A local ride-hailing service can’t beat Uber and Bolt, so its drivers are beating up their rivals
restofworld.org
Shesha was launched as a fair-minded local competitor to Western companies in South Africa. It has acquired an ugly reputation for intimidating drivers and passengers.
  • Siegfried@lemmy.worldEnglish
    6·
    10 days ago

    This happened in Argentina for a long time too. They did a lot to prevent uber from taking market from the taxi mafia.

    Credit cards were not allowed for a long time and while taking an uber you would generally be asked to sit on the front sit to act as if this was a friend driving you or something.

  • RubberDuck@lemmy.worldEnglish
    6·
    10 days ago

    History doesn’t repeat but it does rhyme. A lot of this kind of stuff happened in the taxi world in the Netherlands and other countries, leading to heavy regulation of the taxi branch.

    Intransparent pricing, price gouging customers, violent conflicts between taxi companies. Then the tech bros came in, started trying to offer rides by unlicensed drivers, using whatever vehicle the driver had, called it surge pricing and tried to claim the rules did not apply to them.

    And now you see some places have come full circle.