Rubber meets the road on a Friday night

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 18/12/2017 (2942 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

If Friday evening was a typical experience for a taxi passenger in Winnipeg, it’s not tough to see why there’s growing demand for ride-hailing services such as Uber and Lyft.

Following the city’s approval of a bylaw allowing such services to compete with local cabbies as of March 1, the Free Press sent out a reporter, who was incognito, to get a sense of what passengers deal with on a Friday from 6 p.m. until midnight.

The city was criss-crossed more than 10 times, using both major taxi companies, Unicity and Duffy’s. Cabs were ordered over the phone and through the companies’ apps. Wait times, ease of use, customer service and cost were tracked.

The reporter travelled to downtown, the Exchange District, Corydon Avenue, Osborne Village, Grant Park Shopping Centre, the Centennial Concert Hall and Bell MTS Place in an effort to hit locations Winnipeggers would frequent during the holiday season.

The result: long wait times to order a cab over the phone, drivers who don’t seem to know the city and glitchy apps that occasionally send drivers to the wrong location. Such problems make some users think service can only improve once Uber and Lyft get running.

“I think it’ll be easier to get a ride. We’ll have more options. Competition makes everybody better,” said Curtis Nolan, who takes a cab a couple of times a month.

“If the cab companies aren’t picking someone up at the right time, at the right place, for the right cost, then an Uber guy is going to come in and get that ride. It wouldn’t matter to me (using a cab or Uber), it’ll be about cost.”

Nolan’s sentiment was echoed by many riders who were interviewed throughout the evening. Not one of a half-dozen people said Uber’s arrival would be a bad thing for the city.

One of the most common complaints was that taxi drivers don’t seem to know where they’re going, or take a longer route to boost the fare.

The reporter experienced this first-hand, when a cab was ordered at Grant Park mall around 8:30 p.m. for a trip to the downtown arena. When the driver arrived at the mall, he couldn’t find the correct pickup location, so he circled the parking lot for five minutes, within view of the reporter.

Eventually, the driver called the reporter on his cellphone, and was directed to the pickup location. Then, the driver did not seem to know the best route to get to Bell MTS Place. He asked the reporter what route he’d like to take, and was told to take the quickest one.

The driver did not take the shortest route, and spoke on the phone using headphones during the entire trip. The reporter was dropped off near the arena at 8:56 p.m. and paid $13.60.

Using the Unicity app to order a cab was troublesome. On two occasions, the app’s GPS tracking feature registered an incorrect location for the report. As a result, the driver was sent to the wrong address for a pickup.

The first time this happened, the reporter realized the app’s mistake and called the company to correct the location. The reporter was on hold for seven minutes when the driver called, forcing the reporter to drop the original call (losing his place in the queue). When the driver was told about the app’s mistake, he became angry with the reporter, hung up and cancelled the ride.

The second time a driver was sent to the wrong location, the driver was notified and adjusted his route. During the trip, the reporter asked the driver questions about the app — in particular, the GPS feature. The driver said the app regularly gets the pickup location wrong.

While Unicity’s app has more features, they often didn’t work properly. The Duffy’s app does not have a GPS-tracking feature, which means users have to punch in their pickup address manually. While that won’t be a big deal for many users, it could prove problematic for visitors or people who are new to the city.

Both apps had a number of glitches, which is reflected in the online reviews for them. For example, the reporter was unable to select a payment method when using the Unicity app.

According to Dwayne Fiwuk, who says he takes a cab a couple of times a month, the reporter’s experience would have been worse if he’d stayed out past midnight.

“The cab companies in Winnipeg aren’t bad till about 1 a.m. After that, however, you can’t get a cab. The service just keeps getting worse later in the night,” Fiwuk said.

“I think Uber will be good. People will have more options as the drivers get busier. Anything that will provide quicker service will be good, especially around the earlier hours. I always find it’s difficult to get a cab at that time.”

Overall, the reporter’s experience with the two cab companies was similar in terms of cost and customer service. The telephone wait times were lengthy, and continued to get longer as the evening wore on. Using the app tended to be quicker than placing a call.

While a handful of drivers were friendly and talkative, others did not speak to the reporter and carried on conversations on their phones throughout the drive.

While the service provided was similar when a cab was ordered over the phone, the experience with the apps was worse with Unicity.

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Meanwhile, Winnipeg taxi companies are seeking a court injunction to block the introduction of ride-hailing services. They are also suing the provincial government, arguing the value of cab licences has dropped 75 per cent.

The cab companies claim the province acted in bad faith when it passed legislation in November to pave the way for more competition by disbanding the Manitoba Taxicab Board and turning over regulation in Winnipeg to city hall.

The statement of claim filed with the Court of Queen’s Bench also levels discrimination charges against the province. The plaintiffs claim the province violated the Charter of Rights and Freedoms by not respecting the rights of taxicab licence holders.

They suggest the government is unwilling to compensate cab drivers for their losses because they are new Canadians, and 90 per cent are Sikh.

ryan.thorpe@freepress.mb.ca