Stiff competition from rideshare and taxi booking apps like Ola, Uber, and Lyft has created serious challenges for the taxi and transportation industry. Thanks to their mobile apps, hailing a taxi is now just a tap away! Conventional taxi businesses are hence facing the harsh brunt as their customers are shifting towards these app-based cab hailing services which offer a much better cab booking experience.
While many taxi and cab companies are still stuck with inefficient phone call bookings, competitors and aggregators are using real-time mobile booking channels. Statistics suggest that taxis lose at least $20 million on an everyday basis just because passengers are unable to find a cab.
‘Call me a taxi’, in the 21st century has changed to ‘App a taxi’. The interaction between drivers and passengers are now virtual and everybody is looking for rapid mobility services. Investing in taxi app development to build a mobile booking channel is has become a critical business decision for taxi operators.
What is mandatory for the augmentation of any business is to embrace the new technologies. In the age of smartphones, not having a mobile booking channel will have a huge opportunity cost. Even in a small fleet of about twenty-five cars, a mobile app can take your business beyond the conventional. It helps the passengers connect in real-time with your fleet. Some of the advantages of having a mobile app for your taxi business can be enlisted as below:
- Visibility
Having a whitelabel mobile app gives your taxi business a broad visibility and an automatic customer boost. For example, tourists commonly use search engines to find taxi services whenever on vacation. Most of them carry turn to their smartphones to find a taxi or cab. Therefore, taxi businesses that do not have a mobile app stand to lose out such customers.
- Higher Profits
Many taxi operators and drivers who have worked with popular aggregator apps have complained about heavy commissions and declining perks. This is one of the reasons why many cab operators opt out of aggregator platforms in the long run. However, a taxi service provider can develop his or her own app and save on commissions paid to cab aggregators. They can also choose to work with cab aggregators and have their own mobile app for an omnichannel strategy.
- Leverage Automation & Reduce Costs
By putting a taxi booking app in the hands of your customers and connecting them to your drivers in real-time via a driver dispatch app, your taxi business can smartly grow in autopilot mode. This offers a better booking experience for your customers by reducing ETAs and more, enhances driver performance and reduces the overhead costs generated by managing everything manually.
How much does a taxi app development solution costs?
A typical taxi app solution consists of branded taxi booking apps for customers, booking apps for drivers and a power web-based admin panel to manage the operations. Coming to the big question – how much does all this cost? Well, it depends! There are multiple factors that have to be factored in. The design costs, the choice of platforms, the functionality and features to be added, the complexity of these features, the customization and branding requirements, custom integrations and many more. We encourage you to talk to our taxi app solution experts to get a quote as per your business requirements.In a nutshell, a whitelabel taxi app would:
- Enhance customer experience by reducing booking time.
- Reduce the operational costs.
- Streamline the business operations.
- Improve driver productivity and revenues.