Do I get a movie voucher?

/grabs popcorn

no one stands between hardware and his cabbie lovers.

i saw a billboard the other day telling me i could die if i didnt ride with a legit taxi!

uber >>>>>>>> taxilols

i wouldn't piss on a burning cab

Uber is actually a dodgy as hell company, the CEO is an a****** obsessed with not looking like an a****** but apart from that, the rideshare idea is awesome imo... when we get automated cars. Uber hates it's drivers and cant wait to get ride of them.

I don't know how anyone could defend the practices of the cab industry. They made their bed.

this, and the customer is not first, and hasn't been for a long time


while uber might have it's faults, I personally would love to see a scheme like in say london, where you have black cab's are the one's at cab ranks and able to pick up off the street (which I understand is alot harder to do now, because taxi council dont want you just waving them down, WTF)

and then there are "mini cabs" which can only pick up people who call up, and pre book or what ever, it would get more transport out there at time when it is needed, and you could still have some mild cheaper form of tracking, it would also provide some pressure for taxi's to up their game, and provide better service

Give them time. Uber cabs are all vehicles which have been cabs for less than a year. All cars that have only been a cab for that period of time are nice.

But anyway, my main gripe is that the number of cabs in Brisbane was about right anyway. Too many cabs in off peak times and not enough at peak times. Uber just makes this worse and floods the market.

Yes, licences shouldn't be worth as much as they are. But they've been about the cost of an average house since the 1960s.

But my main reason for sticking up for the cab industry is this: my mate in his wheelchair is able to get a cab anywhere, any time at the same cost as me.
All you labor loving, socialist lefties are all bang on about how you hate predatory big business and love taking care of minorities, but as soon as the opportunity comes to make an ethical choice, you're all found out to be a bunch of selfish, spineless mouths.

Yes the taxi industry has it's bad apples. Yes, you should get a better car for your $2+/k. Yes, cabcharge is the devil. But to say that Uber is the panacea for all the taxi industry's ills is wholly erroneous and short sighted.

I was actually murdered in all six of my Uber rides, it was a terrible experience and I am now a ghost who haunts those who say bad things about Uber.

Seriously though, Uber is a top notch service. Best app I've seen for taxi service and beats the ever-living crap out of our current taxi system in both price and promptness. Oh and the drivers actually chat to you instead of on their phones. I've had some wonderful conversations and even rode with a guy who lived down the road from me on the Gold Coast.

I give no s**** about what the CEO of Uber eats or who they f***, I care about the service and right now that is winning.

If I needed a cab, I would give Uber a go.

Aaron...chip in a bit mate.

Its getting awkward.

Yes, licences shouldn't be worth as much as they are. But they've been about the cost of an average house since the 1960s.

I feel like you are trying to make it sound liek its just inflation when house prices have spiralled obscenely.

Uber is fantastic and more people need to use it. I can't recommend it highly enough.

The actions taken by the Taxi Council Queensland are sickening. Cabs really need to shape up or ship out. Their industry is going the way of the Music industry, and they are powerless to stop it, yet somehow think that they can.

Complete and utter idiots.

Yes the taxi industry has it's bad apples. Yes, you should get a better car for your $2+/k. Yes, cabcharge is the devil. But to say that Uber is the panacea for all the taxi industry's ills is wholly erroneous and short sighted.

I was ever-so proud of the good work my lads did at (( computer store X ))


we beat Dell and HP to some nice big projects here in Australia.


still, years later - I pickup work from Dell and HP when it comes along as they'll accept almost any idiot now to perform their enterprise 'hands on' end.


the upside is meeting the clients and building report where and when it suits your personal needs.


hmm.. yep. no one cares how big your last project was



last edited by koopz at 20:12:03 07/Mar/15

not sure you understand uber cabs, pretty sure the car just has to be under 10 years old (could be wrong) but
all the uber cars are not all brand new,

I perfectly well understand. It's 8 years old, and i wasn't saying all the cars were brand new, I was saying they were new to being a cab. Every cab in it's first year is nice. You don't notice those ones. It's the cabs that have been cabs for greater than two years that you notice. Doesn't matter how long it's been since they were manufactured, it's all about time served as a taxi. About three years of taxi life (~510,000km) is about good. For reference proper taxis aren't allowed to be more than six years old from new. Midnight when they turn six they have to be retired.

That's a solid list of things wrong with the cab industry against only one positive.

No, there are many positives. Security cameras. Insurance. Public Liability. Guaranteed service. Priority for Veterans. Criminal Checked drivers.

Uber aren't flooding anything.

Really. You talked to any cabbies lately? I have. I've seen the figures. Uber is out to steal the cream and it's working. The govt purposely regulates the number of cabs allowed on the road, and they are pretty accurate about it. Oh, and it ain't the 'cab industry' that is stuck in the 20th century. The industry is so govt regulated, and it's all done for the safety of the passenger, both in the car, and for the ability to get a cab.

What would be wrong with a world that was all uber and no cabs? Once we answer that, the situation can be resolved.

No-one in wheelchairs would be able to take a taxi. No-one with guide dogs could take a taxi. No-one with a group of more than 4 people could take a taxi.

hardware, you're going to have to elaborate. You're implying the Taxi industry are white knights for the disabled. How exactly? From what I can see, your mate should actually be getting much cheaper fares than you. And he can get a cab anywhere, any time, depending on the availability of wheelchair cabs.

Yes, i wasn't going to mention the TSS because that would complicate matters. But if someone from out of state or overseas in a wheelchair was to need a taxi they can at everyman fares.

If the Taxi industry was to cease tomorrow, do you think its possible the owners of the wheelchair accessible
cabs could sign up to be Uber drivers?

No. The cost to own and run a vehicle that has a wheelchair hoist is prohibitive. The hoists cost several thousand dollars just for one in the back of a van, let alone a custom modify a vehicle. The hoists weigh close to a tonne, which increases your fuel economy something shocking (it's like towing a trailer, constantly). Even just a van is twice the price of a sedan of the same age.

Or do you think another business might step up to fill the requirements for disabled transport? Its almost like if there is a demand, someone will see an opportunity and start a business to fill said demand. I wonder if there is a name for something like that. Its a pretty wild idea!

The idea of burning an entire working industry to the ground and rebuilding it again just to change a few aspects of it? Yep, that is a wild idea.

Why are you people so hell-bent on hating on the taxi industry? Just because you can't pre-pay with a credit card? Just because you had an indian one time who was jerky on the throttle and smelt like india and the cab was dirty? BET NONE OF YOU REPORTED HIM TO MAKE TAXIS BETTER, YOU ALL WANT BETTER BUT YOU AREN'T WILLING TO DO ANYTHING ABOUT IT.

Laws bought with donation money, they didn't just donate to Liberals, Labor recived plenty as well.

Yep, cabcharge are evil. They are a bad, bad corporation hell-bent on lobbying so they can rule the taxi world.

Got no time for jerky throttle, no time at all.

How was the throttle control?

I worked as a taxi driver for about a year from November 2013 to October 2014 with the Sunshine Coast Cab company. Or to be more precise, I was an individual contractor that in effect hired out a cab licensed under the SCC brand and Taxi Service license.

The managing director of the SCC would send out bulletins every week. Mostly just normal stuff but often there would be their efforts to stop things like Uber (which technically are illegal in Queensland).

As a (former) cab driver, I will definitely agree that the prices of taxi licenses are insane and they're generally seen more as an investment than having any real relation to providing a good taxi service for customers or being in any way fair for the drivers.

I worked just 3 shifts a week (12 hours each shift). Some of the drivers were working 5 shifts a week (60 hours a week). Sometimes even more. I worked nights.

Of the total take for each shift I had to give 50% + $8 (for insurance) to the car's operator (person that manages the taxi on behalf of the owner of the car + taxi license and also interfaces with the taxi company).

Out the remainder, I had to pay GST. Here's a useful bit of info: The Australian Tax Code allows businesses that make less than $70000 a year to not have to pay GST. But there is a single exception to that rule. Taxi Drivers. We have to pay GST. So from my nightly takings I make 0.9 * (0.5 * total - $8) (obviously there's no Super or benefits). We also had to pay for cleaning the car ourselves after every shift.

Now as part of the regulations as a taxi driver there's plenty of things I was simply not allowed to do. I wasn't allowed to refuse to take passengers for the reason that they only wanted to go a very short distance. Which could suck when you're first in the rank, there's 5 cabs behind you, you know that the train is due soon and there's likely going to be someone wanting to go from Nambour to Noosa and you get a job either on the computer or a walkin wanting to go 500 meters, and pay with a TSS card and in small coins (oh and please carry my shopping bags).

The absolute highest *total* take I ever made in a single shift was $710. That was on New Year's Eve 2013. Yes, I got a few tips, but the official take after paying what I owed the cab company and cleaning and after GST was
$306.30 for a 12 hour shift (or $25.53 an hour).
However nights like that were the *extreme* exception to the rule.

The lowest the total take was after a full 12 hour shift was $40. Or $4.80 after the necessary expenses. Or 40 cents an hour.

I worked Tuesday, Thursday and Friday nights. My average Tuesday and Thursday totals would have been around $150 each night and Friday night average was around $425. So an average weekly amount after expenses was around $285 or $7.92 an hour. Plus tips of course.

I of course compared what I was making with what others did and I was pretty much average. Once you've been driving for a few weeks you've pretty much reached par. There were some drivers that might have had some passengers that had your number and you might do them off the books, but as you had to account for your $ total compared to your distance traveled you couldn't game it that much. And there was definitely some corruption at play too on the part of the cab company. Company owned cars and the cars of certain other people were far too often awarded the more lucrative jobs on a consistent basis when the regulations were such that they aren't allowed to do that.

But basically, I would be making $8 an hour for 12 hour night shifts during which I had to often deal with drunken passengers. I was fortunate that I was never physically assaulted (well, as in enough to count). Yes, there were some times I was extremely uneasy with some of the passengers but I didn't end up bashed which *did* happen to some other drivers. I also thankfully only had a few effective runners.

It was a common enough occurrence to see on the computer that a driver had activated their distress beacon and cars in the area were asked to assist.

I had my phone stolen once. As I checked my phone so often I noticed it immediately so didn't leave the house of the people that had stolen it. I kept a spare phone with me so I was calling up Optus to get that phone blocked, I had reported it to the taxi company and my next step was to call the police but the guy came out after seeing me still there and handed it back.

But yeah, I was working for $8 an hour with no sort of benefits, at night, and in a dangerous job and with very little freedom to conduct my "business" how I saw fit.

A big shoutout to my Employment Agency that got me into being a taxi driver to get me off their books lol.

Needless to say there's also a lot of racism towards the Indian taxi drivers. Yes, in my anecdotal experience they were more likely to cut corners, cheat on the tariffs (mid 2014 all the meters were replaced to make such cheating impossible by the way) so some of the feelings expressed by passengers I could understand, but some people were just simply racist. There are some that know I'm no SJW, but yes, I was aware of my "white privilege".

The point being... Yes, taxi licenses are incredibly overpriced and exist only as a way for rich people to make money. But at the same time, there are simply far too many taxis on the roads for 95% of the time and the taxi drivers are most definitely *not* getting rich. The only times there was any real scarcity was when the nightclubs closed. And given that the taxis are by law, supposed to be on the road 24/7 (except 1 shift a week) the drivers still had to be there, sitting and waiting for the rest of that time waiting for closing time.

As for Uber? If the prices are "competitive" compared to that of taxis then those drivers will be making jack-s*** too in the long run. It sounds like that they might have more say on who they take and as I believe they pre-pay or something there's not the problem with runners, but yeah, the driver is still going to be stiffed.

Rukh says big words ... Rukh have s*** job.

Rukh use thesaurus to prove smaert? ... wrong.
QED Asha'man was pre-industrial age.
Save them blah!

I was thinking about this the other day.


We live in a national demographic that has an aging population.


Why wouldn't I recommend to my kids that they Uber to that never ending demographic?