[blackwasp]

Originally Posted by landcruiser123

I'm surprised. I get a lot of incentives to use Ola or Uber. (Some offers)

I though incentives are still in place. Using uber, my aunt came from KIAL to Arekere, Bannerghatta Road- a distance of 50 km by paying Rs. 550, inclusive of a toll of Rs. 120. I think there should be some incentive in such rides.

running cost of a diesel car is around 3.33 (18km/L) and even lesser for CNG.

550-120= 430
per km = Rs 8.6/km.
fuel = Rs 3.33/km
maintenance = Rs 1/km
Net = Rs 4.27/km

Let us decrease one more rupee per km for misc.

so profit = Rs 3.27/km

Now, the cabs runs 10k kms a month easy. (my car ran 6k km in first month - thats only one shift - less than 6hrs a day).

Out of that 10k kms, 2k will be driving to pickup points and returning home empty. So 8k kms = Rs. 26160.

This is just the back of the hand calculation and such long distance trips will not be more than 2-3 per day. The shorter trips will net the operator more income compared to long trips, but if you average it out, Rs 10/km isn't a very difficult gross income figure to achieve.

[arun_kun]

Ok, this is what I have gathered from cab drivers from multiple trips I had in Uber & Ola.

Ola: Ola has strange incentive scheme for drivers. They say that if they complete 15(or 18 Don't rem exactly) trips in a day they will pay them 4000 per day. For example, if they have done 18 trips which amount to 3000, ola will pay them extra 1000 for that day. If they do only 12 trips and that amount to 2500, then they won't get extra 1500 from ola.

Uber: Uber pays incentive of 1000 or 2000 amount if the driver does business of about 3500(or some similar figure). If they don't reach the target then they will not get the incentive amount.

So, what I fail to understand is how these companies are making money?

And some of the drivers do not expect these incentives to continue. They say these incentives will stop. What will happen then?

[carboy]

Originally Posted by arun_kun

So, what I fail to understand is how these companies are making money?

They are not making money. They are losing money each & every day.

This is the internet business model where profits are relevant only turnover. Till the company shuts down. You have seen lot of food delivery startups which paid you money to deliver food from a restaurant to your home and finally shut down. This is the same model.

[landcruiser123]

Originally Posted by blackwasp

so profit = Rs 3.27/km

How come you forgot the price of the car itself?

If you buy a car for 7.5 lakhs, drive 2,00,000 kms and sell it for 1.5 lakhs- you have spent Rs. 3 per km on capital investment.
This applies to owner driven cars. For the cars which are owned by the operator, the driver has to pay a rent if I'm not wrong.

[dark.knight]

Uber is surely better than OLA (too expensive and rude from the feedback I've got) and miles better than the autos and local transport, it has the American service touch to it and I appreciate it for that.

However you cannot take them for granted every single time.. their systems are far from perfect. Their 5-minute cancellation policy is the most idiotic I've ever seen, most of the time when a newbie driver or a tech-ignorant driver is at the wheel they take 5-10 minutes to arrive at a point where it shouldn't take more than a minute and they don't even answer the calls as well. Should I still be the one to be punished for that? Also many a time they think they've refunded but it doesn't show in the actual bill and they refuse to co-operate after that. The surge rates are another scam, why not just show no-availability instead of surcharges and forcing people to pool?

I've spent many a 5-minutes during evenings absolutely blasting them over mail for such actions, its then they sort it out quickly. It seems they also give the drivers an option to rate riders which is another ridiculous thing as the drivers will go broke without the riders, we don't need them but they badly need us. I shouldn't complain with a rating of 4.6 but its a rating I don't need, who knows for what ridiculous reason they might rate us lower.. I tell the drivers each day to switch off the stereo and close the windows because the last thing I want to hear is some irritating Bollywood song after a long day at work, what if they rate 1 Star just for that reason?

For now I'm off Uber and I'm happy. I need full control of my environment and nothing better than the own car for that purpose. Maybe when I'm a bit more free after this month I'll use them and find new ways to counteract their unfriendly policies with tech support.

Uber also blocked my profile once for reasons they themselves didn't know of and when I didn't use them for 2 days without any interaction they unblocked it Do it again, I dare you.

[landcruiser123]

The Ola cab drivers still get incentives which makes them to cancel rides to airport. At around 745 PM, I booked a ride to KSR Railway Station from Arekere. Before he arrived, the driver called me and asked me to cancel if it's a ride to the airport. I told him that the ride is not to the airport.

After he came, I asked him why he is treating a customer in such a manner. His reply was that he had just started his duty and wanted to complete 6 rides before 12AM to get an incentive.

[ksameer1234]

I had been reading rave reviews about Uber and everyone dismissing Ola. I however thought that in the end it is a driver plying similar vehicles on similar roads so how different could it be.

But I was pleasantly surprised by the experience I had with Uber. The biggest change is that drivers actually navigate using maps and reach pick-up point by themselves. In contrast, Ola drivers would ring up straightaway and ask for navigation till pick-up point. Every time I told them to look up in the maps, I would meet standard replies such as map not working, location not showing and so on.

Now I have used Uber far less than Ola but I now wonder why was I so smitten by Ola earlier.

Originally Posted by landcruiser123

The Ola cab drivers still get incentives which makes them to cancel rides to airport.

I live in Mumbai and travel to Bangalore once every couple of months. I find this practice of drivers cancelling their ride on hearing airport quite surprising and frustrating. What's ridiculous is that fares for airport drop have risen upto around 20 rs/km yet Ola drivers need to be cajoled for airport drop.

This refusal is something I haven't ever experienced in Mumbai, even when consistently taking rides of over 20 kms in traffic hours.

[pedrolourenco]

I'm travelling to Mumbai today and staying at Belapur. What are the best option for travel from the airport? I know Meru and Tab cab have to be booked from the counters inside the airport. What about Uber and Ola?

[vivekz]

Originally Posted by pedrolourenco

I'm travelling to Mumbai today and staying at Belapur. What are the best option for travel from the airport? I know Meru and Tab cab have to be booked from the counters inside the airport. What about Uber and Ola?

Book an Uber/ Ola once you come out of the airport terminal. They will come pick you up from the airport pick-up point. Generally there are enough cabs nearby so they should be able to come in within a few minutes.

[tilt]

The latest update to the Uber app has changed Location Services for the worse. Uber now wants to use Location Services even when not using the app, meaning, always.

If I say no, then the app can no longer locate me at all and I have to manually put in my pickup location. And it usually shows a generic world map and puts the pin somewhere in the South of Africa and I have to move in from there to where I live in Bangalore.

They removed the option of using location services "only while using the app". Now it's either "Never" or "Always".

Uber of course claims that this is for our benefit, but I see absolutely no benefit for the user, only a benefit for Uber. Why should Uber know where I go once I am out of the cab, or any time other than when I am in the cab?

This is a massive invasion of privacy, completely unwarranted. And of course, there is no way to complain to Uber about this at all.

Cheers

[scythian]

Originally Posted by tilt

The latest update to the Uber app has changed Location Services for the worse...

I was pretty mad once I saw this update as well. What made me feel a little (just a teeny bit) better was the fact that they claim to use the location data only up to 5 minutes after the trip ends. From the Uber website:

Trip Related Location Data is collected during the following times:

- When you are interacting with the Uber app and the app is foregrounded and visible.
- When you’re on a trip: from the time you request a trip until when the trip is ended or cancelled by the driver, even if the Uber app is running in the background and not visible to you.
- Up to five minutes after the driver ends a trip, even if the Uber app is in the background.

Still, I hate having my location data always at their (or anybody's for that matter) beck and call.

[nitishk]

Originally Posted by tilt

usually shows a generic world map and puts the pin somewhere in the South of Africa and I have to move in from there to where I live in Bangalore.

Cheers

Hate this as well but I have the location history off. When I open the app it asks me to enable it, however I click enable and back and I come to the search bar...key in your location and it will take you there. I rather take that trouble everything instead of uber guys tracking me.

[balajisv]

Took an Uber Sunday late night from MG road to Basavanagudi. Was charged Rs. 194.
I was pleasantly surprised to receive an email from Uber yesterday mentioning about 'fare adjustment' and they gave a credit of Rs.40.
Appreciate their accounting practices!

[Chetan_Rao]

I'm in the habit of keeping 'Location Services' turned off unless I specifically need it, which isn't often.

Unless the Uber app makes it impossible for me to turn off 'Location Services', how does their new policy affect my use case, if at all?

[scythian]

Originally Posted by Chetan_Rao

Unless the Uber app makes it impossible for me to turn off 'Location Services', how does their new policy affect my use case, if at all?

If you normally keep Location Services turned off on the phone unless you are using Uber, Uber's new policy does not affect your use case. Even if you keep Location Services off all the time, you can still use Uber by entering your address manually. I am speaking about the iOS version of the app, but I think this should be the case for other platforms as well.