The evening of November 16, Tik-Tok passenger Ms. Cui said in a network posting, due to Tik-Tok travel network car driver violation of cross-platform orders, she jumped out of the "Tik-Tok network car. The use of the account is suspended until the processing is completed.
This incident has not yet been finalized.
The incident has not yet been finalized, but it has served as a wake-up call for online car rental companies that have been making strenuous efforts to expand in a high-profile manner since the second half of this year: no matter how the landscape of the online car rental industry changes, safety is the "1" in front of all the 0's.
Pre-payment and violations
There are some differences between Tik-Tok's and the passenger's statements, as well as the passenger's own statement, which was made by Ms. Cui.
For the Nov. 16 online trip, Ms. Cui called it a carpooling mess, but Tikta said in its statement that Ms. Cui rode in a hitchhiker. For the difference between the two, Tik-Tok travel sources only told the "China Times" reporter to the official response shall prevail. However, the reporter saw in the Tik-Tok Travel APP, Tik-Tok only has two modes of capacity: hitchhiking and cab. In the hitchhiking mode, Tik-Tok allows passengers to carpool, and will return a portion of the money to the passenger after the success of the carpool.
Additionally, unlike Ms. Cui's claim that "jumping out of the car is a key detail, the Tik-Tok platform gave a response that said, "According to the platform back to the owner of the car, the owner made it clear that he quickly pulled over, and then the passenger got out of the car, and the sound of the door and the door closing can be heard on the recording, during which the two sides also have heated words of conversation. .
The key players in the different representations of the platform and the passenger are all online taxi drivers who carpool across platforms during the evening rush hour.
The timeline released by Tik-Tok shows that Ms. Cui posted a request for a ride before 6 p.m. on Nov. 16, and at 6:08 p.m., the pickup driver said the carpool passenger was a user of another platform, which Ms. Cui said was unacceptable. The two sides had a verbal argument, and then the owner said that passengers do not agree with the carpool can get off. The passenger refused to get out of the car and called the police, the owner agreed.
6:10, the passenger in the car called Tik-Tok customer service, said the owner of the violation of multi-pooling, rushed himself off, asked the platform to verify. Customer service to confirm the safety of passengers, said the platform does not allow the owner to take orders across the platform. Since then Tik-Tok instead of the passenger alarm.
A net car driver told the "Huaxia Times" reporter that there are indeed some drivers on multiple platforms, at the same time, after the release of hitchhiking trips across the platform to take orders for carpooling, "hitchhiking single is very cheap, combined with more than a piece of a kilometer. Drivers pull a person can earn back the gas money, pull two people earned. Peak time earn more. But he also believes that the driver across the platform to take the wind single is not easy, "it is not possible that another passenger just waiting for you on the side of the road, more than a few kilometers around the road first up the passenger will not agree. In addition, the platform have big data monitoring, will find the trip is not right.
And for the Tik-Tok travel driver "hard", the driver believes that this mainly stems from the Tik-Tok travel prepaid mode, "Tik-Tok generally pull a large single, at least 20-30 kilometers. Whether or not the passengers get on the car, quarrel or complaint, the money has been handed.
Difficult to restrain the driver
The driver who is the key to the current dispute is still silent. In fact, the safety of hitchhiking has previously been a concern. And judging from the penalties currently announced by Tik-Tok, the driver cannot continue to pull orders on the Tik-Tok platform until the dispute is resolved, in addition to being deducted travel points.
Tiktok did not announce the specific deduction amount, but the "China Times" reporter saw that the initial score of Tiktok driver behavior points for a full 12 points, each violation of the deducted points in 90 days will be automatically restored. The first behavioral points deducted to less than 0 points will be punished with a 15-day ban, while the second behavioral points deducted to less than 0 points will be permanently banned.
Among the list of violations listed by Tik-Tok, the one that has a certain degree of relevance to this dispute is "bad language and behavior that seriously affects the other party's travel experience," which will result in the deduction of six points, and a 15-day ban on receiving orders for violating the owner's ban. "During the carpooling period to take other means of transporting other passengers at the same time, will only be deducted three points, prohibited from receiving orders for three days.
If you consider the word "threat," which appears in Ms. Cui's article, Tik-Tok's regulations state that "suspected fraud and threatening the personal safety of the person who is riding with them is subject to a deduction of 24 points and a permanent ban.
But a number of online taxi drivers, when asked by a reporter from the China Times about the seriousness of deducting traveling points, all agreed that the impact of deducting points on the driver is not great. This may be one of the reasons why some drivers still violate the rules even though they know that the platform does not allow cross-platform orders.
Another online taxi driver told the "China Times" reporter, with his past experience, usually points deducted from the platform will just reduce the single, or "as much as send some small single, only to be consecutive points deducted, or deducted to a certain number of points will not be allowed to get out of the car. "But can go out after the car, continuous pull a few days, pull enough singles points will come back.
Behind this, the driver has become the meat and potatoes of the various online car platforms to compete. After all, passengers can rely on diversion, but there are drivers to have capacity, capacity to fulfill orders.
According to the "China Times" reporter, after the drop APP was taken down in July this year, Meituan, Cao Cao. Gao De and many other online car platforms have taken a variety of incentives to attract drivers to station.November 18, the "China Times" reporter in the Meituan taxi driver APP also see, new driver registration can still be 7 days free of commission, in addition to inviting the new driver can be rewarded and other activities. Under the strong subsidies, many drivers choose to join multiple platforms at the same time.
Capital-driven changes
Along with the hot recruitment of drivers by several online taxi platforms, capital has also become a driver of changes in the online taxi industry.
A clear example of this is the record-breaking financing of online taxi in the second half of this year. in early September, Cao Cao Travel announced that it had completed a 3.8 billion yuan round of B financing. The financing was then dubbed the largest single domestic financing received by an online taxi company since 2020. But in late October, T3 Travel's 7.7 billion yuan financing announcement directly doubled that record.
But they ultimately can't get around the battle with DDT.
Established in 2014, Tic-Tac travel, previously wanted to preempt the drop to become "the first share of online car travel. However, its road to market is not smooth. In April this year, Tikta travel in Hong Kong stocks for the second time to submit a prospectus, but the "Huaxia Times" reporter in the disclosure of easy to see, at present the document has been in a "lapsed state, can not be accessed. Tik-Tok travel in October last year for the first time in Hong Kong to submit a prospectus, also passed the six-month validity period.
November 18, Tik-Tok travel related sources told the "China Times" reporter that the listing application lapsed is the normal mechanism of the Hong Kong IPO, more information is not convenient to comment, all to the official notice shall prevail.
From the data disclosed in the updated prospectus in April this year, the plate of Tik-Tok travel is not big. 2020 full year, Tik-Tok travel operating income increased from 581 million yuan in 2019 to 791 million yuan. And in the $9 billion of total travel transactions, Tik-Tok occupies $8.1 billion, accounting for up to 90%. The prospectus also cited Frost & Sullivan's research report that Tik-Tok is China's largest hitchhiking platform by number of hitchhiking rides in 2019, accounting for 66.5 percent of the market share.
In terms of profitability, Tik-Tok Travel lost 756 million yuan in 2019 and 2.194 billion yuan in 2020. However, after adjustment, the net profit of Tik-Tok Travel in both 2019 and 2020 is more than 300 million yuan.
The prospectus shows that the average monthly active users of Tik-Tok Travel App in 2020 is about 15.3 million. The data released by the net economic and e-commerce research center shows that the monthly activity of Tik-Tok App in December last year was 55,751,800, and on the list of monthly activity of mobile travel that it listed, only the second place in the current period Ha_ has more than 10 million monthly activity, and the others are less than 10 million. The above-mentioned online taxi drivers also told the Huaxia Times reporter that after the DDT APP was taken down, they felt that the orders were reduced compared to before. But among all the net car platforms, although DDT deducted the most, but also the most orders.
An insider in the Internet industry, in exchange with the reporter of the Huaxia Times, believes that in the future, Ticktock, Shouqi, T3 Travel and these companies will still make an effort in the single line of business, such as hitchhiking and special cars. "In the next two to three years, the market is still very much a test of the profitability of travel companies.
Responsibility Editor: Huang Xingli Editor-in-Chief: Han Feng