Police (PSP) said during a regular press conference yesterday, adding that the cabbie claimed that he mistook the banknote for a HK$100 note due to “insufficient lighting” inside the vehicle.
The spokesperson identified the suspect as a 30-year-old local man surnamed Chan. The couple were visiting Macau as tourists.
At around 6:30 p.m. last Saturday, the couple got into Chan’s taxi outside a casino-hotel resort in Cotai for a ride to Rua da Tribuna – a street near the Barrier Gate border checkpoint, the spokesperson said.
When arriving at the destination, the woman handed Chan a HK$1,000 banknote for a fare of 95 patacas. The woman told her husband to collect the change from the cabbie as she got out of the taxi and went to the boot to take out their luggage, the spokesperson said.
As the man did not know that his wife had given Chan a HK$1,000 note, he got out of the taxi after receiving a five pataca coin, the spokesperson said.
When Chan was about to drive away, the woman – after finding out that her husband had only received five patacas in change – immediately told him to stop Chan from leaving the scene. At this moment, the two passengers repeatedly hammered on the taxi with their fists in an attempt to stop Chan from leaving, according to the spokesperson, who said that the cabbie steadfastly ignored them and sped away.
The couple were angry at being cheated by the cabbie and decided to report the case to the police.
After investigating, PSP officers identified Chan as the suspect and managed to get in touch with him on Sunday afternoon, telling him to go to a police station for questioning, according to the spokesperson.
Under questioning, Chan denied having intended to cheat the two passengers, but claimed that he mistakenly thought that the female passengers had handed him a HK$100 note so that he merely gave her change of five patacas due to “insufficient lighting” inside the vehicle, the spokesperson said.
Chan also told the police that he had tried to look for the couple after realising that he had given them the wrong change, but searched in vain, the spokesperson said.
Chan has been transferred to the Public Prosecution Office (MP) for further questioning, facing a fraud charge.
This undated handout photo provided by the Public Security Police (PSP) yesterday shows the HK$1,000 banknote that the female passenger handed to the cabbie last week.
