Taxis in Kolkata go hi-tech with Ola Taxi service

Taxis in Kolkata have gone hi-tech as the cab service Ola has inducted yellow taxis in its fleet of cars. These taxis will run on meter and the fares will be same as that of normal taxis with an additional Rs 10 charged extra as convenience fee.
This has been reported in telegraphindia.com dated 29 August 2015.
Ola has kicked off the service with 1,000-odd yellow Ambassadors and blue-and-white Swift Dzires and Amabassadors (AC and Non-AC) – all its drivers have been provided with smartphones.

To avail of the Ola Taxi service - yellow as well as the blue-and-white ones (AC and Non-AC) – one must necessarily be in possession of a smartphone. He can book a cab through a taxi icon on the bottom right of the Ola app homepage.
Everything is same as that of other app-based service providers like Uber – the person who books the cab can know the approximate distance at which a taxi is stationed and, once a ride is confirmed, the details of the driver will be displayed – like his name, phone number and taxi number.
These cab services are gradually gaining popularity and regular cab operators are feeling the pinch because they used to go on sudden strikes on any pretext putting travelers to a lot of inconvenience. They used to dictate terms and exploit the travelers – especially, if he was new to the city. And – they enjoyed the support of political parties. However, all that is changing due to the emergence of cab services like Ola and Uber.
(Image courtesy wikimediacommons.org)


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