The wealthy, or those who like to see monopolies thrive can ignore this post…
It is much easier than you think to avoid the monopoly held by expensive taxi company Fly Taxi at Otopeni Airport, Bucharest main airport. (Of taxis at Baneasa airport, stand by for a separate post).
Fly Taxi, to remind you, charges a whopping 3.50 lei per kilometre, meaning that you will get little – if any – change from 100 lei when taking a Fly Taxi into the city. Romanian newspaper Adevarul touched on Fly Taxi last week as part of a wider investigation into general rip-offs practised at the airport.
Though Fly Taxi is the only company allowed to park its taxis right outside arrivals, there are ways around the monopoly (which do not involve the bus or the minibus-train combo).
Option 1:
Call a taxi from any of Bucharest’s trusted taxi companies. You will find their names and numbers at Bucharest In Your Pocket, here. You will need to wait ten minutes or so, and taxis from other companies can’t stop right out front: you will need to wait for it in the car park, opposite.
Option 2:
People still seem unaware of the fact that there is now (and has been for sometime) a walkway from Arrivals to Departures. Turn right as you exit baggage claim and keep going. Once at Departures, simply go outside and pick up an ordinary taxi as it drops somebody off. Easy. You never have to wait more than a couple of minutes, except after 9pm or so, after which few planes depart, and this tactic does not work.
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Only once did I get sucked into a Fly Taxi some years ago and I knew I would have my revenge with them. This is how I kind of got one over Fly Taxi. I arrived back at Otopeni. Got into a Fly Taxi, and as soon as we were 50metres round the corner I spotted the normal Taxi’s, yelled “Stop Now Shit Lips”! left the driver about 4lei and jumped into a normal taxi. End of aggravation, End of story!
Thanks a lot! Mersi mult de tot!!!
They’ve gone. You might find the odd one hanging around but by and large you will have to call one. Walking to departures is the best option.
Do regular taxis still lurk in the parking ramp across the street from Arrivals or have they been chased out of there too?
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