NEW LOGOS, SAME DRIVERS: FOR A SAFE RIDE TAKE FLYWHEEL TO SB 50

FLYWHEEL TAXI SUES THE CPUC

Flywheel taxi filed a lawsuit in Federal Court last week against the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) for unfair business practices.

The main complaint is the "uneven manner" in which the CPUC is regulating "e-hail taxi companies (i.e. Uber, Lyft & Sidecar). "The CPUC," the complaint asserts, "in-behind-the-door negotiations allowed these services to obtain a state license that they have since used to circumvent all established municipal taxi rules"

"Flywheel Taxi’s suit seeks injunctive and declaratory relief against the CPUC for the CPUC’s assertion of jurisdiction over e-hail taxi companies, which has prevented municipal agencies from applying the same rules to e-hail taxi companies that are applied to traditional taxi companies, resulting in an unfair two-tier system of regulation that has created an unlevel playing field for on-demand transportation companies."

Hansu Kim (photo), President of Flywheel Taxi, said,

“Calling these new taxi services ‘ride-sharing’ is the height of irony. It’s a type of Orwellian doublespeak intended to make people feel good about them. I mean, who is against sharing? But there isn’t any sharing going on. These are venture capital backed commercial businesses trying to skirt regulatory requirements. This lawsuit is intended to make sure everyone gets to compete while playing by the same rules.”

In a telephone interview, Kim clarified this by saying, 

"Taxicabs are being treated unfairly in terms of rules that we have to follow compared to the e-hail taxi companies ... regulators either have to treat us equally under the law – where we all are regulated similarly – or, if they want to deregulate the industry, then they have to deregulate all of us." 

Flywheel is not suing for money but rather a change in laws.

"All we're asking for," Kim says, "is to be able to compete on an even playing field. ... If we have that I know we can succeed. ... I'm not afraid of technology or new services or competition – I'm all for it. This is about making sure that they have the same costs and provide the same insurance and standards of safety that we do. Even a company like ours that is incredibly innovative and progressive is not going to thrive in an environment where the competition is allowed to endanger the public with cut rate insurance, 3rd rate background checks, phantom vehicle maintenance and zero driver training."

Regulate all or regulate none," Kim concluded, "but don't regulate some."

For a list of regulatory differences between e-hail taxis and real taxicabs, and a copy of the suit – click below.

Uber & Lyft's Attacks on Fingerprinted Background Checks

Uber made the SF Examiner last week for being against fingerprinted criminal background checks. As usual the venture capitalized corporation (VCC) is being given too much credit. Its VCC rival, Lyft, is also against fingerprinting – maybe even more so than Uber.

In any case, the arguments that Uber & Lyft made against fingerprinting before the California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) hearings for regulating TNCs are almost identical.

I had intended to take part in the latest hearing but I wasn't able to do get my comments together in time. Instead I'll make my arguments here.

Since my favorite TNC attorney is Lyft's General Council Kristin Svercheck (Photo 2012 ), I'll mostly be using her reply comments from the CPUC proceeding (1) for my own comments.

Why Fingerprinting?

Fingerprinted background checks are considered to be the best practice by law enforcement agencies throughout the world including: the FBI, the NSA, the CIA, the US Department of Homeland Security and INTERPOL.

Why? From One Standard for All, “A fingerprint-based check is the only way to verify a person's identity and ensure that criminal records found (if any) are for the right person."

Why? From The History of Fingerprints,  "Fingerprints offer a reliable means of personal identification. That is the essential explanation for fingerprints having replaced other methods of establishing the identities of criminals reluctant to admit previous arrests."

Why? From an INTEERPOL forensic symposium,  "Since a person’s fingerprints are unique and do not change during the course of their life, they can be used to quickly and efficiently confirm or disprove a person’s identity ..."

The main exceptions to this are few rare diseases that affect only a few extended families word wide. The odds are over 3 million to one against a person having these diseases. 

The simple truth is that the best, quick way to know that a person is who they claim to be is fingerprinting.

Lyft's Arguments Against Fingerprinting

According to Councilor Svercheck

"Fingerprinting is not necessary to ensure public safety."

Just to clarify: What she is saying is that the technique that is considered the best way to identify people with criminal pasts – especially people convicted of sexual, violent or dangerous driving crimes –  by the FBI, INTERPOL et al is a waste of time.

If one is going to undermine or disprove a method that has been shown to be effective millions of times by the world's leading experts in identification, one would think that one would have to come up with very strong evidence. You know –  statistics, body count comparisons, etc. 

So what does Lyft give us?

"There is no evidence that ... current TNC background check requirements are not adequate and effective."

A double negative? This is the kind of argument used by attorneys on Law and Order when they are defending the Mafia.

Once again, it should be up to Svercheck to prove that TNC background checks are as effective a deterrent to crime as fingerprinting – not the other way around.

On the other hand, I never suspected the General Council of having sense of humor. I stand corrected for, when it comes to proving that Uber and Lyft's methods don't ensure public safety, the evidence is seemingly endless. It's hard even to know where to start?

How about the Uberx driver with the reckless driving record who killed Sophia Liu? 

Or, the City of Houston's investigation into Uber & Lyft's back ground checks by the FBI which found "several drivers with prior criminal histories including indecent exposure, DWI, prostitution, fraud, battery, assault, robbery and aggravated robbery?"

The investigation was started after an Uber driver who raped an intoxicated passenger was found to have spend 14 years in federal prison. "Houston said that the driver would never have passed its fingerprint-based background check conducted by the FBI."

Or, the Uber driver who exposed himself to a female passenger and was found to have numerous past crimes and traffic violations?

Unfortunately, I could go on and on.

Instead of fingerprinting, Lyft uses "privately administered background checks based on Social Security numbers."

Svercheck spends a lot of time explaining a complicated process but I don't feel the need to waste much ink listing her arguments. Instead,  here's a quick listing of the weakness of name and social security based checks from Mentor – a national mentoring partnership.

• A person can provide a false name and social security number. Over 1% of the 45 million individuals in the FBI criminal database have used over 100 aliases and false Social Security numbers.
• People can have two or more different last names if they have been married more than once. You can miss a criminal record if you only have one name.
• Criminal databases can have mistakes in the spelling of person's name or other relevant information.
• You can have "false positives" where a person appears to have a criminal record because of a crime committed by another individual.

Mentor goes on to say that "A fingerprint-based check is the only way to verify a person's identity..."

In addition, of course, we all know that that social security numbers are constantly being hacked and stolen in various ways. What I didn't know until today was that there are websites to help people create fake social security numbers and identities.

Finally, we have an Uber driver explaining how to get around background checks in ValleyWag,

“[Uber's] background check is done through a third party called Hirease. It consists of filling out your name, address, DL & SSN online. That's it. Every taxi company I worked for required drug screening and livescan fingerprinting at the local police department before being issued a taxi driver permit. … One person could fill out all the info and hand off the approved account to another person. You can't do that in the taxi world ….”

I wonder if it would be possible for a person to file off his or her fingerprints and get job at Lyft? Judging by my own experience of applying to drive for Lyft I think so. One could wear gloves during the 3 minute personal interview. Si, no problema.

This is turning into a bigger project than I anticipated. Council Svercheck apparently thinks than an accumulation of bad arguments will somehow equal one good one. We shall see.


Notes:

(1) REPLY COMMENTS OF LYFT ON ASSIGNED COMMISSIONER AND ADMINISTRATIVE LAW JUDGE’S RULING AMENDING THE SCOPING MEMO AND RULING FOR PHASE II OF PROCEEDING OF RULEMAKING 12-12-011
June 8, 2015

Why People Use Flywheel & Taxicabs Instead of Ubers or Lyfts

Customer response to the Flywheel taxicab app have been overwhelmingly positive. The number of people using the app grew 6X over the last year despite limited funds for advertising.

This fact has been ignored by all forms of media so I thought I'd write about it myself.

I've gotten most of my information from talking with over a hundred of my taxi and Flywheel customers. The following ideas and comments come from these ad hoc interviews.

A major reason why Flywheel is becoming more popular ...

Thoughts on Flywheel/Desoto

Desoto is changing its name to Flywheel and within two months the old blue & white Desotos will all look like the above pic. The first cabs are already on the street.

Flashier, no?

Brilliant, yes!

The new color scheme acts as an advertisement for the app and the app is advertisement for the company.

However, a bit of confusion and hostility surrounds the change.

First the Confusion

Drivers at other companies who use the Flywheel app are apparently worried about losing rides. They shouldn't be.

Part of the agreement between Flywheel management and Desoto Owner Hansu Kim is that that orders will continue to be dispatched in the same way that they always have – the ride goes to the closest cab regardless of company.

What Desoto is counting on, according to part owner Matt Gonzales, is an "upsurge of advertising" that will cut into the TNC's market share and hopefully spread the wealth to everyone.

There some evidence that this is already happening. According to former Flywheel manager Sachin Kansel, the number of Flywheel orders has gone up six times over the last year. 

Flywheel also has recently picked up several investors and a new CEO Rakesh Mathur who intends to use the money to advertise and expand the Flywheel brand across the country.

In addition, former Uber and Lyft customers are coming back to Flywheel because the TNC drivers are generally inept and don't know where they are going. The refusal of Uber and Lyft to fingerprint their applicants or train their drivers guarantees a continued flow of thugs and incompetents into the future. 

As Flywheel becomes a more widely known brand we'll be getting more and more riders back – plus new riders who can now get cabs because of Flywheel in neighborhoods where they couldn't before.

In addition, Hansu Kim says that Flywheel is working on a new version of the app that will do things that Uber and Lyft apps can't. A current example of that is the ability to make advance airport reservations.

Now the Hostility

Luxor and Yellow Cab companies don't like it. Well ... of course they don't. The idea is bold, innovative and creative. As the leading dinosaurs of the taxi industry, John Lazar of Luxor and Nate Dwiri of Yellow have been doing everything they can to help themselves, and the industry, become extinct.

They are the ones who killed Open Taxi Access over four years ago. As you might recall, the SFMTA had allocated $405,000 to set up a universal app in all the taxis and John Lazar reputedly went backdoor to his former school mate and then buddy, Major Ed Lee, causing the measure to mysteriously disappear from the MTA's agenda.

At the same time, Yellow was feverishly holding back radio orders so that they could petition for more cabs. Let me spell this out: They were deliberately giving bad service so that the City would give them more medallions.

When Uber et al attacked and the dinos finally realized that taxi apps were the future, instead of embracing Flywheel as the de facto universal app, Dwiri had a relative design a Yellow app (that works about as well as the old Yellow dispatching system – that is to say, badly), and Luxor continued to back Taxi Magic – a dinosaur in its own right.

Even to this day, when Yellow can't begin to fill its shifts, they still keep drivers waiting two or three hours to start work so that Yellow can extort more money in tips. That there might be a relationship between their treatment of their drivers and the dwindling numbers of same has apparently never occurred to Yellow management.

Whatever – If it hadn't been been for the geniuses at Luxor and Yellow, Uber and Lyft would never have taken the market-share that they have.

BTW – Uber came out with a "study" that saying they did $500 million in business in San Francisco last year while the taxi industry only took in $140 million. But Flywheel calls this bullshit (don't blame me for the crudeness. I don't use such words – in print.) The actual figure should be $400 million for the taxi business.

A Few Problems

One is that the Flywheel paint job does not make it clear that the taxi also takes flags and credit cards. In addition, the cabs I've looked at don't have the advertising space on top. That space could be used as part of a campaign for Flywheel/Desoto and against Uber – could be much effective than a bus because taxies go more places.

Another is that Flywheel has a website and blog that is slick and up to date but, as an advertising tool,  could be more effective.  The contrived pic in the blog makes it look a little too much like Lyft light.

There are also continuing problems with the driver support system such has holding drivers off the app for various minor reasons. I personally am not sure what all their rules concerning accepting orders and cancellations are.

Sachin Kansal and Steve Humphrey have moved on ("happily" they say – Humphrey upped his investment in Flywheel). Therefore, it seems a good time for the new management to meet with the drivers and take a look at some of the policies that might be changed, clarified or improved.

Taxi Myopia Blues

I offer this photo as a balm to those who've taken umbrage at my comparing San Francisco taxicab company owners to dinosaurs. I think this analogy is more accurate. Besides, it also applies to many cab drivers (far too many) as well.

Let start with the owners.

One could write a fat, non-fiction novel on the short-sightedness and petty greed of the people running S.F. cab companies – especially Yellow and Luxor. But for this article, I'll restrict myself to their opposition to an universal app or Open Taxi Access (OTA).

When John Wolpert first introduced Cabulous in 2010, it should have been obvious to anyone with an entact frontal lobe that, if adapted throughout the taxicab fleet, the app had the potential to both drastically improve service to the neighborhoods and create business for the drivers.

Flywheel Amps Up II

In this post I want to address a few concerns and clarify some aspects of the Flywheel app.

My information comes from a recent Town Hall meeting where CEO Steve Humphreys spoke as well as from conversations with Humphreys, Chief Product Officer Sachin Kansal and Head of Operations Ryan Nobrega.

Let's start with a few things drivers hate:

The 10% Solution

Director Hayashi had a plan B.T. (before tncs) where the city would pay for all credit transactions with a $0.25 - $0.30 fee for all passenger. But this probably is not workable in our current scenario where we're being underpriced by the competition.

Flywheel is a for profit company and has to charge something. They have credit processing fees, payroll, rent, marketing, R&D and other costs to cover. I have no idea what their bottom line is but I would like to see a fee closer to 5%.

I bought the subject up to Humphreys. He hinted that they might be able to lower the percentage if they could lower their processing costs or if the volume of users drastically increased.

One positive is that, unlike Uber, Flywheel does not take a percentage of the tips. This means that the actual percentage of a driver's gross is closer to 8.5%.

Flywheel Amps Up Together with the MTA

Cab drivers are worse gossips than small town sewing circles so let's start with a few rumors.

One had it that Uber had bought out Flywheel. A more recent canard claimed that Flywheel changed its name from Cabulous to get "cab" out of the title because they intended to begin a peer to peer taxi service ala Summon.

I spoke with CEO Steve Humphreys (photo left) about this and he said that Uber would buy Flywheel "over my dead body." He also said that he had no interest in starting a ride-share operation because he thinks that taxis will win out in the long run. Insurance and the superiority of trained taxi drivers over untrained amateurs, in his opinion, will carry the day.

Humphreys, a man with an engaging smile and infectous enthusiasm, agreed with the thought that once the accidents start adding up, "the other options won't look so attractive."

Flywheel Partnering with the SFMTA

Starting tomorrow, June1, 2014, Taxi Services will be running a series of advertisements boosting the taxicab business in which Flywheel will get prominent mention.

This, course, is the brainchild of Director Christiane Hayashi who was the person who first introduced Flywheel (then Cabulous) to San Francisco taxi drivers almost four years ago.  Humphreys has been working closely together with Hayashi and Director of Transportation Ed Reiskin to make the marketing effort pay off.

The promotion will go at least through June and possibly longer.

Jamming the Streets with Lyft, Sidecar, Uber & the Illegals

Taxi Services investigator Eric Richholt invited me to ride with him and his partner Andres Martinez so I could photo & videograph the gridlock caused by a couple of thousand unregulated, fake cabs on the Friday and Saturday nights.

"You wouldn't believe it," he said. "People should see this."

"Is it worse than last time we went out?" I asked.

"Oh, yeah."

Uberx, Sidecar & Lyft Blow More Smoke

Today's lesson in sophistry comes from the dynamic TNC trio's defense of requiring their customers to sign terms or agreements waiving their liability rights ( The Warmth of the "Sharing Community" vs Lyft & Sidecar's Terms of Service) before being allowed to ride or drive in one of their vehicles.

As I've said before, excluding space travel, Uberx, Sidecar & Lyft offer the only forms of public transportation – bus, shuttle, taxi, limo, airplane or train - where passengers and drivers must waive their rights to collect compensation for negligence before getting into a vehicle. 

TNC spokesmen, while not addressing my statement directly, give four main arguments in favor of compelling their customers to sign these agreements: 

1. That the terms are standard for software companies.
2. That the TNC'S are app and not transportation companies.
3. That the liability limitations only apply to software problems.
4. That taxi apps like Flywheel and TaxiMagic also have similar terms for their passengers to sign.

Number One 

The argument is that because somebody else does something it's cool for you to do it too. (i.e. "Why should I have insurance? He doesn't.") Here the argument goes that because software firms deny liability to their customers, it's okay for Uber, Sidecar & Lyft to do the same. This, of course, avoids the question of whether or not this is a good idea at all. There are two ways in which I think it is not:

1. This is essentially a way to avoid taking responsibility for a companies' services or products. There was a time when companies were proud of their creations and backed up the quality of the things they made with guarantees. This is clearly not the case in today's "innovative" software world.

 Thanks to the TNC trio, I've started reading terms and agreements before I download anything and it's not a pretty picture. Almost all computer based companies – Apple, Adobe, Netflix, etc –  do indeed deny liability for most forms of negligence on the part of their products, services or employees.

 How does this work out in practice? A friend of mine spend three years traveling, researching and writing a book that ended up on a Mac Air. Her computer froze and the password was forgotten. It turns out that Apple will not allow the owner of a Mac to re-set her or his own password.

Since there was no way to override the password, we took her Mac to Apple's "Genius Bar" and asked them, three separate times, not to do anything that might erase the data. They said that this was extremely unlikely to happen but made my friend to sign an agreement that waived liability before they would do any work. They also promised to avoid using any procedure that might lead to losing her data. Then, the "geniuses" took the computer and erased her book.

Of course it could be argued (and repeatedly has been by her) that my friend should have backed up her work. In addition, she has recovered some earlier versions from other places and there is a possibility that people smarter then Apple's "geniuses" may be able resurrect the book.

Nonetheless, it was Apple's bizarre rule of not allowing Mac owners to re-set their own passwords that ultimately lead to the destruction of my friend's data.  Grounds for a suit?

2. In any case, the obvious difference between Apple's and Uber, Sidecar & Lyft's denial of liability is the fact that the TNC's expose their customers, not to data loss, but to injury or death – conditions from which people don't always recover.

Number Two 

The TNC'S claim that Uberx, Sidecar & Lyft are just software companies that connect passengers and drivers. 

I think the easiest way to dispute this is to note the difference between taxicabs and (for the moment) the illegal passenger transportation networks run by the dynamic trio.

Legal taxicabs will be on the streets of San Francisco regardless of whatever app or dispatching service they may or may not be using.

TNC vehicles ONLY WORK THROUGH TNC APPS. 

If the Uberx, Sidecar & Lyft apps did not exist, the TNC vehicles would not be rushing around in traffic. They'd just be private cars, mostly parked at home.

Number Three 

The TNC's came up with the argument that their limitations of liability only apply to the TNC customer's software especially for the CPUC's Party Meeting. At least I hadn't head it before.

All I can say is that this not clear from reading the TNC's terms and conditions. 

Does this sound like the TNC'S are ONLY talking software?

1. YOUR USE OF THE SERVICE.
2. 
   
3. SIDECAR DOES NOT WARRANT, ENDORSE, GUARANTEE, OR ASSUME RESPONSIBILITY FOR ANY RIDE YOU REQUEST OR PROVIDE THROUGH THE SIDECAR SERVICE, NOR DOES SIDECAR WARRANT, ENDORSE, GUARANTEE, OR ASSUME RESPONSIBILITY FOR ANY PROPERTY DAMAGE, INCLUDING TO YOUR VEHICLE, PERSONAL INJURY, UP TO AND INCLUDING DEATH, THAT OCCURS AS A RESULT OF THE RIDE OR YOUR USE OF THE SERVICE.

Or this?

LYFT HAS NO RESPONSIBILITY WHATSOEVER FOR THE ACTIONS OR CONDUCT OF DRIVERS OR RIDERS. ... RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE DECISIONS YOU MAKE REGARDING PROVIDING OR ACCEPTING TRANSPORTATION REST SOLELY WITH YOU. IT IS EACH RIDER AND DRIVER’S RESPONSIBILITY TO TAKE REASONABLE PRECAUTIONS IN ALL ACTIONS AND INTERACTIONS WITH ANY PARTY THEY MAY INTERACT WITH THROUGH USE OF THE SERVICES. LYFT MAY BUT HAS NO RESPONSIBILITY TO SCREEN OR OTHERWISE EVALUATE POTENTIAL RIDERS OR USERS. USERS UNDERSTAND AND ACCEPT THAT LYFT HAS NO CONTROL OVER THE IDENTITY OR ACTIONS OF THE RIDERS AND DRIVERS, AND LYFT REQUESTS THAT USERS EXERCISE CAUTION AND GOOD JUDGMENT WHEN USING THE SERVICES. DRIVERS AND RIDERS USE THE SERVICES AT THEIR OWN RISK.

But, then, I'm not a lawyer.

Number Four

The TNC smoke about Flywheel and Taxi Magic's terms and conditions being similar to their own is true but misleading. The difference is the difference between a legal taxi and the illegal cabs sent out by Uberx, Sidecar & Lyft. 

San Francisco taxicabs are already fully insured for $1,000,000 with primary insurance by the taxi companies. And, the driver is protected by Worker's Compensation.   If a taxicab driver is negligent and in some way harms a customer or a pedestrian, the customer is clearly covered by the company's insurance. Therefore it is unnecessary (and might be confusing) for taxi apps to also cover the same taxis.

The vehicles used by TNC drivers, on the other hand, are privately owned and covered by personal liability insurance with coverage that can be as low as $15,000 – $30,000. Furthermore, the drivers are falsely told by Uberx, Lyft & Sidecar  (in the words of the later), "Because this is ridesharing, special insurance is not required..."

However, the Personal Insurance Federation of California (PIFC) at the hearings on ridesharing last spring stated, "The issue before the CPUC is not ridesharing, but instead using a private passenger vehicle in a livery service. This is clearly not covered under a standard policy; if an accident occurs, coverage would not exist." 

(BTW. Despite the fact that the CPUC has since agreed with the PIFC's position, the TNC trio continue to give their new drivers the same fraudulent information.)

Uberx, Sidecar & Lyft, of course, now have their famous $1 million excess liability policies with coverage that "... begins when a Sidecar (etc) driver has accepted a ride through the passenger app and continues until the passenger exits the vehicle at the end of the ride."

The excess policies do not cover collision. Nor do they cover the driver or any third party like a pedestrian while he or she working as a TNC but doesn't have a customer. 

Uberx, Sidecar & Lyft have led the public to believe that the TNC driver's personal insurance will automatically take over the moment the driver drops off the customer. This is almost certainly not true for two main reasons:

1. When the TNC driver is looking for rides, he or she is still working as a commercial driver and thus: "If an accident occurs, coverage (under a personal liability policy) would not exist."
2. More important, not to mention more interesting, is the fact that personal liability insurance companies almost certainly will not insure a vehicle for personal liability if it is being used as a commercial vehicle at all.

This is based on a truism culled from hundreds of years of insurance underwriting experience. The truism question in goes, "If people can cheat, some of them will."
(See News From the Lyft Lounge).

It would often be impossible to tell if a TNC vehicle was being driven commercially or not. In the words of the PIFC, "Tracking if accidents have occurred involving such vehicles is difficult, as the insurer will not always have the knowledge that the passenger paid for transport." Or, I might add, looking for a passenger to transport.

In any case, I researched the question (see next post for details) by asking 10 different insurance companies if they would write personal insurance for Uberx, Sidecar & Lyft vehicles if they were covered by a $1 million per incident excess insurance policy. All the companies I talked to said that they would NOT write personal insurance policies for Uberx, Sidecar or Lyft vehicles – excess insurance policy or not.

This puts the TNC driver in the bizarre position of being insured ONLY while he transporting passengers. And, his personal insurance appears to be voided the moment he or she agrees to do so.

There is also a conflict between the limitations in TNC's terms of service and the $1million policies that Uberx, Sidecar & Lyft do provide

 "DRIVERS AND RIDERS USE THE SERVICES AT THEIR OWN RISK,"Lyft Terms.

SIDECAR DOES NOT WARRANT, ENDORSE, GUARANTEE, OR ASSUME RESPONSIBILITY FOR ANY RIDE YOU REQUEST OR PROVIDE THROUGH THE SIDECAR SERVICE, NOR DOES SIDECAR WARRANT, ENDORSE, GUARANTEE, OR ASSUME RESPONSIBILITY FOR ANY PROPERTY DAMAGE, INCLUDING TO YOUR VEHICLE, PERSONAL INJURY, UP TO AND INCLUDING DEATH, THAT OCCURS AS A RESULT OF THE RIDE OR YOUR USE OF THE SERVICE.

What do we believe? The assurances of CEO's John Zimmer and Sunil Paul that their insurance policies (insurance policies that they will allow nobody except the CPUC to see or read) will cover everything and everybody; or, do we believe the limitations that Zimmer and Paul's own attorneys have written into the terms that they require all their customers to sign?

In any case, excluding space travel, Uberx, Sidecar & Lyft continue to offer the only forms of public transportation – bus, shuttle, taxi, limo, airplane or train - where passengers and drivers must waive their rights to collect compensation for negligence before getting into a vehicle. 

Flywheel at the Town Hall

Ever since Flywheel took over Cabulous six months ago, they've done wonders marketing and expanding the use of their product. A faithful core of customers has begun to use the app. Many people are switching back to taxis from Uber.

However, Flywheel has started pursuing policies that are undermining its successful flourish. One of these is its insistence on only accepting payment through its app on smartphones and refusing to take cash. Another is its draconian practice of holding drivers out of service if they cancel a ride for any reason whatsoever - despite the fact that a major reason for such cancellations is the inaccuracy of the app's GPS system.

The new management also has an attitude problem.

• When Flywheel came to sign up drivers at Desoto, one young recruiter kept nervously calling everybody "man" and adopting an antiquated, hip lingo whenever he spoke to a driver. He obviously thought that he needed to speak to us in our native, ghetto tongue because we wouldn't be able to understand English.
• I spoke to another recruiter about being shut off their system for a week. "It's because you've been bad," he said. He was only half joking.
• When Flywheel announced their nixing of non smarphone payment options, they claimed they'd done surveys of both customers and drivers, and that everbody enthusiastically embraced the idea. I met one of the women who did the survey and she said that, yes, most of the customers liked the idea. But nobody did a driver survey. If they had, they would've found out that 80% of the drivers like the cash option. Does Flywheel believe that we're so stupid that they can tell us what we think?

In sum, Flywheel is being run as an top-down organization that treats cab drivers less like customers than like the students at the Catholic Military High School (appropriately named "Cretin") that I (left photo) got myself thrown out of fifty years ago.

On top of this, the app has features that make it difficult to use. Instead of automatically calculating the price of the ride, the driver has to punch in the figures. This slows everything down and naturally leads to mistakes. Furthermore, the customer interface is not intuitive. Many of my passengers have trouble figuring out how to call or send a message to the driver. This can be a major problem because of the aforementioned GPS inaccuracy. I once was given an address at 1800 Divisadero when the order was actually at 2700 Sutter - four blocks away; five if you take one-way streets into account. This was their most spectacular miscalculation but major errors are common. 

I called up Director Chris Hayashi and, without going into too much detail, told her that there were problems with the app and asked her if she could arrange a sit-down meeting with Flywheel's brain thrust. What I had in mind was something like the ballpark workshop. What we got instead was Vice President of Marketing Jason Dewillers (lead photo).

At the Town Hall

Hmm, I made that sound like a put down, didn't I? Not fair. Vice President Dewillers was articulate, personable and well spoken. He listened carefully to the opinions of people in the room. He also told us that Flywheel had already corrected a major problem with the app. Kudos.

Dewillers actually agrees with cab drivers that Flywheel should allow a cash pay option. Unfortunately, he said that he was voted down on this by the majority of their board. So, as much as I enjoyed his presentation, I would have preferred talking with the board members who are anti-cash.

Why not talk to them now?

• Regular Flywheel customers have told me that they are going to quit using your app even though they like the service because of the anti-cash dictum. Some are people in cash businesses like waitressing or bartending. Others don't want every transaction in their lives tracked.
• The customers I talked with were more than willing to pay you a fee for the use of the app. So all you'd have to do is put a credit card on file and charge them for the ride no matter which option they choose.
• There are also drivers who only want to accept cash. Of course, there is a potential problem of a driver insisting on cash from a customer who wants to pay via the app but I can see two solutions for this:
• Have the app notate how the rider wants to pay when the order is put out.
• Put the driver out of service if he or she accepts a ride with the auto pay option and later insists on Cash.

Flywheel certainly has no difficulty holding people out of service. Dewillers told us that he turned the app off for two customers who'd paid cash and two drivers who had demanded to be paid in cash. Indeed, they almost cut me off. 

For some reason (possibly a miscue by me) the app wouldn't allow me to put the figures in for a ride. No matter what I tried, the app would not flip to the input page. I finally cancelled the ride and took cash. The next morning, I listened to a voice mail where a young Flywheel techie threatened to fire me.

Is this a workable economic model?

• Is it wise to limit the number of your customers and drivers that use the app?  Especially when your company is trying to gain market share.
• Is it smart to turn down cash when it would give you a competitive edge on Lyft, Sidecar and Uber?
• I've been using the Cabulous/Flywheel app since it came out and I've probably taken as many orders as anyone. I've also talked several hundred of my passengers into trying your service. Do you really want to rid yourselves of drivers like me because we take cash once in a while?

As irritating as the "no cash"policy is to many drivers, this annoyance is minor compared to their feelings about Flywheel's punitive urges. At one point, Dewillers wistfully spoke of Lyft's ability to discipline their drivers, forgetting that Lyfters have little choice for making money except taking dispatched orders.

My feeling on this subject is that there are no end of venues for discipline in San Francisco and that Flywheel brain-thrusters would be better off availing themselves of these services than threatening taxi drivers who, if they'd think about it, are their most essential customers.

A number of taxi drivers won't even consider trying the app because of Flywheel's punitive policies. Others, like myself, are simply using the app less frequently. I'm not going to take a call unless I'm certain that the GPS won't lead me into gridlock.

Almost all drivers want Flywheel to modify its decree. The most popular idea is to have a time limit where the driver can cancel the ride without penalty. The passenger has two minutes to cancel. Giving the driver one minute to do so would probably solve most of the difficulties. However, it appeared to me that Dewillers wasn't interested in this solution.

To be fair, taxicabs create a problem for app makers that Lyft, Sidecar and Uber don't pose. The so-called NOETS do steal flags from time to time, but they make far more money by taking dispatched orders. With taxis, whether a call is better than a flag depends on the situation. What an app maker (or anybody trying to build up a dispatching service) does not want are too many drivers taking orders then canceling, which loses business.

In my opinion, the best solution is the one-minute cancellation option coupled with creating a culture of drivers who realize that taking orders builds up the business and thus, in the long run, makes them more money. As it turns out Dewillers had a different solution in mind at the Town Hall which, needless to say, he didn't bother to discuss with us.

What's wrong with it?

When I went to work last Tuesday, the Flywheel app was no longer giving cross streets. It simply gave the complete address of the order.

This is what happens when you put a gaggle of geeks in a room who know technology but don't fully understand the complexities of the problem to which they are applying it. I'm sure they thought they'd come up with a brilliant and elegant solution. It takes care of the GPS difficulties while allowing Flywheel to maintain its culture of punishment.

"Elegant" and "brilliant,"  are not the words that popped into my mind when I realized what Flywheel had done, and the ones that did are better left unsaid. This "solution" is bad on so many levels that I don't where to begin. Let's start with first idea that pops into my head:

• A certain type of driver will decline the order then rush to pick it up anyway and make the customer pay cash.
• This will create no-goes for the drivers who take the orders and annoy many of the customers.
• And, Flywheel won't even know who did it: they won't even know who to chastise.
• It doesn' t actually cure the GPS accuracy problem. It makes it worse. The GPS often gives the wrong address. At least we used to have some idea of what neighborhood the order was in. Now there's no clue. 
• Asperger's syndrome geniuses may be more common in the taxi business than in other professions but there still are probably less than two dozen San Francisco cab drivers who can match up street numbers with cross streets for the entire city.
• So many streets start off at angles from Market or Columbus and the like that is little uniformity in the numbers.
• It's difficult to remember where the numbers on minor streets start or finish.
• It's hard to know where many alleys are without the cross streets.
• Of course I do know where the numbers are on many major cross streets so I can tell you that 1700 Vallejo crosses Franklin and that 3000 Baker is close to Chestnut. But what are the numbers at Vallejo & Baker and where is 1800 Baker?
• I count 11 (or is it 12) streets between Franklin & Baker so it's 2800 or 2900 Vallejo.
• I had an order on 1800 Baker and guessed Pine for the cross when it was actually California. One block wasn't much of a difference in this case, but it could've been if it was a one-way street.
• I suppose that doing arithmetic all night could be a good method for fighting off Alzheimer's but is it something I want to do or should be doing when I'm driving a cab?
• Knowing the cross streets is essential. It determines the routes that a diver can take at various times of day. It means getting to an order faster and easier.
• Giving the cross streets is supposed to be a function of a taxi app. Are we supposed to use our own GPS to discover where the numbers are?

Flywheel doesn't have worry about firing me.

I'm about to fly off on my own. I'm pretty much done with them. They've accomplished the almost impossible feat of alienating one of their biggest supporters - me. I've made a living for thirty years without their app. I don't need the aggravation.

From now on, I'll only take orders when I know exactly where they are, and I'll blow off the rest. And, the ride will have to be very close because I won't know whether some other driver is already racing to it or not. Currently, I don't accept hails longer than 5 minutes away downtown and 8 minutes away in the neighborhoods. I'll probably cut that time in half.

One thing is certain: I hope that Hayashi changes her mind about making Flywheel and Taxi Magic the only games in town. Talk about being between a rock and hard place! Taxi Magic doesn't even have tracking and the biggest company supporting their app charges their drivers a fee to use it. Does the Director of Taxis Services actually expect these guys to make San Francisco cabs competitive with Uber?

I think it's essential to leave the field open to other apps so that we can bring in a company that has the brains to develop their software in conjunction with the people who use it. Then we'll finally have a taxi app that both customers and cab drivers will want to use.