Kolkata commuters caught between surge, refusal

KOLKATA: The surge in app cab fares and refusal by yellow taxis have left the city’s commuters hapless. While surge pricing has made app cabs unaffordable, frequent refusals by yellow cabs have made passengers virtually stranded. “Such situation makes a commuter consider buying a vehicle. More cars on roads are bad for the city’s congestion,” said Anup Shankar, a transportation expert.

“As app cabs are unaffordable with longer spells of surge fare, we opt for yellow taxis. But the latter either refuse or ask for absurd rates. So it has become difficult to move about during peak hours. You have to depend on public buses,” said filmmaker Sourav De.

The surge pricing issue has been on the minds of policy makers. The transport department plans to allow “range bound dynamic pricing” to effectively match demand and supply. One likely way to tackle this was by permitting the maximum tariff up to three times the minimum one.

It is difficult to rely on the yellow cabs in times of emergency, particularly when it rains. “I waited at Ruby crossing on Thursday night for a bus to Behala for more than 30 minutes and the only one that came was too crowded to get in. Auto queues didn’t move and Uber showed a fare of Rs 1,070 for a 15km ride to Behala’s Chowrasta that generally costs me less than Rs 230,” said Subhrajit Halder, a hotel executive.

Teacher Anirban Mitra echoed, “I was refused by as many as seven cabs while trying to take my son to his examination centre last Saturday. Finally, I paid twice the usual amount to a yellow cab driver from Behala to Sovabazar.”

“Running a yellow cab is a loss because of successive rise in diesel price and no change in taxi fare in last seven years. This is why a yellow cab driver asks for a few more bucks over the metered fare. If you can pay a much higher fare to avail an app cab, why can’t you pay Rs 10 or Rs 20 more than the metered fare?” said Bimal Guha, president of Bengal Taxi Association.

But app cab loyalist Gautam Dastidar said, “There is no comparison between yellow taxis and app cabs as the latter offer comfortable and cool rides, security features like ride sharing and no dispute app-generated fares.”

The cab sector in Kolkata is in disarray as their drivers are unhappy with the successive withdrawal of incentives by the aggregators like Uber and Ola. “They initially offered good schemes to their drivers to capture the market. There were beelines of the drivers to enrol in the app cab system. But now they are leaving the platforms. The aggregators must think of ensuring a minimum earning of Rs 20,000 to each driver to make their business viable,” said Indranil Banerjee, convenor of the West Bengal Online Cab Operators’ Guild.