The government, the parliament and the city council have come to the conclusion that the municipality should set tariffs for Snapp and Tapsi internet taxis
According to Iran digital economy annotation, The increase in the rate of internet taxis, or as some officials say, “confusion and unbridledness” in determining the rate by the platforms that provide internet taxi services, has led to the fact that in the past few months, various authorities and institutions have been involved in monitoring the rates of internet taxis and setting tariffs for this. Follow up services.
One of the constant problems in the field of tariff setting is the uncertainty of the body overseeing the issue of setting rates for internet taxis. Mehdi Chamran, the head of the Tehran City Council, previously on the sidelines of the 158th meeting of the council, while criticizing the fact that other departments besides this council set rates for internet taxis, said: “There should be thought about this and the Ministry of Interior should be notified that the council applies have an opinion; Because it will definitely benefit the people.”
Of course, based on the government’s approval in 2016, the Ministry of Interior and the Ministry of Security have been assigned to deal with the activities of Internet taxis, and in 2019, the guidelines for monitoring Internet taxis have been approved by these two ministries.
Tapsi, about how the tariff and rate setting procedure is, referred to these approvals and announced:
According to Article 6 of the Internet Taxi Supervision Directive, the pricing of online taxis based on dynamic pricing algorithms has been recognized.
In his explanation, Tapsi has also pointed out that according to this instruction, “if the price of internet taxis is higher than the one approved by the city council, this issue must be informed to the passenger, and passengers are currently being informed through the application.”
Despite this, in recent months there has been an increase in pressure on internet taxis and a comprehensive demand from various institutions to change the procedure of monitoring internet taxis and their pricing method. In one of the comments made by Parviz Sarvari, the vice chairman of Tehran City Council, it was announced:
“We believe that there is a kind of unbridledness in the rates of internet taxis, and we also receive complaints from citizens; As we can see, unlike in the past, the fares of internet taxis are constantly increasing.”
The opinion of the members of the city council is that the pricing for internet taxis should be done by the city council and the municipality, just like other services in the field of public transportation. They had promised a few months ago that they will follow up on the issue of determining the tariff-paying body for online taxis.
In response to these comments, the platforms providing internet taxi services have stated that they have been under the supervision of the Virtual Business Union since the beginning, and as members of this union and the businesses they have received from the Ministry of Interior, they should not be subject to pricing by the city council or municipality.
However, the head of the Tehran city council has read this issue as wrong and declared: “The rates of all public transportation means must be determined and approved by the councils; “It is not true to announce that internet taxis have obtained a license from the Ministry of Interior and their union determines the rates.” According to Chamran, if internet taxis receive their fares according to the law, the city council will not have a problem, “but if they abuse people’s rights, we will not give them this permission.”
This issue is the subject of many debates. According to many people, the issue of determining the rate or monitoring of online taxis is a root and fundamental issue that goes back to the beginning of these businesses and from the time of obtaining licenses.
Jafar Tashakori Hashemi, the head of the Transportation Commission of Tehran City Council, called this issue a “deviation” that has occurred since the start of internet service provider platforms. Hashemi says:
“The beginning of this issue goes back to the beginning of the activity of these taxis and the deviation that happened from the beginning with regard to the relevant laws, because there are many laws and regulations that consider the management of cargo and passenger transportation within the city and territory to be the responsibility of the municipality, including Article 9 of the Development Law. Public transportation and fuel consumption management approved by the Parliament in 2007, Article 2 of the Executive Regulations of the same law approved by the Board of Ministers in 2008 and Article 3 of the Executive Regulations of the Law of adding a note to the single article of the law regarding the concentration of matters related to taxis in the city of Tehran under the supervision of Tehran Municipality. which was approved by the Board of Ministers in 1995.“
According to him, the subject of this regulation is not only limited to taxis and the cars that operate in agencies will also be subject to it. Referring to this regulation, this member of the Tehran city council believes that internet taxis should also be subject to this type of tariff.
It seems that the parliament is not opposed to the entry of the municipality into the issue of setting rates and tariffs for internet taxis. Mojtabi Yousefi, a member of the civil commission in the parliament, has recently provided explanations about this issue:
“They may be parts of the transportation sector; We are not exposed to internet trade and business and we have to accept that the way of doing business has changed, but if no one monitors the pricing and exorbitant prices are charged by internet taxis, in addition to passengers, drivers in the field of cargo and passengers in and out of the city are also harmed.”
Yousefi believes that this law needs to be amended, and when it is amended, “in practice, the supervision of Internet taxis will be with the municipality and the council.”
The issue does not end here and before that, the Competition Council has also entered the field of setting tariffs and rates for internet taxi platforms. Esmail Shojaei, the spokesman of this council, criticized the tariffs that are set by two or three companies active in the internet taxi sector and said: “The competition council puts this issue on the agenda to clarify and determine the reasonable amount of the fare tariffs and the received commission. He will enter it after the final summary.”
Despite this, the new statement of the Minister of Interior specified the tariff assignment for online taxis. The Ministry of Interior, which, along with the Ministry of Security, oversees the activities of Internet taxi platforms, has now assigned the responsibility of determining the tariffs of Internet taxis to the municipalities. Ahmad Vahidi, the Minister of Interior, announced in this regard:
“Organizing intra-city transportation is one of the tasks of municipalities, and determining the tariff of internet taxis is also the responsibility of municipalities. We know the municipality as the organization of intra-city transportation and the municipalities should enter in this area.“
Comments and decisions in recent months have led to increased pressure on Internet taxis. The managers of Snapp and Tapsi platforms, as the main players in the country’s internet taxi sector, had reacted to this issue.
Milad Monshipour, the CEO of Tapsi, considered assigning the duty of tariff and supervision to the municipality as granting regulatory powers to a competitor and said: “When the municipality takes over our regulation, our fate will be like VOD and video platforms with radio and television, because taxi drivers The biggest competitor is internet taxis. That’s why we stood up about this issue.”
Despite the stand that Monshipour has pointed out, it seems that the decision to entrust the responsibility of regulation to the municipality is serious and the country’s legislative and executive bodies have agreed to it. An issue that will usually lead to command pricing. An issue that the CEO of Snapp recently warned about the consequences of in a meeting:
“By continuing the policy of prescriptive pricing, we will undoubtedly face the death of innovation. The property of platforms is to create transparency in various areas, especially in the field of pricing. Our defense of transparent and floating pricing is the defense of the technology and knowledge of the world; Because this type of pricing is done based on current world knowledge. Defending prescriptive pricing against floating pricing is a kind of standing against the current knowledge of the world.“
It seems that in the discussion of pricing and setting rates for internet taxis, it is the same as the regulatory issue for active platforms in the insurance field, which has caused challenges between insurance startups and the central insurance, as well as the regulatory issue regarding home viewing platforms, which causes differences between VODs. And satra has created, it brings serious problems.
Although legislation, regulation and supervision are necessary for internet businesses, a serious challenge in the regulatory field is the delegation of authority by the government and parliament to institutions that are traditional actors in these fields and among the beneficiaries, and for this reason are considered competitors of online businesses.
This decision, which seems to originate from an incomplete understanding of the nature of Internet businesses, makes the private sector, which is considered the main driver of Internet businesses and startups, to be monitored and regulated by government institutions that compete with them.
This is while it is expected that the supervisory body is the superior institution of the players in this field so that its rules and regulations take into account the interests of the people in the first place, and in the second place, taking into account the interests of all actors and activists, it leads to the creation of a competitive market. to be
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