BC Taxi Association President Mohan Kang told The VOICE on Thursday that the association had accepted that “ride shares would be implemented in some reasonable form,” adding, “however, to implement ride shares in a manner that creates such a distinct disadvantage to taxis is not reasonable.”
He said: “That was and remains our position.”
Kang pointed out: “The taxi industry has not taken the position that there should never be a ride share regime in BC.”
He said the association had read and carefully considered the decisions of the Passenger Transportation Board of January 23 on approving Uber and Lyft ride sharing and noted that the applications have been approved in spite of their position that approving ride share with “no limit on the number of vehicles operating will not be in the public interest as it will hurt the taxi industry to the point that the taxi industry cannot continue in its present format.”
Also, “the lack of any defined operating area for ride shares is an unfair advantage to ride share, while taxis remain very limited to operating from small geographic areas.”
Thirdly, “the ability of ride share to significantly undercut taxis with their pricing will be predatory to taxis and ride shares can surge their prices to any amount when busy, which taxis cannot do.”
He also pointed out: “Ride shares are not required to make any vehicles available for accessible transportation, which taxi licenses are required to do.”
Also, “ride shares enjoy a much better insurance rate with ICBC, over taxi rates which are much higher for the same work,” he said.
Kang said: “The decisions are currently in the hands of our lawyers and we will be meeting with them in due course to consider their recommendations and to decide on a go forward plan for BCTA.”
It’s too late to knock the doors of lawyers when whole Taxi industry could not come on the same page and voice their concerns unitedly.Thanks
Hard to believe that Mohan Kang and the BC Taxi Association…and literally every taxi company in BC, hasn’t been seriously rethinking their business models in the face of an inevitable significant market change. Obvious for many years now that they’ll have to come to terms with competition the likes of Uber and Lyft and yet there is no visible effort. Fighting change in the courts is not a solution for the BC taxi industry. Visionary leadership, radically different service models and an acute awareness of consumer demands are needed, but it appears way too late for that. Looking for a high mileage used Prius? I’m sure we’ll see plenty on Craigslist and Autotrader in the coming months.
Most Taxi companies also have an app similar to Uber/Lyft. I think many passengers dont know that.
Kater should appeal also against PTB.