I flew to Bangkok on Friday (21st Sept) and once I had collected my suitcase, I headed off in search of a taxi to take me to central Bangkok.
I followed some advice given by a couple of people on here and ignored all the signs and "taxi touts", heading out past customs and then straight up to the 4th floor, where my intention was to pick up a meter taxi that had just dropped of at the Departures level (4th floor). There was hundreds of them all waiting in a line and even a couple of MIB sitting on a motorbike directing me to bypass the first 2 taxis and go to the third. I assume those 2 were trying to jump the queue and rather than try and move all the taxis along, the MIB were just trying to keep things orderly. As I say, this is just my assumption.
I jumped in taxi number 3 and told him "Sukhumvit Soi 6" as I was staying at the Dynasty Inn Grande. It was about 11pm and
the journey took around 30-35 minutes when using the highway. There are 2 toll points, the first costs
25baht, then second
40baht, therefore tolls costs
65baht one way.
When the taxi dropped me off at the hotel, the meter read "187" and therefore the fare was
187baht. I gave the guy 250baht and he was very happy.
The next day, I was due to fly down to Phuket, so I asked reception to organise a meter-taxi for me at 1pm. They tried to push their "limo service" but it was 900baht and I said that was 3 times more than a meter-taxi, so I wasn't interested. They didn't push it anymore and confirmed that they would arrange a meter-taxi for me. The taxi was there 5 minutes early and the bell-hop spoke in Thai to the driver, but I heard the words "pay meter" which made me feel comfortable that I was not about to be ripped off.
Sure enough, the driver was on the level, after paying
65baht again for the tolls, the meter read "199" when we arrived at Departures, therefore the fare was
199baht. I gave the guy 300baht as I only had 100's and couldn't be bothered to ask for 50baht change. I also thnk that 300baht for that journey is still very cheap.
Thanks to those who have mentioned before about going up to Departures for a taxi, this has turned out to be excellent advice.
