The Tourism Administration yesterday said it is investigating a private driver working for an unlicensed travel operator whose behavior allegedly left an elderly Malaysian traveler feeling “deeply distressed.”
The 62-year-old woman from Penang visited last month with a group of four other elderly people, she said in a post on the online forum Baoliao Commune (爆料公社) on March 17.
The Facebook post has since amassed more than 6,300 likes.
Photo courtesy of the New Taipei City Tourism and Travel Department
She said she had visited Taiwan eight times since 2007 and often recommended it to friends for its warm hospitality and scenery.
The group booked a private driver package through a company named “Taiwan Travel,” she said.
The Tourism Administration said that the travel company is not on the government’s list of licensed tourism operators.
As the operator’s Facebook page has since been shut down, the authorities have requested more information from the tourist concerned, the agency said.
If more evidence is provided, the agency said it would continue to investigate the complaint.
The tourist reported that the driver told them to “speak a human language” when they were conversing in Cantonese.
On a separate occasion, the driver referred to her as “that depressed one,” which she said was particularly offensive, having had clinical depression for four years.
Moreover, when they asked to turn up the air-conditioning on a humid day in Nantou County, the driver said: “My car has air-conditioning, not refrigeration. Refrigerated trucks are for carrying fish, shrimp or corpses,” the tourist said.
The driver also asked the group to walk down a long, slippery staircase in Jiufen (九份) in the rain, even though two of the women used walking sticks and the group required wheelchair assistance at the airport, she said.
Although the trip ended in tears and “broke her heart,” she said she still believes Taiwan is full of kind, helpful and polite people.
Unlicensed travel operators may be liable to fines ranging from NT$100,000 to NT$2 million (US$3,149 to US$62,977) under the Act for the Development of Tourism (發展觀光條例), the agency said.
Under the Civil Code, travel operators must provide “itinerary planning” to qualify as a travel agency business, it said.
Many private car tours often push customized itineraries for the passengers to choose the destinations, evading this rule, it said.
Whether this contravenes the law must be determined on a case-by-case basis, it added.
China has reserved offshore airspace in the Yellow Sea and East China Sea from March 27 to May 6, issuing alerts usually used to warn of military exercises, although no such exercises have been announced, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) reported yesterday. Reserving such a large area for 40 days without explanation is an “unusual step,” as military exercises normally only last a few days, the paper said. These alerts, known as Notice to Air Missions (Notams), “are intended to inform pilots and aviation authorities of temporary airspace hazards or restrictions,” the article said. The airspace reserved in the alert is
More than 6,000 Taiwanese students have participated in exchange programs in China over the past two years, despite the Mainland Affairs Council’s (MAC) “orange light” travel advisory, government records showed. The MAC’s publicly available registry showed that Taiwanese college and university students who went on exchange programs across the Strait numbered 3,592 and 2,966 people respectively. The National Immigration Agency data revealed that 2,296 and 2,551 Chinese students visited Taiwan for study in the same two years. A review of the Web sites of publicly-run universities and colleges showed that Taiwanese higher education institutions continued to recruit students for Chinese educational programs without
A bipartisan group of US senators has introduced a bill to enhance cooperation with Taiwan on drone development and to reduce reliance on supply chains linked to China. The proposed Blue Skies for Taiwan Act of 2026 was introduced by Republican US senators Ted Cruz and John Curtis, and Democratic US senators Jeff Merkley and Andy Kim. The legislation seeks to ease constraints on Taiwan-US cooperation in uncrewed aerial systems (UAS), including dependence on China-sourced components, limited access to capital and regulatory barriers under US export controls, a news release issued by Cruz on Wednesday said. The bill would establish a "Blue UAS
The Republic of China Army Command yesterday relieved Kinmen Defense Battalion commander after authorities indicted the officer on charges connected to using methamphetamine. The Kinmen District Prosecutors’ Office on Wednesday detained Colonel He (何) after the Coast Guard linked him to drug shipments and proceeded to charge him yesterday for using and possessing crystal meth. The man was released on a NT$50,000 bail and banned from leaving Kinmen, the office said. Army Chief of Staff Lieutenant General Chen Chien-yi (陳建義) told a news conference yesterday that He has been removed and another officer is taking over the unit as the acting commander. The military
RSS