A mother gave birth in the back of a taxi then was subsequently charged a £100 ‘fouling charge’.
According to ITV, Karolina Dabrowska and her partner Matthew Errington called an Addison Lee taxi after Ms Dabrowska went into labour at their home in Peckham, south east London.
However when en route to University College Hospital in central London, Ms Dabrowska’s waters broke and the taxi driver pulled over by the Aldwych One hotel by Covent Garden.
A guest staying at the hotel happened to be a doctor and assisted Mr Errington after a birthing complication. Mr Errington dialled for an ambulance and baby Sebastian was born on October 25 at 12.30am.
However, the relief was short-lived as the taxi driver then asked Mr Errington for a cleaning up fee during the emotional ordeal.
Mr Errington said: “My baby came out with his cord wrapped around his neck and at that point the taxi driver starts asking for money.”
“I said my son’s not breathing leave me alone. The doctor came out and saved my son’s life. Everybody was so helpful, however the taxi driver was saying, ‘How am I going to get my taxi clean?’”
Mr Errington gave the driver £40 to cover the fare, however the driver allegedly started “banging on the doors to get into the ambulance and said get out and clean the taxi.”
Addison Lee have since apologised to the couple and refunded them the fare. They also donated what would be the £100 fouling charge fee to the premature baby charity, Bliss.
The letter said: “We would like to wholeheartedly apologise again for the service that Matthew and Karolina experienced, at what was a stressful time for them.”
“As soon as we investigated what had happened we refunded their fares for both journeys to and from hospital, discussed with the driver how he could have been more sensitive to Matthew and Karolina’s needs at a difficult time and are issuing guidance to all our drivers to ensure this unfortunate situation can never happen again.”
