If you are travelling in Taiwan in a large group, staying from place to place each night or have children/ elderly with you, the most hassle-free way would be to hire a driver! I used to save on transport costs like these, because it is usually just Zac and I travelling, but I am now a private car convert – it is SO much less stressful not to have to figure out directions all the time, worry about getting lost/ run over by locals and lug our luggage around on public transport. In Taiwan, having a driver means knowing all the road conditions (which can change swiftly due to weather/ road blocks), never getting lost and best of all, knowing all the best local recommendations.
For our grad trip to Taiwan in June 2017, there were 8 of us, all girls (read: all admittedly bad drivers). Due to sponsor obligations, we had to travel all over Taiwan, from Taoyuan to Taichung to Alishan to Sun Moon Lake to Cingjing to Hualien to Ruisui and finally to Taipei. Gulp. Moreover, we would be staying in a different hotel practically every night, which meant all of our luggage would be travelling with us. The only reasonable course of action would be to hire a driver. But our next headache was picking through the sheer number of private drivers available for hire in Taiwan. We scoured various forums like TripAdvisor, blog recommendations and even from our friends and family and obtained a few quotations – but no individual driver really stood out, until we came across Tong Bao Bus.
Tong Bao Bus is a company managing private car drivers, based in Taichung, Taiwan but their drivers can travel to any part of Taiwan with you! We were very impressed by the speed at which they replied to us, in addition to their replies being in perfect English (making it so much easier for us to discuss itinerary plans) and their dedicated service. We had to change our itinerary multiple times before the trip, and the manager liaising with us Leo was so patient with us! He even suggested some tweaks to our itinerary so that we wouldn’t be on the road for too long, or warn us if there might not be enough time allocated to an attraction.
We were blown away by the personalized, warm service from Tong Bao Bus and Leo – other drivers we obtained quotes from were more interested in squeezing out as much money as they could from us, especially once they heard “8 girls, 10 luggages.” We didn’t need a driver for a few days, and Tong Bao Bus was very kind to exclude charges from those days, even though our driver would still have to stay at our location to pick us up again – the other drivers still charged us nonetheless for those few empty days. As we were travelling with them for 11 days, Leo also extended a discount to us for some of the days! From all the quotations we obtained, the average cost per day for a private driver for 8 pax was about 6000-6500 NTD but with Tong Bao Bus, our average cost per day only came up to about 5500 NTD!
We reached Taoyuan International Airport a little late (and spent more time in the toilet) but our driver Xiao Chen waited patiently for us. We knew exactly how to contact him, as Tong Bao Bus had sent us a message before the trip informing us about our pick up – such a nice touch! We booked a hugeeeee 9-seater Volkswagen and 8 of us fit super comfortably inside, with plenty of space for all our bags and shopping (we made such a mess in the 11 days). 6 of us at the back and 2 of us in front! We had so much fun all packed into the car on long drives across Taiwan.
Best of all was our driver Xiao Chen, who is hilarious in his own quiet, understated way. He would say something totally lame in a deadpan voice and just crack all of us up.
He was like our dad for the whole trip, posting Facebook photos and captions of our trip religiously and catering to all our itinerary changes instantly. He recommended us places when we asked (I hate drivers who pressurize you to go to certain places), pointed out local sights and places he loved and tolerated our horrendous singing. He probably regretted letting us hook up to the Bluetooth in the car…
Xiao Chen drove us through horrible weather conditions, from torrential downpours to extreme fog in the mountains. On our way up to Cingjing, there was a roadblock due to rockslides and the queue of cars was almost an hour long. He took one look, turned our huge car into an extremely small and narrow sideroad leading through the paddy field, and managed to maneuver us around the roadblock!! We were dead impressed (I can’t even park properly). His driving was safe and quick, we didn’t get honked at once in 11 days and always made it to our next destination early. Super thankful for Xiao Chen! (He’s super adorable and awkward whenever I ask him to pose for a picture with his car HAHAHA)
When we were in Taichung, Leo invited us down to a cozy little Japanese omakase restaurant tucked away in a hotel. It turns out the place was famous with locals and had a waiting list over a few months long! We wouldn’t have been able to book it at all, but the company pulled some strings to get us in 🙂 As we wined and dined, Leo shared more with us about the company. Tong Bao Bus and Zhongmei Car Rental never believe in competing based on prices, as it would inevitably lead to a price war and a lose-lose situation for all companies. Low prices are also highly unsustainable for the companies. When it comes to services, you get what you pay for – very low prices would usually mean the drivers cutting back on flexibility, safety and service in order to earn back the same amount with more customers.
With Taiwan’s unpredictable weather, flexibility with your itinerary is so so important. We were all rained out in Sun Moon Lake, trapped in our hotel because all the Sun Moon Lake tours were cancelled for the day, but Leo and Xiao Chen came to our rescue by sending another driver down to pick us up from Sun Moon Lake early back to Taichung! Tong Bao Bus has a 12 driver team and always has a reserve car on standby for emergency situations!! Best. Service. Ever!!! We were so glad the weather didn’t delay our plans, thanks to Tong Bao Bus! Safety-wise, they take no chances and will always purchase personal injury and death insurance for their passengers. Their thoughtfulness and dedication really goes above and beyond!
They also have a sister company Zhongmei Car Rental, in case you are more adventurous and would like to rent a car to drive around Taiwan yourself! It’s insanely hard to find a reliable car rental company that wouldn’t steal your spare tire and charge you for it, or try to mark up unnecessary insurance and add-ons, but both Tong Bao Bus and Zhongmei Car Rental pride themselves on integrity and top-notch service to consumers, which is evident in their customer reviews!
Really sad to leave Xiao Chen on our last day 🙁 A huge huge thank you to Tong Bao Bus for this wonderful trip in Taiwan, for providing us with comfort and the best service throughout!! Check them out for your next trip to Taiwan, and save all the trouble weeding through unreliable drivers 🙂
Stay tuned to my Youtube channel for a short video compiling our time in Taiwan with Tong Bao Bus!
☛ Tong Bao Bus ☚
Website: http://www.tongbao-bus.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TONGBAOBUS/
Email: tongbaobus@gmail.com
LINE: tongbaobus
Note: This post was sponsored by Tong Bao Bus, but all opinions are, as always, my own 🙂