What is "obviously superior" about Uber?
* Knowing where your driver is and how close, who they are, what they're driving, and what their ratings are before you even climb in.
* Payment is all handled on the back end. You call the cab and don't have to worry about it. Tips are not a thing.
* Bad ratings cause drivers to get kicked out of the program - and since they're automatically prompted for as soon as you get out of the car, they're going to be done more often (and therefore be more accurate) than a complaint-based model. It solves the problem of "Well, this driver was surly and slow, but I've got better things to do than go on the taxi commission's website and fill out a complaint form"
* MUCH cheaper rates than taxis, though that no doubt varies by area. I know in SF, it only cost me $15 to get from SFO to the wharf. (About an hour drive, IIRC) Equivalent shuttle: $34-50. I priced it.
* Random everypeople drivers, rather than career folks. I've met some pretty interesting people via Uber.
* Drivers can't arrive and then refuse to drive you - they know where they're going when the app pings them. If they don't want to drive you, one of the others surely will. Drivers are penalized for dropping rides.
None of this is specific to Germany, the topic of the story notwithstanding. These rideshare outfits face the same government interference in every single country they operate in.
After tooling around California for about a week or so, I am 100% on board with these guys. Uber was consistently awesome and less expensive, taxis were consistently more annoying and more expensive.
Prices as far as I've seen were similar to Taxi prices.
Payment: just checked, I thought the current apps already took care of that, but didn't seem so. Not yet that big of a problem, since Germany is still very cash-based anyways.
I have to admit I don't really care about the other points, since the current state of things seems mostly fine to me. So for me it is not "obviously superior", since I value the downsides higher (insurance, availability (a german taxi can't deny a route inside it's area of responsibility, which is a large part of why competition is restricted), ...)
//Edit: extended some points, spelling/grammar
If Uber isn't changing that, then it's not helping either.
As the GP points out, cash is still very common here. A _large_ supermarket over here (Kaufland) doesn't accept CCs, but does accept direct debit.
Listing 'accepting CCs' as a bonus for Uber seems.. weird in this environment.
Might be because we were able to keep the middle man (CC companies) out by having the banks cooperate on electronic cash directly - since the 80s.
Uber is just another such middle man we have no need for (and at 20% commission, they make CC companies look cheap).
Normally, I don't carry cash with me, except for a few coins for a bus ticket or a vending machine or a quick lunch. I don't even carry a wallet; I have a phone case which has pockets for driving license or ID card, and bank/credit card. Above, I said credit card, but I actually use it as a direct debit card. I pay may lunch and groceries with it, and gas and parking, and whatever.
If I make a one-day business trip to Stockholm, I don't need to make any special preparations: I can pay everything with the same debit/credit card, and I don't need to change any currency even though Sweden does not use euros.
If I make a one-day business trip to Berlin, I do need to prepare with currency to pay the taxi there. If Uber brings pressure for taxis to accept debit/credit cards, that's good.
How many accidents have you been in which required claiming against their insurance (or lack of it). What about unvetted drivers who might rape you?
After airBnB, and Uber, surely the next area ripe for "disruption" / completely ignoring the laws and regulation, is banking. Just offer higher savings rates than any bank, but ignore all that irritating regulation the big banks are subject to!
* You can get a taxi just as fast in Berlin.
* If you feel the need to use an app that has ratings, payment and stuff, there are apps such as mytaxi for that.
* Taxi drivers are professionals and you can complain about them which would eventually not end well for them.
* Payment is regulated so it's the same with every taxi and it's not that expensive, besides we have an actually working public transportation anyway, so it's not like you're going to use taxis daily.Yes, I "feel the need" to have a taxi rating system. You can claim all you want that government taxis have equivalent systems, but they obviously don't. Taxi drivers are usually assholes, and Uber drivers are usually nice.
Uber also costs the same every time, and it's usually cheaper than a government taxi.
If no, then you have not made a fair determination of what service is superior.
San Francisco's dysfunctional taxi regulation doesn't extend past the cities borders, much less the US despite Uber's best efforts to make seem as if that were the case.