[DuHasstMich]

Originally Posted by deehunk

He was repenting for the mistakes he made by doing fake trips

This is exactly the problem, the drivers tried to act smart and beat the system. Guess what, the system corrects itself, and pushes the drivers off the edge. Penny sound, pound foolish!

I have seen such random folks driving Ola and Uber cabs, you would really think twice whether one should get into a cab with such a driver. My understanding is that most of these drivers and actually drivers and not owners. They are paid a standard 15k/month type of salary, and the actual earnings move on to a owner(about 40-50k/month/car).

The driving sense of these cabbies is just too much to tolerate, it gets on your nerves, but there is hardly you can do anything about it!

[Eddy]

Originally Posted by DuHasstMich

but there is hardly you can do anything about it!

The driver rating is something you can use, it is possible that it has some impact on their incentives.

[DuHasstMich]

Originally Posted by Eddy

The driver rating is something you can use, it is possible that it has some impact on their incentives.

Yes, when you are in the cab yourself, but other times when you are driving and come across these guys..what to do!

[fordday]

Originally Posted by DuHasstMich

Yes, when you are in the cab yourself, but other times when you are driving and come across these guys..what to do!

This is biggest curse and is really getting intolerable.

They park on the road side haphazardly and does not have any road manners.

[sdp1975]

Protests turn ugly in Bangalore. Uber office vandalized by stone pelting . Cabs that were plying have been stone pelted , stopped and the drivers attacked.

http://www.thehindu.com/news/cities/...le17348922.ece

[theexperthand]

I think the strike is on force today. My wife was looking for a cab (Ola and Uber) from Singasandra from 4 PM for about 1.30 hours and was not able to find a single cab.

She at last got an Ola Auto till silkboard and got a bus from there, but unfortunately the bus broke down near bellandur.

From there she tried to get a cab for almost 30 minutes without any success. At last, she got an auto from there about 30 minutes back.

--Anoop

[cpbopanna]

This is a classic case of killing the goose that lays the golden eggs

Earlier, drivers/owners were a frustrated lot, bought vehicles on debt and 'waited' for business. Most of the trips were those 'package' ones, i.e. Rs. 500 for 4 hours/40 km, etc.
There are no designated taxi stands like in other countries, where a passenger could just fetch a taxi.
Customers shunned taxis (other than the corporates) and relied on auto rickshaws, who made hay when the sun shone!

Enter the aggregator, who matched supply and demand!
It was a win-win situation for both, the customers had an economical ride and the taxi driver/owners had steady business!
The greedy and demanding auto-rickshaws were relegated to where they deserved to be!

Then the dark side of human nature surfaced! GREED
Why share with others what I can consume myself?
Even if I cannot pocket everything, the others should not get a part of the pot of gold!

The solution? Protest!!
Do not allow the aggregators to tie-up with more taxis
Do not allow aggregators to charge less than the Government fixed norm
I have written in a earlier post that not many customers are actually paying below the prescribed fare

But for a moment, even considering that the aggregators are indeed charging less, what is the problem?
As long as the customer is happy, the owner/driver is happy, it's good for everyone, isn't it?

Slightly OT, but let me share one of my professional experiences.
I was managing a factory in Kerala, whose bottom-line was sagging due to reasons beyond our control
Whilst I was trying various means to keep the establishment afloat, the brilliant workmen decided to go on strike demanding a hefty increase!
This was when we were barely managing to pay their wages on time!

The end result?
The top management decided to retrench the workmen, pay compensation as per law and shut down the factory!

Everyone has aspirations.
We should be happy as long as we earn according to our ability and in line with our area of business.
A bus driver cannot expect the remuneration of a pilot, and so on and so forth!
As long as the economy of India continues to grow, there is piece of cake available for everyone, as long as we work hard and professionally
Let us not ruin the party by trying to grab the entire cake for ourselves!

Why upset the apple-cart when things are working well?
Is this because of a few bad apples and disgruntled elements?
Or is it because we want to earn more by working less?

In any case, we should not forget what happened to the farmer who killed the goose that lay the golden eggs!

[Chetan_Rao]

At what point will the penny drop and drivers realize this isn't a govt-run corporation that will be forced to bend over and kept running forever with the bill sent to taxpayers?

Plenty of honest drivers wanting to earn their daily bread are becoming targets of intimidation/violence. I'm finding it increasingly tough to retain whatever little sympathy I had, given this has pretty much descended into mass thuggery. As happens with most causes in India, this one got hijacked by hooligans too.

[TorqueyTechie]

Originally Posted by cpbopanna

Then the dark side of human nature surfaced! GREED

Yes this exactly is what is happening here. I used to feel happy that many people have benefited from this aggregation based service but from past one year have been seeing them behave like how the Auto drivers/owners are behaving by

1. Driving haphazardly and with continuous honking.
2. Over speeding.
3. One way driving, double parking, driving slow looking at mobile or calling customers.
4. Rowdy behavior either by intimidation or physical assaults.

I lost respect for them so much so that I stopped taking these cabs and instead driving to wherever I wanted to go myself. Now after having jumped ship without understanding the basic tenets of how the business model works and only on the preemption that it would be always a handy pay, they themselves are to blame for the mess.

I know how much of an inconvenience it is to people but I just couldn't resist posting that since past couple of days my drive to office is far far peaceful. Yes still there are people who cut across lanes or drive rash but the percentage is definitely down and its mostly because of the cabs being off road.

[srikanthns]

I am a late entrant to this thread. What is the economical ride that consumers are having? For the first time in my life, I rented an Ola cab through app from my home in Trivandrum to Kochuveli Rly station , a distance of 6.6km. You know what I was billed? Rs 147 ! Works out to Rs 22 per km! What economy we are talking about? Base fare Rs 50, Running fare Rs 66, Running time fare 19 rs (19 minutes journey) , then 12 rs tax! I do not have any sympathy for these drivers when they charge like this! They are also living in this society and they should compare what others are earning also! A honest to goodness teacher in a private school in Trivandrum may earn only Rs 12 to 15,000 only per month!

[dark.knight]

Originally Posted by srikanthns

I do not have any sympathy for these drivers when they charge like this! They are also living in this society and they should compare what others are earning also! A honest to goodness teacher in a private school in Trivandrum may earn only Rs 12 to 15,000 only per month!

Well, not that I support the increasing popularity of cab system, but technically OLA/UBER frames the charges, not the driver. Didn't you get a quote in advance before accepting the ride? I guess UBER has that feature sometimes

I for one am glad these protests are going on, the system of joining UBER/OLA were perceived to be unduly lucrative and just about everybody who weren't happy with their earnings jumped to this ship. The companies handed out the goodies at first just to grab a market base with their tremendous drivers portfolio, now neither are the drivers making money after having indulged in extended trips, fake trips etc, nor are the passengers happy paying surge and not getting cab availability and in turn the credibility of both the aggregators has taken a huge hit, I'm sure the bombardment of cabbies will end and a stable situation will take its place.

The app-based cab model was never supposed to work when the availability of cabs were far exceeding demand, because then rates, benefits and ride requests will all get diluted. As for the foolish few drivers who keep blaming UBER/OLA for the current mess, well yeah maybe the company should've been more cautious on the ceiling for number of driver-partners, but they weren't and hence the situation today.

[kiku007]

The freebie party is coming to an end I guess. It's not just drivers. There were some who took loans to buy cars, rented drivers and ran the cars for Ola or Uber.

Here's one thread from last year,
http://www.team-bhp.com/forum/what-c...-ola-taxi.html

The incentives were never sustainable on the long term.

I don't know if the OP really bought a car. But it would be interesting to hear their perspective as well.

Originally Posted by nik0502

Hi Kiku007,

Yes, I am sure about the numbers as I have got these from OLA office itself.

Earlier it was an incentive of 4500 obove your earnings per day once complete 13 trips in a day. Moreover you get an update on your phone via SMS about changes in the scheme every day. For example last week's scheme was, complete 19 trips out of which 11 should be in peak and minimum business garauntee was 11000. On completion of 14 trips out of which 8 must be in peak minimum business is 7200 & complete 11 trips out of which 6 in peak on minimum business was 4200. You have to finish these trips in 24 hours and peak is 10am till 11pm. Now you can calculate. Even if you do the 11 trips you make a billing of 90k approx. Out of which your expenses are 20k Driver's Salary, 13k EMI, 20k fuel and 10 k maintenance. You still make 30k approx.


Note- OLA takes 15% as commission and Uber takes 10%. Hence the calculation is basis 3500 per day. The schemes keep changing and the owners keep getting updates however overall the summary remains the same at this moment. I understand that they can't keep doing this forever. However I want to take advantage of it till the time they are paying it. Also they pag 13 rs per km for a WagonR and 15 for a Dezire category. And take 15% commission. So they pay you 11.5 rs per KM anyways. And I believe what will happen in future is they might not pay minimum business. But per km price will remain the same. Also we think a lot about them charging very less to customers, I think it's 9 rs per km. So if you consider per minute charges and minimum base fare customer is actually paying almost this 13 rs km.

[srikanthns]

Originally Posted by dark.knight

Well, not that I support the increasing popularity of cab system, but technically OLA/UBER frames the charges, not the driver. Didn't you get a quote in advance before accepting the ride? I guess UBER has that feature sometimes.

Yes, I found out that very late, ie , today, after installing the app. Now coming to my original complaint, I did not get a cheap ride, now OP is telling that drivers are a disenchanted lot, then where the money goes?

[haria]

well, this doesn't really come as a surprise. This whole heavily discounted/attractive model itself is flawed and is not sustainable in the long term.

OLA/Uber - they are in the similar predicament as the other "e-tailers".

Flipkart is going thru the similar crunch, Snapdeal is already messed up badly. Amazon has got deep pockets so it is not so evident, but I am sure even they are bleeding.

Most likely, after a bit of shakedown (long overdue), things should settle down a bit. Hopefully, it will not herald the restarting of high-handedness of auto rickshaw drivers. They were pretty awful few years back and thanks to the Uber/OLA revolution, autorickshaw drivers are much mellowed now

[fordday]

I don't have any sympathies for the drivers.

Most of them, if not all, very well knew what they were getting into.

Not trying to be arrogant here, but earning a six figure income by driving a taxi (which does not need any skill apart from having a driving license) is like a dream. Enjoy as long as it lasts. But then equilibrium will set in and reality strikes which is what is happening now.