After several failed attempts at hailing a taxi to return home from work downtown, a friend of mine changed strategy.
Instead of giving her destination, she asked the driver sarcastically: "Where are you heading? May I come with you?"
The strategy worked.
Taxi problems are not new here in Bangkok. Locals and foreign tourists have experienced the same plight for a long time.
The most familiar excuses taxi drivers give to Thais are: they are running low on gas, their shift is nearly over, or there is too much traffic along the destination route. But it's well-known these drivers refuse locals and target only foreigners in order to overcharge them.
This week, the taxi problems became big news again after a Japanese man, Akihiro Tomikawa, vented his frustration on his Facebook page after a taxi driver refused to turn on the meter, and instead charged him a flat rate of 700 baht from Suvarnabhumi airport to Saphan Khwai.
His complaint drew a great deal of attention on social media, which prompted the authorities to take action. They duly revoked the driver's permit to operate at the airport.
But this wasn't the end of the story. Yesterday, an image was shared on social media showing a sign, supposedly in a taxi window, which read: "No Japanese tourists".
The sign was written in Thai, Japanese and English and appeared to have been issued by the Taxi Drivers Phauthai Suvarnabhumi Association.
However, Sadit Jaitiang, the association's president, denied any knowledge of the sign.
He said the sign was probably made by drivers who were angry about the Tomikawa row which resulted in a colleague losing his permit to operate at the airport. However, his association didn't see them make it so can't be held responsible.
By law, a driver cannot reject a passenger or charge a fare higher than the one on the meter, the association president told the Bangkok Post.
But in another interview, the taxi association president appeared to support his fellow drivers.
He said travellers who paid thousands of baht for air tickets should not negotiate over a few hundred baht for a taxi fare.
Such an attitude by taxi drivers and their representatives, plus weak enforcement of taxi rules by the transport authorities, means we can't expect taxi problems to go away any time soon.
It's no wonder that the services provided by GrabTaxi, EasyTaxi and Uber have become popular as passengers are able to book them directly via a telephone call or online.
Many passengers, especially the more affluent, don't mind paying higher fares for a reliable service, and save themselves the frustration and headaches caused by rogue drivers.
More importantly, these passengers feel safer as they know each driver working for these app-based taxi firms has been registered with the firms and their real-time location can be tracked by GPS.
The problem is they are considered "illegal" because the state still has no idea how to register them.
But they are still in high demand and their rising popularity has sparked an outcry from ordinary taxi drivers who don't seem to have learned anything.
They keep complaining that the "illegal" app-based services steal their passengers even as they themselves don't care much about abiding by the law and providing a good service for their passengers.
Of course, we should not allow illegal taxi services to continue.
Instead, legalise them and and allow them to compete with the ordinary taxis. In fact, the legalisation process is under way, but how long the authorities will take to deal with the matter is anyone's guess.
Is it too much to hope that this process will be transparent and above board?
While the app-based taxi services sort out their legal glitches, many of us will still have to depend on ordinary taxis, so they may have to adopt some kind of strategy like my friend did.
And for those who try a similar approach to her, I think it might be fair to tell the driver to share the fare too.
Sirinya Wattanasukchai is an Assistant News Editor, Bangkok Post.