March 2008

Fake Friends
How AFSC is trying to take Chicago cabdrivers for a ride
By: George Lutfallah

If you have been overcharged on your lease, you are entitled to get all of your money back. Why shouldn't you? It's your money, isn't it? But the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC) working through a group calling themselves the UTCC is putting out more propaganda suggesting that you should let them help you sue owners to get your money back. They say they won’t get anything for this but that they’ll “pull in outside counsel” who will take 25-33% of your money if they win.

Drivers, please don't be fooled by this scam. If you have been overcharged on your lease, there is a very simple remedy to get all of your money back, if talking to the cab owner directly doesn’t work. In fact, you have already paid for this service. All you have to do is file a complaint with the Department of Consumer Services (DCS) and let them do the work.

AFSC knows you can do this so they use fear as a tactic to try to get you to fall in line with them. They say that you should join with them for fear of “retaliation” by the fleets. Ooooh! Scary!

But that still doesn't explain why they need to use outside attorneys. If there's strength in numbers, still, why can't you collectively go to DCS? I don't seem to be able to follow their logic. I mean, if they want to get you your money back, DCS will get it back. All of it. Not only that, but DCS has regulatory authority so they can also punish owners who overcharge. But maybe this has more to do with strong-arming cab owners than actually solving your problems.

If you're not sure you're being overcharged, or if you're just uncomfortable about going by yourself to the city to file a complaint, ask someone to review your lease and go to the city with you. I'm sure one of the truly independent cabdriver organizations would be happy to help. You could go to the CCO, the AUPD or the Ghanaian Cabdrivers Association. If you need help getting in touch with them, give us a call at the newspaper at (773) 348-8294.

And if you're really being overcharged on your lease and the city doesn't do anything about it, let me know, or let any major media outlet know. If the city is conspiring with fleets to overcharge lease drivers, the media will have a field day with this!

If AFSC has proof that drivers are being overcharged on the lease, they have never sent us a single complaint they filed on behalf of a driver. Not one.

Prateek Sampat of AFSC even testified at the last fare increase hearing that, “The current lease rate law in our analysis is very protective of drivers.”

So why does AFSC want to sue cab owners privately rather than just go to the city to get all your money back, if you have been overcharged? I don't think it takes a genius to figure that one out.

But just for the fun of it, let's run through an example of how this would likely go down. Let's suppose that you are part of a group of a thousand cabdrivers who have in fact been overcharged by $15 each. If you take your case to the city, you'll get your $15 back and that owner may be hammered with fines.

If you take it to the AFSC endorsed lawyer, you'll get about $10 and you'll wait a very long time for this fraction of your money. Actually it may be even less than this because you will have authorized the attorney to negotiate a settlement on your behalf, which could be for less than you’re owed. But if the lawyer is successful at getting you the entire $10, just so you know, the lawyer will get about $5,000. That's how it works.

So for whose interest is AFSC really working?

Regarding the UTCC, I will reserve my comments at this time, primarily because I honestly believe that some of the cabdrivers involved think they are doing the right thing by being involved with AFSC. But I'm hopeful that they will realize soon enough what's going on here and will break away to form an independent organization or will work with existing independent cabdriver organizations. Rest assured, this lease overcharge plan is being driven by AFSC. They were working on this scheme long before the UTCC was even formed.

Now, let me prepare you for what's probably going to happen next. If history repeats itself, AFSC will not be able to counter a single point I made here. So what they'll do is attack me personally. They're going to tell you that I'm just “in with the fleet owners.” They'll say that I'm “in with the city.” They'll spin a lot of stories about me, all in a feeble attempt to cover the facts I've laid out here. Don't let them off the hook when they try to pull their misdirection play. And whatever you do, do not sign any document authorizing AFSC or their cohorts to represent you!

It's a cheap lawyer's trick. When you can't defend your position, attack the person. But given the scam they're trying to pull now with these outside attorneys, would you expect anything less?

And nothing they say will change the fact that if you've been overcharged, you're entitled to get every penny back and that AFSC is trying to scare you into letting outside attorneys get a cut.

-George Lutfallah, CL # 79310

I recently looked in to see what's up on the cab market forum -- what a disappointment!

It seems like nothing has changed, except maybe for the worst.

Foulks is still ranting and raving and attacking people even though he has no business saying anything about anyone. If this is all cab drivers have, I feel sorry for them.

It's easy to see why cab drivers got the shaft again from the city.

Lutfallah is still trying to scare drivers away from realistic help by demonizing people he mistakenly believes will upset his cozy little foothold in the cab industry.

It's just nauseating. What do people really think about the Foulks-Lutfallah marriage? Here are a few comments recorded here for posterity:

“He is a self-made man & worships his creator.”

“He has all the virtues I dislike and none of the vices I admire.”

“A modest little person, with much to be modest about.”

“I've just learned about his illness. Let's hope it's nothing trivial.”

“I have never killed a man, but I have read many obituaries with great pleasure.”

“He is not only dull himself; he is the cause of dullness in others.”

“He is simply a shiver looking for a spine to run up.”

“He has delusions of adequacy.”

“There's nothing wrong with [him] that reincarnation won't cure.”

“He can compress the most words into the smallest idea of any man I know.”

“He has the attention span of a lightning bolt.”

“He never opens his mouths without subtracting from the sum of human knowledge.”

“He loves nature in spite of what it did to him.”

“His mother should have thrown him away and kept the stork.”

“Some cause happiness wherever they go; others whenever they go.”

“He has no enemies, but is intensely disliked by his friends.”

“He uses statistics as a drunken man uses lamp-posts - for support rather than illumination.”

The point is that as long as the cab industry is infested by oportuniists, leaches and bloodsuckers like Foulks and Lutfallah who do nothing but pander their pathetic false hopes with, every cab driver stands to lose.

Welcome back Wolf. Before I respond, I want you let you know that I'm not going to let you sabotage this site like you did before.

You wrote, "Lutfallah is still trying to scare drivers away from realistic help by demonizing people he mistakenly believes will upset his cozy little foothold in the cab industry."

Wolf, exposing people who are trying to scam Chicago cabdrivers doesn't "upset my cozy foothold in the cab industry." If I said nothing, it wouldn't have any bearing on my income and would mean just less work for me.

I say what I say because it would be irresponsible for me to remain silent when it's obvious that people are trying to take advantage of hard working Chicago cabdrivers.

Finally, just so you know, my phone rang off the hook with drivers thanking me for exposing this issue and the culprits trying to push it. You're the first person to criticize me for it, and you weren't even man enough to admit it was you.

George Lutfallah

Hi George. Please don't get your panties all bunched up.

I wouldn't think of sabotaging your precious little site "like ALLEGEDLY did before."

I have come to believe that it is your own lack of imagination and insight, as well as a similar lack of your most outspoken -- albeit sadly misled and mournfully misguided -- patsies who are the source of any alleged "sabotoge" on this site.

All I have been trying to do is to save you from yourselves!

However, if you feel that you've been sabotaged or somehow your efforts have been countermanded, perhaps then you know or can appreciate how some of the people you targeted in your smear campaigns feel. It's just a little dose of your own medicine, Doctor Lutfallah. (I even spelled your name correctly!)

Perhaps I'm getting senile (you know "Aging Hippy Syndrome") but I don't recall any "sabatoge" of this site by me or any of the people I invited to join this forum.

I do recall throwing some of the garbage posted herein back at the cyberspace polluters who left their garbage here and apparently continue to do so where ever they go.

The only scams in which "people are trying to take advantage of hard working Chicago cabdrivers" I am aware of seem to be coming from City Hall, DCS and AH and the so-called "big fleet" operators.

You know, some of the lovely and talented people who are listed as regular "contributors" to your little publication.

Finally, with regard to the verbiage being bandied about herein and other forums and emails, the old saying still applies: "Empty barrels make the most noise."

Anyway, good luck in getting your head on straight and figuring out who your real friends - and enemies - are.

Perhaps I'm just a dreamer. Oh, by the way, what's your favorite flavor of bar soap? Essence of Crow?

Love & Kisses,
Wolfgang J. Weiss