Source: CCTV
A woman in Shanghai was in for a surprise when she tried to reserve a car on a private-cab APP. Instead of a car picking her up, a bus came to take her home.
According to the Youth Daily, the woman, Ms. Chen, hailed a car via the popular car sharing APP DidaPinche after she finished work at midnight. The APP indicated that an SUV would be coming to pick her up, but instead of seeing an SUV parked in front of her, she found a bus waiting for her.
Ms. Chen told the Youth Daily that the bus driver told her he had no time to drive his own car to pick her up so just drove the bus, which he had been driving earlier for work, directly to her.
It is reported that the bus driver did sign up for an account as a driver on the ride-hailing APP with his own car’s make and registration number and the reason he drove the bus to pick Chen up was that he received the APP request and needed to park the bus in another parking lot which just happened to be on Chen’s way home.
Unsurprisingly, the case has again stirred up discussions surrounding ride-hailing APP services on Chinese social media.
“Although the driver does not follow the regulation, earning bread is not that easy nowadays,” commented AiweiSerendipity.
“Once I reserved a car by phone in Shanghai, I found the make of the car I had reserved and the gender of the driver were not what the ride-hailing APP told. Everything would happen in Shanghai,” said Wangweixing.
Meanwhile, the DidaPinche APP confessed they have little power to check the truth of the information drivers supply, and verification is mainly dependent on users’ feedback.
The bus company also stated that bus drivers are not allowed to pick up passengers in their buses after their shift is over. Using the bus as a private taxi for personal use is a serious breach of the company’s regulations, and the driver’s monthly bonus will be deducted by 2,000 to 3,000 yuan, the company added.
Recently, hailing taxis or cars on mobile Apps has been very popular in China, which also triggered off fierce competition among mobile ride-hailing and traditional taxi transportation. Last year, Shanghai was taken as a pilot city, allowing drivers to use their own cars. To balance the interest between conventional taxi drivers and private cab drivers, as well as reducing any potential damage to passengers, the Department of Transportation is conducting a long-time research into the service.
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