<story><title>UberCab Ordered to Cease And Desist</title><url>http://techcrunch.com/2010/10/24/ubercab-ordered-to-cease-and-desist/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>corin_</author><text>Maybe I&apos;m just misinformed but... basically they&apos;re running a taxi service without a license to do that, then acting surprised when the city calls them on it?&lt;p&gt;There&apos;s a taxi company I use whenever I&apos;m in London called Addison Lee, and they&apos;ve done the same as UberCab - using nice technology to know where you are, where the nearest available cars are, how long it will take for a car to get to you...   In actual fact, at least based on &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.ubercab.com/learn&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http://www.ubercab.com/learn&lt;/a&gt;, AdLee is better: it has all the benefits of UberCab, plus they tell you the price of the journey before you book the car (it won&apos;t become more expensive if you get stuck in traffic, or if the driver takes a longer route), which always works out cheaper than a black cab, in my experience. Oh, and in adition to letting you pay with the credit card on your account, you can chose to pay by cash if you so wish.&lt;p&gt;Anyway, my point? Seems that Addison Lee have been (albeit in a different city/country) doing what UberCab is doing, slightly better, and for quite a bit longer: and they actually bothered to pay to be a licensed taxi provider, meaning that the London officials don&apos;t have a problem with them.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>sutro</author><text>I believe the loophole they operate under is that the ability to pick people up randomly on the street in SF requires a license, but picking people up who call ahead is simply a car service and not subject to taxi licensure. The fact that UberCab has made doing the latter effectively as easy and convenient as doing the former is indeed a challenge to the old guard, whom you can bet is working behind the scenes to close the aformentioned loophole as quickly as possible.&lt;p&gt;Taxi service in SF is truly horrible and is ripe for disruption. I hope these guys win. Go UberCab!</text></comment>
<story><title>UberCab Ordered to Cease And Desist</title><url>http://techcrunch.com/2010/10/24/ubercab-ordered-to-cease-and-desist/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>corin_</author><text>Maybe I&apos;m just misinformed but... basically they&apos;re running a taxi service without a license to do that, then acting surprised when the city calls them on it?&lt;p&gt;There&apos;s a taxi company I use whenever I&apos;m in London called Addison Lee, and they&apos;ve done the same as UberCab - using nice technology to know where you are, where the nearest available cars are, how long it will take for a car to get to you...   In actual fact, at least based on &lt;a href=&quot;http://www.ubercab.com/learn&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;http://www.ubercab.com/learn&lt;/a&gt;, AdLee is better: it has all the benefits of UberCab, plus they tell you the price of the journey before you book the car (it won&apos;t become more expensive if you get stuck in traffic, or if the driver takes a longer route), which always works out cheaper than a black cab, in my experience. Oh, and in adition to letting you pay with the credit card on your account, you can chose to pay by cash if you so wish.&lt;p&gt;Anyway, my point? Seems that Addison Lee have been (albeit in a different city/country) doing what UberCab is doing, slightly better, and for quite a bit longer: and they actually bothered to pay to be a licensed taxi provider, meaning that the London officials don&apos;t have a problem with them.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>tkalanick</author><text>Ubercab is not a taxi service and does not own or operate limo vehicles. We simply connect consumers with existing Limo Drivers. We do make sure that all limo drivers that connect are properly licensed and have the appropriate insurance.</text></comment>