got an email from uber saying they'll fight. not sure, but seems like a big win for kapten now.
Do not forget Bolt (a.k.a Taxify)
Uber loses licence to operate in London, will still operate while appealing
141–150 of 520 posts
Re: Uber loses licence to operate in London, will still operate while appealing
#142It's pretty amazing how consistently Uber fails to abide by even the most basic regulations. How many times does a billion dollar company get a second chance? Every time this happens people talk about how the Mayor will get in trouble for this, but let's face it, ride hailing apps are 10 a penny. Lyft, Taxify, MyTaxi? No one in London is going to miss Uber.
Do you even live in London? I love when people talk about a whole city in general terms like they can speak for millions of people. Well get this, I live in London and I love Uber and I would definitely miss Uber if they stopped operating here. So your statement is wrong. In fact, our general slack channel at work had a ton of people posting sad faces about this news. But yeah sure I guess you know what every Londone…
Yes, thanks I do "even live in London". In fact, I've lived in and around London all my life. Uber is fine, it's about as great as any of the other identical apps, and frankly, is far worse than being familiar with the local public transport 99% of the time inside London.
Re: Uber loses licence to operate in London, will still operate while appealing
#143Earlier quoted context omitted.
The UK definitely does not have “full employment” unless you have a very stretched meaning of the word “full”. Even if you think the level of unemployment is okay, the level of underemployment reveals things are very far from rosy.
Full employment is includes the fact people are going to be out of work for other reasons like in the process of switching jobs. Also you have to remember that people work for best option they have right now. If uber wasn't their best option they simply move to a better job. If you ban uber you simply remove the current best option for most people working for uber.
Above you said "they're doing it because they like working for Uber". Now you say it's just the best option they have. That's quite different
> If uber wasn't their best option they simply move to a better job.
Simply? You know there are costs and risks associated with changing jobs, right?
> If you ban uber you simply remove the current best option for most people working for uber
This is blackmail and using workers as hostages. If Uber were a decent company, it would have hired the workers they need instead of the fraud that is the partner scheme. In this situation of Uber losing license to operate, the drivers would either be still employed or be fired and get severance packages and unemployment benefits.
This is why a lot of people dislike and want the "gig economy startups" gone: they ignore the rules in the name of "user experience", exploit their workers to keep prices down and eat up the market, and then use the position they have to force their views on public policy. Governments must stop them and make them pay what they should have paid if they were operating correctly.
Re: Uber loses licence to operate in London, will still operate while appealing
#144On one hand i am glad that a transnational company is getting stopped like that, especially when breaking the rules. they are basically a giant money hoover that comes in and sucks the money offshore with offshore interests as #1 priority.
on the other hand, often it often takes an outsider to disrupt a well established and corrupt market in order to move it forward.
Re: Uber loses licence to operate in London, will still operate while appealing
#145Earlier quoted context omitted.
NYer here: you should read how the taxi companies exploited their workers. And NYC was at least regulated. Moreover, the cabs were filthy, they often refused passengers due to race, disability or other illegal prejudice, refused certain destinations, spoke little English, didn't know the city, would drive inefficiently to drive up costs and on and on. Oh, and cellphones arrived and they did NOTHING until Uber pushed…
Also good luck getting reasonable (or any) cab service outside of Manhattan and NW Brooklyn. It was even worse pre rideshare days. Those are the areas that would need something like rideshare more since they're both less dense with less expansive public transit. I don't know if private transport is ultimately unsustainable. That's something people much smarter than me will have to figure out how to measure. But I do…
There were black car services that covered the entire city. The further out you got the cheaper most of this services would become.
Re: Uber loses licence to operate in London, will still operate while appealing
#146The only thing these disruptive companies (Uber, Deliveroo) are providing is unregulated access to cheap labour in first world countries.
I don't know why on earth that even technical people praise them so much.
The technical innovations to delivering this cheap labour are just an afterthought.
Re: Uber loses licence to operate in London, will still operate while appealing
#147Earlier quoted context omitted.
"regulations gives us passengers safety and fair prices." - We had these before Uber, and it was worse. Uber has pushed up quality in general. Market pressure is often a better way of doing these things rather trying to have a central inspector who can't see everything all of the time.
Libertarian playbook: * Deregulate halfway, by promising that things will be better in the free market * Wait for trust erosion in the public institutions and regulations * Remove remaining regulations, because obviously, regulation is not working, and the "free" market will take care of things * Create an effective monopoly because it is not economic to maintain two or more infrastructures in parallel. After that, r…
Thats about as honest as saying: Democrat playbook; strawman all other belief systems into being immoral, while not bothering to form a basic understanding of them.
Please, take some time to understand why people have different ideas. It is seldom if ever, malice. If you cannot relate, keep your mouth shut, or ask questions.
Re: Uber loses licence to operate in London, will still operate while appealing
#148Interesting though, same incident, same news from 2017: hxxps://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-41358640 I'd assume, this will be resolved like the last time, just a minor hitch.
Yep, they will challenge it in court, keep running while it happens and then fix the problems and continue their license.
At worst (for Uber) it's just some free organic traffic for their competitors.
Re: Uber loses licence to operate in London, will still operate while appealing
#149Earlier quoted context omitted.
What you said was correct a year ago but Kapten and Bolt exist now, they’re often the same fare or cheaper than Uber.
Bolt is funded by Chinese money. They're heavily subsidizing rides with that money to capture some of the market and they will have to raise prices eventually.
Uber is funded by Saudi money, same deal.
Re: Uber loses licence to operate in London, will still operate while appealing
#150I know this opinion is not popular but I'm so happy everytime I see bad news for Uber and all these companies that only exist thanks to basically exploiting THEIR workers. Private transporting is not sustainable and it is not something that has to be affordable for everyone, even less by lowering workers wages or playing with the tariffs by demand. Taxi regulations gives us passengers safety and fair prices. There ar…
The taxi service in London is generally quite robust. Drivers have to pass a rigorous exam prior to certification, and the cars used are just awesome. Visiting there from the states and using their taxis was quite a pleasant experience I wish we could replicate.