[jetsetgo08]

The strike is not yet withdrawn in Telangana. Is this the start of the declining/no profits for the drivers?

http://www.newindianexpress.com/citi...e-1557020.html

An excerpt from the above -

The drivers claim that with more and more people registering as drivers, the existing cab drivers are not making enough and hence that needs to stop.

[King_pin09]

Me too had a pretty harrowing experience with Uber recently.

I requested for a ride from 4-bunglows (D.N. Nagar) to Dombivali and a Driver accepts it. He arrives in about 7 minutes. He sets the app and starts the trip. After about 20 minutes he asks,

He: "Sirji, aap kahan ja rahe ho"
Me: "Dombivali east, app me dikta hoga na.?"
He: "Woh to bahut door hai, traffic bhi milega"
Me: "Haan, par mera ghar udhar hi hai."
He: "Sirji, aaj mere bacche ka birthday hai, mujhe udhar 15 minute mein rehna hoga. Main aap ke saath nahi aa sakta."
Me: "Kya? Nahi aa sakte iska ka kya mathlab hua. Nahi aana tha toh accept kyu kiya.?"
He: "Galti se dab gaya tha. Aap doosra gaadi dekh lijiye."
Me: "App pe toh raasta Dombivali ka hi to bata raha hai, Galti se kaise dab sakta hai. Main iska ek paisa nahi doonga."
He: "Theek hai saab. mat dena."

I got down from the taxi and he closed the trip from his app. Within next 5 minutes I received a call from their Call Centre asking as why did I cancel the trip and I would be charged for it in the next trip. I narrated the whole episode and gave a piece of my mind. The executive apologized and said that they cannot help but charge me in the next trip.

[luvtandon]

Booked a cab for my mother with Ola from Sushant Lok-I to Karol Bagh. During the trip te driver did not pay the MCD Tax but Ola has charged Rs. 100 as State Tax/MCD Tax in the Invoice and collected from my mother. When I reported the same to Ola they just gave a standard reply that State Tax is applicable for rides from Gurgaon to Delhi, but before being collected from the customer they have to pay it to MCD, without payment collection is illegal but still they do that.

[akshaymahajan]

The same happened to me at the airport once. I landed and got an Ola. The driver tells me he is at the departures after dropping someone, so I should just come downstairs. And I did since I had no luggage. I still had to pay the airport charges, etc.

And then I brought this up with the CC and got the same answers.

The only case I see where this is fair is if the drivers pay a monthly/yearly pass fee and hence dont need to pay per entry.

[luvtandon]

Originally Posted by akshaymahajan

The same happened to me at the airport once. I landed and got an Ola. The driver tells me he is at the departures after dropping someone, so I should just come downstairs. And I did since I had no luggage. I still had to pay the airport charges, etc.

And then I brought this up with the CC and got the same answers.

The only case I see where this is fair is if the drivers pay a monthly/yearly pass fee and hence dont need to pay per entry.

They do not pay any monthly/yearly charges. They are supposed to pay per entry. In my case they have charged without even paying any and are stubborn enough to refuse a refund.

[mykal shoemaker]

Originally Posted by luvtandon

They do not pay any monthly/yearly charges. They are supposed to pay per entry. In my case they have charged without even paying any and are stubborn enough to refuse a refund.

With so poor customer care, they are going to burst once more competitors arise in the market.

[noopster]

Originally Posted by cpbopanna

Taxi service providers like Meru are more reliable for airport travel!

Is this really true? I really think Uber at least uses technology a lot more effectively than Meru to allocate a driver.

On a recent visit to Hyderabad we were at a location along the ORR about 70 km from the airport. We needed two cabs so ordered an uber (using the "ride later" option) and a Meru the previous day to go to the airport. The Uber landed up on time and the driver told us he lives near by and could plan the trip properly. Whereas the meru guy who arrived had to drive 25 km to the location! Furthermore he was given only 15 minutes notice to arrive at the pick up location, which is ridiculous. In between I got an automated call "informing" me that my driver had cancelled the ride since I had not departed on time (!) but luckily I had already established direct contact with the driver by then who told me he was on the way. The Meru driver was a good chap and stuck to his word otherwise there was a good chance that we would miss our flight that day.

Even the billing is not transparent in Meru. My driver was flashed an amount of some 300/- which I paid him. Later he called me and said it was actually close to 400/- I had already cleared Security when he called so there was no way for me to go back and pay him the balance, assuming I wanted to since I had no way of knowing if it was true! Later found out that it was when meru sent me the receipt for the trip (after I asked for it).

I coNfess am rather partial to Uber after using them hundreds of times in many cities but this experience just cemented my belief that Uber (and Ola to some extent) are much preferable options to old school radio cabs. If Uber had allowed me to order two cabs on the same phone that day I would have...unfortunately we had only one working smartphone with app installed!

[deathwalkr]

Had an interesting trip in an Ola cab recently. Usually take uber but had no cabs in the vicinity so booked an Ola cab.

Cab driver was a jabbermouth! Kept talking for 30mins non stop. Reminded me of the scene from bad boys where martin lawrence rants on and on at will smith

Anyhow, he says he used to be with Uber but they have brought down incentives to very low levels and there is no limit to new entrants so existing customer pool gets divided thinly.

They have formed taxi unions now and very proudly showed me his id card for that.

Kerala will never be truly rid of the union/strike culture.

After dropping me off, he had the audacity if could book a fake trip for him so that he completes his incentive level for the day!

Needless to say ended up having a headache after that ride :(

[shankar.balan]

Our Company has set up Corporate Accounts now with Uber and Ola.
Very very convenient indeed.
One can easily separate the personal use Uber from the Corporate trip Uber through two linked but yet discrete profiles.
Very good initiative.

And the best part is that it works well even while travelling Internationally.

And the Uber Scheduler feature is truly a boon.
It works like a charm.

Absolutely ideal for those regular Airport commutes!

[ragh_bhushan]

I always prefer Uber over OLA for local trips and have found its service way superior than OLA. But OLA offers one-way outstation trips which Uber does not. I decided to give it a shot recently when I had to travel from Pune to Mumbai.

Charges as advertised on big billboards: Rs. 1599 (Upto 170km)
Actuals: Driver daily allowance (Rs. 250) and taxes are extra (~7%)

Still quite cheaper than blue cool cab service or others.

So I booked the cab and it came perfectly on time. Started from Kalyani Nagar and reached Sakinaka in about 3.5 hours. There were no diversions and we took the shortest possible route while navigating using Google Maps. The distance shown was 155km. But the distance calculated by OLA app was 195km. So I raised a ticket in their support system and promptly got a reply that the calculation and billing is accurate.

When I pushed them a bit and asked them to check Google Maps they said that they cannot track the actual route taken and hence cannot validate the actual distance traveled.

Is this possible? For an app based taxi service to not being able to track or validate the actual distance traveled? I wonder how their billing system works.

[ragh_bhushan]

Update:
Received call from Ola support. They informed me how the billing system works:

• CRN number is entered into the app to start the trip
• System captures the ODO reading
• At the time of drop-off, system again captures ODO reading
• You are billed for the time and distance traveled

I think they might be using the some sort of OBD instrument to capture the ODO readings.

[drmohitg]

Originally Posted by ragh_bhushan

Update:
Received call from Ola support. They informed me how the billing system works:

• CRN number is entered into the app to start the trip
• System captures the ODO reading
• At the time of drop-off, system again captures ODO reading
• You are billed for the time and distance traveled

I think they might be using the some sort of OBD instrument to capture the ODO readings.

But did they provide a resolution for the same? I have never bothered to match the distance actually covered with what these cabs show. In your case the difference ( and hence the error) is huge and would amount to a significant addition to the total bill. Is it possible that the driver fleeced you by starting the trip before he picked you up?

[ragh_bhushan]

Originally Posted by drmohitg

But did they provide a resolution for the same? I have never bothered to match the distance actually covered with what these cabs show. In your case the difference ( and hence the error) is huge and would amount to a significant addition to the total bill. Is it possible that the driver fleeced you by starting the trip before he picked you up?

Driver could not have started the trip as he needed the OTP from my side.

They have closed the ticket without giving any further explanation on why they provide the route map on the invoice if they cannot track the ride. Neither did I receive any credit / refund / adjustments. Just a confirmation that it will not be possible to check the exact route taken. Uber support system is far superior.

[speedmiester]

Originally Posted by ragh_bhushan

Driver could not have started the trip as he needed the OTP from my side.

They have closed the ticket without giving any further explanation on why they provide the route map on the invoice if they cannot track the ride. Neither did I receive any credit / refund / adjustments. Just a confirmation that it will not be possible to check the exact route taken. Uber support system is far superior.

This has happened once with Ola with my father-in-law, which made stop using their services once and for all.
The app just considers the fastest time between two points even if the driver takes the shortest route. There is absolutely no resolution on this and they just blame the customers stating terms and conditions.
I have swore off Ola for their cheating. I am relying on my neighborhood trustworthy taxi operator for my travels with cabs even if it means I pay more.

[ragh_bhushan]

Ola certainly does not seem to have control over the quality of cars, drivers or overall customer experience. Above incident is only the latest episode in the series of bad experiences that I was unfortunate enough to have faced in the past. They include booking cancelations by drivers, denial of service after starting the trip and upon realising the drop-off point, demand for cash inspite of having Ola Money balance and many more.

I might be sounding rude and being biased towards Uber here but the fact of the matter is for me Uber certainly has set the right benchmarks while Ola is lagging far behind.