Taxi Turmoil

It has been an interesting few months where Singapore's taxi landscape is concerned. Beginning two years back, several third-party taxi-booking mobile apps have emerged on the market. And until Singapore's existing cab companies (Comfort DelGro, Prime, SMRT, TransCab, Premier, CityCab) come to terms with them, there will be a certain amount of upheaval in the industry.

Cab companies in Singapore

Editor's Note: Comfort Cab and CityCab, while being two separate companies, technically belong to the same corporation - Comfort DelGro.

Some third-party taxi booking apps

Currently only a few companies have their own taxi-booking apps - Comfort, TransCab and SMRT. And due to the advantages these third-party apps have over them, these companies have lost ground. Customers are using those apps. Their own cabbies are using those apps.

What are some of these advantages?

Faster booking time due to response of servers. It's more of a network infrastructure problem. A local taxi app is scaled down to provide coverage on this island only, whereas third-party apps are run on servers powerful enough to service the entire globe.

Lack of red tape. Ever been told to hold because "all operators are busy at the moment", and then treated to some appalling music and advertising? Screw all that, now you can interact with cabbies far more directly.

Incentives. Special promotions notwithstanding, consumers tend to pay less (but with a minimum fare) and cabbies stand to earn more.

User interface. I'm not sure about the others, but I have tried SMRT's app. It's functional enough, sure... but how do you compete with the many useful nibblets of information the typical third-party app gives you, like how many taxis are in the vicinity, their locations on the map and etc?

Mixed reactions from cabbies

Some cabbies have expressed the opinion that independent operators driving rented vehicles are taking away a substantial piece of their pie without having to conform to strict licensing and regulations. They'd prefer a more level playing field. These cabbies might just have gotten what they wished for.

And some cabbies welcome the apps - it's a welcome break from having to deal with the restrictions placed upon them by their cab companies, weans them off reliance on those companies and gets them more business. What's not to love?

How does this affect me?

I'm not much of a cab-user. And I tend to hail my cabs rather than book them. But watching all this unfold is utterly fascinating. Computer technology, mobile technology in particular, has once again changed the way we do things.

Talk about a technological drive!
T___T