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Comment by cwilson | Hacker News Reader

My guess is yes. Uber makes it so easy to quickly and painlessly get a ride that I find myself using the service much more often than I would a normal Taxi in the past. From casual observation I find this to be true for the majority of my friends and even family members as well.

Normal Taxi services are a pain in the ass to book, not connected to my credit card (so you have to go through the whole guilt trip for not having cash, takes longer, etc), and for whatever reason I always had bad experiences with them at least half the time. None of these things are issues with Uber, leading to much more usage on my part. It's just so damn easy, and even satisfying, to tap a few times and have a car magically show up.

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I'm surprised taxi services are so far behind here. Why can't I request a taxi in a single click, select the vehicle, charge it to my account, see the location of the taxi on a map and the ETA until it arrives? Why can't I see the route it'll take, or modify the route myself and set a waypoint?

I'm sure some taxi services offer a couple of these features, but none of the ones that I've used. I think one had online booking, but it was broken and I had to find a phone, and then I got no answer, and then I was on hold for 5 minutes.

Why can't I set a custom alert, so I get notified when the taxi is 2 minutes away? That way I don't have to keep looking out the window, or spend 15 minutes sitting on a curb, wondering if they forgot, and I'm going to be late.

If taxis are losing business to Uber, it's their own fault, and lack of innovation.

> I'm surprised taxi services are so far behind here. Why can't I request a taxi in a single click, select the vehicle, charge it to my account, see the location of the taxi on a map and the ETA until it arrives

You can, it's called Uber. It's why it exists :)

And in Chicago at least, you can summon a cab with Uber just like you can a black car or SUV.

In most cities can't you just walk out on the street, stick out your arm and have a taxi at least as quickly as it takes to book and wait for one through the Uber app? I guess it's much more useful when the streets aren't filled with cabs like in the suburbs or at night.

I'm in Ireland, and while I don't use Uber (too expensive) I keep telling this story to explain why I use Hailo a lot: Around 3am one Saturday after a family party my parents were worried about getting a taxi, because they had heard lots of horror stories of driver stealing things etc, but were prepared to catch one from the taxi rank across the road. I pulled up Hailo, was able to book (and know the driver's name a face), and have the taxi arrive before they could cross the road (in a suburban town). And since I was paying for it by card they just got in and went home and I didn't have to worry about a thing. These things sold me completely on the system.

I live in a pretty central part of Chicago, and have to walk at least 3-4 blocks to get somewhere where hailing a cab within 10 minutes is a reasonable expectation.

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