London cabs will apparently soon be full of phones. According to a study cited on BBC News, more than 63,000 phones have been left in London cabs over the past six months, which works out to about three phones per cab. Interestingly, however, the Brits trail their counterparts on the continent in lost phones per capital, while they are out in front in lost laptops:
The numbers of lost laptops has leapt by 71% in the last three years.
This has left Londoners, or those travelling by cab in the capital, as the world’s best at losing laptops, according to the research by the Licensed Taxi Drivers Association and Pointsec, a mobile-data backup firm.
More than twice as many laptops were left in the back of black cabs in London as in any of the nine other cities (Helsinki, Oslo, Munich, Paris, Stockholm, Copenhagen, Chicago and Sydney) where the research into lost and found gadgets was carried out.
By contrast Danes were most adept at losing mobile phones being seven times more likely to leave it behind in a cab than travellers in Germans, Norwegians and Swedes.
But Chicago leads the way in lost electronics, according to the study:
The U.S. company polled in the survey, a major Chicago cab company, reported the highest number of losses per taxi of all firms studied, both in mobile phones (3.42 per cab) and PDAs/Pocket PCs (0.86 per cab).
Based on the large size of the Chicago company’s fleet, the statistics indicate a staggering 85,619 mobile phones, 21,460 PDAs/Pocket PCs, and 4,425 laptops left in the firm’s licensed cabs during the six months covered in the study. Only London, with 0.21 laptop PCs lost per cab versus the Chicago firm’s 0.18, was higher in any category.
Speaking for myself, I have yet to lose either a laptop or a cell phone, although I’m sure it can only be a matter of time — especially now that I’ve drawn Murphy’s attention to myself.
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