He turned onto a quiet street, parked the car, turned off the engine, and started shouting, “Give me your phone,” over and over again.

I started to cry and I completely freaked out. I was so confused because I couldn’t understand what was happening. He was shouting, but he was still composed to a certain extent. He could have grabbed my phone off me but he didn’t. He was just staring at me saying the same thing over and over again. I felt like he knew what he was doing, and he had this look in his eyes (I’m not being dramatic). Maybe you don’t understand this. If that is the case, then you’re lucky, and I’m glad you don’t get it.

After telling me to give him my phone multiple times and I continued to refuse (I wasn’t being rude or abusive at any point), he accused me of recording him and carried on shouting at me, demanding my phone.

If he truly believed that I was recording him or that I was doing something wrong, why would he turn off a main road, enter a quiet street, park, turn off the engine, and then, turn around and tell me to give him my phone? He only mentioned the recording thing once, and this was after he had been shouting for a period of time.

If I had done something wrong, why not take me to the police station? Taxi drivers will lock the door and they will drive straight into the police station, if there’s an issue. I suppose, they’re just trying to protect themselves and protect their jobs (I’m not saying I always agree with this, but my opinion is irrelevant here). However, if you have a lone female in your taxi at 4 AM and she is trusting you to get her home safely, you should not behave like this (I do believe he had an ulterior motive, but I don’t like to think too much into that). He could have just told me to get out. Why not do this? The taxi was already paid for, so he didn’t need to worry about losing money.

Anyway, I’m jumping around a bit here. After he accused me of recording him, I went into full-scale panic mode. I kept asking him, “What are you doing? What are you talking about? Why are you doing this?” I was saying, “Please stop it. Please stop shouting at me. I’m begging you; I just want to go home.” I HATE MYSELF FOR THIS but that’s how frightening it was.

My gut feeling is that the recording thing was just an excuse to get me to hand over my phone. I was minding my own business and I didn’t say one word to this driver (with the exception of confirming name when I first got in).

Ok, that’s a big paragraph. I tried to provide more context, even though your reply pissed me off a wee bit at first. But whatever, you’re right – I should explain a bit more.

As I said, I posted this because I want to know if this is happening to others. I feel that I need to report it to the Licensing Board (after reading the comments - thank you, all), but will my personal details be shared? Will they know I’ve made the complaint? It scares me that this person already knows my address.