We go along and listen. “Krone” reporter Robert Fröwein sits in the back seat of a taxi or Uber and talks to the drivers about their experiences, their worries, their fears. Human stories straight from the heart of Vienna.
Habibullah is all about four wheels. He has been interested in motorized mobiles of all kinds since his early childhood days and knew early on that his career path would inevitably lead in this direction. Of course, not every car fanatic can rise to the next Max Verstappen, but the sympathetic man in his mid-thirties never had anything to do with the masculine speed bolt. Habibullah prefers to move around in the legal area on the streets of Vienna and does so in multiple forms. In any case, the comparison makes sure, as he emphasizes with a laugh, “of all the variants that I’ve tried out on the street in different jobs, driving a taxi is by far the best.” is self-employed and has thus gained a maximum of freedom. “I’ve been driving rental cars and taxis for about three years and it always annoyed me that I could never organize my time the way I wanted to.” He got his trade license relatively quickly, he proudly explains With the taxi license, which became mandatory for rental car drivers during the pandemic, things looked a little different. “So many hurdles, so much to learn. It wasn’t easy, but I fought my way through it and now I’m as free as I always wanted to be.” Habibullah only works day shifts and usually takes the weekends off. “I am responsible for my car, my shifts and my income. I might be able to earn a little more if I’m out on Friday and Saturday nights, but I value free time and quality of life more. Even back then, my wife wasn’t particularly enthusiastic, when I was still driving for others. I can’t go around at night as a freelancer.” Relationship life isn’t always easy anyway, he adds with a smile. “The really bad thing about Corona was that now everyone is shopping online. Since then, my wife has been ordering a lot more and I can’t keep up with the payments.” In such cases, adequate financial support is certainly not a disadvantage, which is why the step into self-employment was the right one for Habibullah. “Of course I have to struggle more with taxes and I have more things to do when I’m not driving, but I always earn around 2,500 euros net per month with the normal shifts. There are many tourists in the city again. Vienna is particularly thriving in the summer and I felt that positively as a driver. The fact that the pandemic is now largely over is important to all of us.” A few years ago, he could only dream of earning this money, even if he still remembers his older jobs well. “First I was on the road for a parcel service. It was incredibly stressful because you almost can’t manage to deliver everything on the given routes in one working day. In addition, customers usually wait a long time and quickly become restless if they only come in the middle of the day or in the afternoon.” Shortly thereafter, Habibullah was hired by Wiener Lokalbahnen and transported people with disabilities. “It was a good job, but sometimes the days lasted ten to twelve hours and you got out with a maximum of 1400 euros net. That wasn’t enough for me, especially since everything is getting more and more expensive.” After three years as a taxi employee, he has now been completely independent for almost exactly three months. “It’s not always easy, I’ll admit that, but I would never want to trade again.”
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