Cab Services Dataset

Aim:

Supply and Demand gap analyses on Uber Cab services.

Introduction:

 Uber Technologies, Inc, commonly referred to as Uber, is a transportation conglomerate that mainly provides taxi services where individuals can hail a taxi (Uber) in an app on their phone. The company, based in San Francisco, provides ride-hailing, food delivery, package delivery and freight transport in the United States and across the world.

See you there: access to rides at 700+ airports

Request a ride to the airport. In most regions, you’ll also have the option to schedule an airport pickup or drop-off in advance.

Problem Statement:

Uber is an app-based transportation network and taxi company. In its airport rides in a particular city, many of its users face the problem of cancellation by the driver or non-availability of cars.

These very issues impact the business of Uber and it loses out on its revenue.

 

 

Approach:

The primary approach is to use EDA operations like univariate and segmented univariate analysis to identify problems and tackle it.

Using the data set available, we make use of R, a statistical computing program to perform various EDA (Exploratory Data Analysis) operations and hence find out the results.

Problem Statement: Pickups from the airport are half of the number of drops to the airport.

Approach: Our core problem resides in the activity of the number of the pickups from the airport which are not at par with the number of drops. We’ll be majorly focussing on increasing the number of pickups in the solution.

Assumptions:

• The number of passengers flying out of the city (airport) is comparableto the number of passengers landing in the city
• All data is over a fixed period of time (Undefined: day, week, month)

Pre — Analysis: 

The problem of a smaller number of pickups from the airport has two aspects to it. Uber is an aggregator of demand and supply. Demand-side is the riders who use the app to book cabs and supply side is the cab drivers registered with Uber. To form our solution, we’ll be focussing on both the demand and supply side of the business activity.

 

Methodology:

Initial Analysis: Understand the dataset given. Look through its structure, identify the datatypes of various columns and get a basic idea of the dataset to proceed further.

Data Cleaning: Look out for visible data quality issues and rectify them. Check for blanks, duplicate data and convert certain columns to required datatypes.

Exploratory Data Analysis: Making use of R, carry out various EDA operations like Univariate and Segmented Univariate analysis and come up with intuitive insights of the Supply-Demand problem.

Visualization: Make use of ggplot2 package to plot various graphs with proper aesthetics and geometry, clearly displaying important insights.

Analysis (Data sheets pertaining to it):

1. In this plot, we see that the time slots between 5.00 to 9.00 and 17.00 to 21.00 are particularly busy with more demand.
2. It is also seen that between 5.00 to 9.00 time slot, there are a greater number of cancelled cabs.
3. Between 17.00 to 21.00 time slot, there are a greater number of “No Cars Available”.

4. To carry out further analysis, we create time slots based on the number of trips.

5. From our observations from previous plots, we notice that the times between 5.00 to 9.00 and 17.00 to 21.00 have high request and hence are of our interest.

Insights:

Uber is an on demand transportation service which has brought a revolution in the taxi industry all across the world. The business model has made it possible for people to simply tap their smartphone and have a cab arrive at their location in the minimum possible time, leaving a lot of budding startups yearning for an App like Uber and wondering how Uber works.

Uber is one of those few tech companies in the world that has been valued over $70 Billion. Uber has already received an equity funding of $22.2B and is present in 633 cities worldwide. These facts surely show the trust of investors in the business model and make it easy for us to imagine how much revenue will the organisation be making once it attains liquidity.

In this post, we have highlighted some unknown facts and figures along with a detailed explanation about the model by which Uber earns money and how uber works. Uber’s customer segments, value propositions, key problems, solutions, cost structure and revenue model have also been discussed. For budding entrepreneurs, we have catered to the rise of ‘uber for x’ startups and what you should be looking for in this space.

Recommendations:

Deregulate fares

City hall currently sets the fares for all taxis, including the drop rate and per kilometre costs. Uber sets its own rate, depending on type of service and takes a commission of up to 25 per cent.

The report recommends that street-hailed rides still be regulated, but individual taxi brokerages be allowed to set their own rates if the ride is pre-booked.

Uber uses a controversial surge-pricing model, where regular rates can be doubled or tripled or even more when demand is high and the supply of cars is low. But the consumer must consent to increased rate, or have the option to decline.

By deregulating fares, taxi companies would have every chance to compete — and a taxi brokerage could bring in surge pricing, if it wished.

Cashless transactions

Fare evasion is a constant threat for taxi drivers, which leads to drivers profiling passengers, being selective of who they pick up or avoid certain neighbourhoods they consider high-risk. And passengers increasingly worry about becoming victims of fraud if they use a debit or credit card for their ride, due to banking information being copied with point of sales terminals.

Licensing

All drivers need to be screened with background checks, with the same rules for everyone, with the city doing periodic audits. All vehicles must be inspected before it is taken on the road, with inspections permitted at any mechanic shop. Flexible licensing fees are needed — one for the company and another for drivers. In Calgary, drivers pay a yearly licensing fee of $220 and companies pay $1,753. In Edmonton, Uber has an annual fee for $70,000 and drivers pay 6 cents per trip.

Training

Toronto’s taxi drivers must pass a full-time 17-day training program to become licensed, and then take a refresher course every four years. Meanwhile, UberX drivers watch a short online video, though they receive instant feedback on their service as passengers rate their drivers.

The city should set the criteria for a basic training program, but leave it to the taxi brokerages or companies such as Uber to provide the training. Requirements could vary depending on the number of hours a driver is working.

Insurance

Every vehicle must have appropriate insurance, but barriers need to be removed to allow for new products or hybrid products to cover UberX drivers. At the same time, commercial insurance for taxicabs, which can range from $4,000 to $7,000 a year, should be lowered. Policies should be developed to allow for co-operative fleet insurance that rewards drivers with good records with a discount.

Conclusion:

Modern consumers are innovative; prefer convenient, comfortable, faster, safer and cost-effective travellers. The innovative and tech-savvy behaviour of consumer now a day helps to download the mobile application of online Uber cab services. It helps to book a car/cab/auto-rickshaw online for easy comfortable traveling in cities. The present study tried to examine the factors of customer experience and uses of online Uber cab services. The findings indicated that, Uber services are more convenient and faster, provides good cab service at a very effective cost. The availability of offers & discounts, behaviour of drivers, quick booking of the cab were the most influential factors of Uber services. As the study focused on demographics of Uber cab users, it has been concluded that female customers have good experience of services in terms of well qualified and well behaviour of drivers during their traveling hours whereas male customershave good experience in the on-time pickup and drop and overall good services.