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Comment by tokamak-teapot | Hacker News Reader

Taxis around here before Uber:

* Quite possibly just someone in a car pretending to be a taxi.

* 20 minutes on the phone to 3 different companies, to find out they won't come for two hours and they don't turn up anyway.

* Dirty.

* Terrible driving.

* Rude.

* Refuse to go where you've asked after you've already hailed one and got in.

* Only take cash.

* Take the long way to run the meter up.

* Use other tricks to get paid more - 'Oh the meter's broken. That'll be $lots'

* No way to see when they might arrive, or if there are any in the area.

* No way to know anything about your driver.

* No way to see which is your taxi when it arrives.

* ...

Taxis around here since Uber:

* Some have an app that only works for their company, and is terrible.

* Some have signed on to an app that works for more than one local companies, and is terrible.

The rest is pretty much the same.

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It's funny I had completely forgotten about having to wait for a taxi to arrive.

How is uber not given massive credit for reducing the dangerous waiting-around-in-some-random-place-you-don't-know time from 30mins+ to 3mins+

That must have saved a few thousand muggings on its own by now.

Don't forget the reduction in DUI's as a result of reducing the cost/friction of getting a 'cab' home.

If you don't understand the motive of particular political decision then it is very likely a matter of money under the table.

Quite possibly just someone in a car pretending to be a taxi.

Is this true in London? Do people privately own black cabs?

I think London has a 2-tiered taxi system - black cabs and minicabs - and I suspect faking a black cab would be much harder?

Mostly in London, you used minicabs because the Black Cabs were soooo expensive, and they had all these different fare modes depending on what time of day or night it was, and they'd tick at different rates depending how fast they're going and all sort of other black-box opaque bullshit.

At the end of a night outside clubs, there'd be (illegal) minicabs everywhere, offering to take you wherever for much less than a black cab, and sometimes that's just all the money you have left. Usually they'd get lost or be terrible in some other way very well-described above.

Does Uber pay taxes? Quite surprised that it's not mentioned as a requirement.

Likely not, but one of the reasons taxis want you to pay cash is it’s easier to report lower income and thus avoid tax.

Yeah but at least you know the money stays(most of it) within the local economy.

... why wouldn't they pay taxes?

Because they are a big tech corp. Even more, a US based one.

https://www.icaew.com/insights/viewpoints-on-the-news/archiv...

That link has absolutely nothing to do with them being US based or not.

This is the problem with having conversations about tax law: the vast majority of people have no idea what they're talking about. Worse: the vast majority of people think they know what they're talking about.

They don't pay VAT (currently 20% in the UK - similar to sales tax in the US) by treating each one of their drivers as a separate business. In the UK your company has to make more than £85000 to be forced to charge VAT which is well below what each driver makes. Uber itself offers digital services though a Dutch subsidiary and I don't believe that company is liable to pay corporation tax in the UK. I personally think that this is a more unfair issue than not paying VAT.

Ref. https://uk.reuters.com/article/uk-uber-britain-tax/uber-face...

Is there any reason other than tax deduction that a company operating in the UK would offer their services through a Dutch subsidiary?

Probably not. It's known as the "Dutch Sandwich", I believe:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dutch_Sandwich

Curiously the "GST" in Australia (which is a similar type of tax) has a similar thing, $75,000 AUD+ per year before you need to register.

Unless you're a taxi driver, when you need to register regardless. They carved that out.

The ato claims this is because[1]: 1) to avoid the confusion that would be created if some taxis had to charge GST and others did not 2) avoiding the added problem that would arise if a passenger was using a taxi for a business trip (creditable acquisition). In this instance, the passenger would want to be able to claim an input tax credit for the GST included in the fare 3) meter rates are set by each state authority and after 1 July 2000 all meters were adjusted to reflect the GST. If some drivers were registered and others were not, all would be collecting the higher rate. This would disadvantage drivers who had to be registered if the ordinary registration turnover threshold applied.

Interesting point of view in that specific case.

[1] https://www.ato.gov.au/Business/GST/In-detail/GST-issues-reg...

Uber since Uber: * Take a round about route to hike up the price with some made up excuse about an accident. * Driving dangerously because you're on 5 apps and hitting cyclists

Taxis, Uber, they're all the same. Give me public transport anyday.

> Take a round about route to hike up the price with some made up excuse about an accident.

never experienced this. does that actually work? I thought the initial quote was binding.

> Driving dangerously because you're on 5 apps and hitting cyclists

I've certainly had some aggressive uber drivers, but nothing that stood out as less safe than the typical cab experience.

public transit is great when it goes where you need it to. unfortunately I live in the US so...

With the exception of California, the initial quote is indeed binding

Secondly, uber drivers have ratings (unlike cabs) and a set of consistent low ratings for dangerous driving will flag the dangerous behavior

Here in London it's not binding unless you share the ride with another passenger, then it's a fixed fee. But you can look at the route after and if it's a problem, you just give 4 stars instead of 5, which means they'll probably never drive again...

So there's a strong incentive for them to act properly - unlike a black cab where they know full well they'll never see you again.

I tried giving lower ratings and I've tried complaining to Uber. Even in cases where the route is clearly 3 sides of a square that involved 3 times the distance (and 3 times the price) they still side with the driver. I've had trips to the airport on Uber be more expensive than a Black Cab.

I can't give the rating if I'm the one being hit. Uber drivers will consistently pull out when they don't have right of way because they don't want to wait. When how you're paid is dependent on you driving from A to B as fast as possible it's going to encourage bad driving.

it seems like you are making two incompatible complaints in this thread: a) the payment structure incentivizes drivers to drive recklessly to complete the trip as fast as possible, and b) the payment structure incentivizes drivers to drag out a trip much longer than necessary to milk the fare. so which is it?

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