

Angry London cabbies attack Hailo taxi app office - choult
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-27517914

======
TheAnimus
A classic problem with the free market. As it makes something more efficient,
it creates pain as this change happens. Government rules designed to be
protectionist exacerbate the matter.

I feel sorry for the London Cabbie, he has passed The Knowledge, which I
believe takes more than 2 years to study for, he pays a high fee for his
license.

But ultimately, driving around waiting to find someone needing your service is
not efficient, environmentally friendly or the most convenient solution. Their
days are numbered, it's just a matter of when.

~~~
voicereasonish
You're confusing "more efficient" with "deciding to not abide by licensing
regulation".

Regulation exists to protect consumers. It's like that shady hotel chain that
sidestep any regulation - airbnb.

Only in the startup bubble is "Ignoring consumer protection laws" spun as
"distruptive".

Good on the black cabs I say.

~~~
fennecfoxen
Well. If you're going to make a moral appeal to The Law, my question would be
whether the laws are actually there to protect the consumer, or whether
they're actually there to protect the entrenched interests under the guise of
protecting the consumer.

So here's my challenge for you: If these Uber cars are, in fact, injuring the
consumer, you should probably be able to find a bunch of reports of
disgruntled consumers who were injured in some way (bad service, ripped off,
etc).

All I've heard about is very-happy consumers, and disgruntled _taxi drivers_
(who have a conflict of interest here). So please forgive me if I think this
matter is about the cabbies who think of the passengers as some form or
another of chattel. :P

~~~
voicereasonish
I very much doubt Uber does enough business to draw any conclusions.

Look at another example though - airbnb negative reviews and experiences -
you'll find millions of them.

------
joshstrange
If every taxi ride I have ever taken wasn't so shitty I might care but they
were and I don't. I live in Lexington, Kentucky and I don't use cabs very
often except to get home from the bars on occasion, get a ride to the airport,
and once or twice when my car got locked in a parking garage downtown.

On 2 occasions I distinctly remember calling (or used online tools) to
scheduled a cab ride for ~1hr in the future only to be called less than 15min
later by the cab driver letting me know he was out front. Also I've called a
cab on at least 3 occasions and they never showed up and I had to call again.
Every cab I have ever taken only accepts cash which I rarely have on me and
getting change back is awkward and so I normally end up overpaying so I don't
have to deal with it.

I have been patiently waiting for Uber/Lyft to come to Lexington and about a
month ago Lyft came. I was ecstatic and signed up right away and a few days
later had my first Lyft ride. It was the most refreshing ride I have ever had.
Not only did I not have to worry about the driver not showing up but I knew
what car he was driving and had his picture on my phone and so it was very
easy for me to spot him. The drivers have all been very nice and their cars
have been clean and took me straight to my destination without me having to
give directions unlike the dirty cabs I've ridden in with drivers that barley
speak English and don't use GPS.

I will never use a taxi again if I can help it, Lyft has provided me with an
amazing alternative and I would gladly pay double for a Lyft driver because
the experience is so much better than a taxi.

YMMV.

~~~
anigbrowl
This is about cabs in London, which have exactly nothing to do with cabs in
your home town other than being vehicles available for hire. London drivers
use specially designed vehicles the drivers go through an incredibly long and
challenging training regimen, and they'r held to very high standards of
behavior.

~~~
joshstrange
Do you have some proof for this? (aside from PR spewed from the taxi
companies) Somehow I doubt that the citizens that use the taxis would agree. I
may be wrong but just because the official line is "very high standards of
behavior" doesn't mean that's how it works in practice.

I would love to be wrong but I can't help but think the taxi drivers are
protesting because Uber and other ride-sharing problems are stealing customers
left and right due to providing a better service.

~~~
JonFish85
> due to providing a better service.

And let's not forget skirting around existing laws & regulations. Speaking
just for myself, I'd be pissed if my neighbor, who makes the same salary as I
do, just decided to stop paying taxes, and suddenly was able to bank ~30% more
than I do. Is it because he works harder, provides better service, or is it
just because he decided that somehow rules don't apply to him?

~~~
kazagistar
Right. But getting angry at him is not productive. Either convince the
government to enforce the law, get the law changed, or use the same weakness
in the law yourself.

~~~
anigbrowl
Why not? By evading the law he's creating additional expense for taxpayers,
compounding the free rider problem with the need for greater expenditure on
enforcement.

------
jackgavigan
Uber drivers will do the same thing when Uber start shifting to Google
driverless cars.

I walked past the Hailo office earlier (it's right next to a taxi drivers
café, by the way). If anything was scrawled on any walls, it must have been
inside. The outside looked normal.

------
BrainInAJar
I'm torn, on the one hand we've put up huge barriers to becoming a cab, and
cabbies went through all the necessary steps (including set fares, mandatory
pick-up rules, etc) to be a legit cab service.

On the other hand, cabbies are scum and the worst drivers in the world, and
maybe we should rethink those regulations.

I do think Uber's made "flaunting regulation as a service" and is pretending
that making an app somehow makes them anything other than an illegal cab
service.

~~~
simonw
"cabbies are scum and the worst drivers in the world" \- do you count London
cabbies in that? They're pretty phenomenal in my opinion.

------
Lockyy
Maybe if if every time I used a black cab it wasn't one of the worst service
experiences I can find I wouldn't be so enthusiastic to move towards companies
like Uber, who actually provide a service that doesn't make me fear for my
life at times.

~~~
alanbyrne
Interesting. I've only ever had good experiences with black cabs. Especially
if there are road works or traffic, they seem to know exactly which street to
turn down without any sort of aid.

The Uber drivers I've used in London have always used GPS and gone down routes
which I would consider slower and more expensive.

------
loso
This reminds me of living in Harlem and the battle between the gypsy cabs and
the yellow cabs. Yellow cabs hate coming to Harlem and you will rarely see
them compared to the gypsy cabs. But yet when Bloomberg proposed new rules to
make it easier for gypsy cabs to operate uptown and the outer boroughs the
yellow cabs union pitched a hissy fit.

If the yellow cabs were anything but downright hostile to anyone going outside
of lower Manhattan and midtown then I would have a little sympathy. But that
went out the window when they forced my ex now but girlfriend at the time to
get out of yellow cab after they dropped her friends off because she was going
back home to Harlem.

------
jff
> In the Italian city of Milan, taxis have been sitting idle for the past five
> days in protest at what they say is "unfair competition" from Uber.

They just make the Italian jokes too easy...

Anyway, nobody actually likes taking cabs, so perhaps rather than trying to
reinforce their previous monopoly the cabbies should try to improve their own
services, maybe with a cab-summoning app similar to Uber.

~~~
jackgavigan
_> Anyway, nobody actually likes taking cabs, so perhaps rather than trying to
reinforce their previous monopoly the cabbies should try to improve their own
services, maybe with a cab-summoning app similar to Uber._

That's pretty much _exactly_ what Hailo is currently.

------
pling
£38 from Guys hospital to Waterloo and back is the reality of black cabs.
Bring it on Uber.

Don't ask me about other forms of transport as I have to do the journey
pushing a set of wheels around and I have a slipped disk myself...

~~~
unfunco
I have fallen asleep on the District line meaning to change at Embankment, and
woken up in Essex, this has happened around 4 or 5 times (usually after a
couple of beers) and it costs around £120 (~$200) from Dagenham East to Camden
– a private hire would be much cheaper – and I'd welcome it.

Though there is something a little more special about the black cab and
knowing what the driver has gone through to earn it, compared to any old
numpty with a SatNav, it's just not worth the _massive_ difference.

~~~
pling
Ha I ended up in Ipswich once (rather than Stratford).

Don't really care what they've been through when I've been told to fuck off
four times when I was in a wheelchair with a broken leg and with my daughter
in a buggy.

Just drive in now. An NCP plus the congestion charge is better value and
Google Maps navigation hasn't let me down once.

~~~
unfunco
Fair enough. I'll give one more story as to why I like cabbies though, after a
heavy night in Bethnal Green, I hailed a taxi (hungover) at around 6:00am,
told him to drive me to East Sheen and said I'd pay him the next day because I
had left my wallet at my friends. He said fine, took me home, and came to my
office during the week to collect the money. Nice guy. We've obviously had
different experiences with them...

------
aneisf
Here in St. Louis, Lyft is under attack from the Taxi industry for not
complying with the same regulations those companies work under. It's been an
interesting battle so far. You can read about it at
[http://www.bizjournals.com/stlouis/blog/biznext/2014/05/test...](http://www.bizjournals.com/stlouis/blog/biznext/2014/05/testimony-
wraps-in-lyft-mtc-court-battle.html).

