Taxi Driver Online

Reply moved from private mail as it's possibly of general interest.



All systems basically work the same but the "fastest finger" method went out with the Ark.

Essentially, the town is broken down into areas and these are then treated like large taxi ranks.

Jobs go out automatically to the top car in the area providing the vehicle is suitable.

If there is no car, the system usually looks in the immediate surrounding areas to find one.
(This may be the nearest or the one that's been waiting the longest depending on how the system is set up to work.)

If it still can't find a car, then it broadcasts to all cars allowing the drivers to bid for the job.
After about 15 seconds, it again makes a decision based on a similar set of rules.

Hope this helps.

Bill

Under Mercury would (if it wasnt "disabled") being on automatic allow any car to take a job the same way?

do job details go first to allow users to decide?

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Of all the things ive lost, i miss my mind the most

I would guess that most systems would just give the pick up zone. if the full job details came out before the driver had accepted the job it would lead to cherry picking. you are either available for a job or you aren't.

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Grandad,

Our system works like this... only displays distance to the customer... you accept or not...

Our system (MTData) uses the "fastest finger" approach. Drivers can bid for work up to 1.5 miles from where they are, or further if there are no drivers in that particular area. The road name and area is usually the only information displayed, though if it's a very long road then the first digit of the number may be included.
Edit: to clarify the whole system is not based on fastest finger, only the cover channel where jobs go if there's no drivers in the immediate area.

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Sometimes the most telling information comes from what's not said...

So I assume you are talking about autocab here.

Why was I sat in 1st after dropping down from 7th on Friday and there was 8 cars behind me in the area. (all hang out in this central area fyi)

A guy asks to get in. I say no. Pre book only. He then calls from outside my car. Told he will have a car in a minute.

I wait for my screen to flash. Still wait.......

STILL WAIT...!!!!!!

Car pulls up and takes him to town.


I ring the office. Office say it is a system error.


I called bullchit.

They sighed and hung up.



This puts me into the world of quickly learning that we are all FED and STARVED whenever the office feels like it.

Bill is from Datamaster, not Autocab.
In the situation that you describe it is more than possible that you would not get the job. We have noticed that when on Auto, the system "balances" out work so you could be clear 1 but you have just had 2 or 3 jobs and someone could be clear 2 but not had a job for a while so they get that job even though you would think it would come to you.

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Grandad,

It’s always difficult to say without the full information but if you were first car in the area and the customer was standing at the side of you then irrespective of which system you’re using, you should have got that job.

Pulling or bidding from nearby areas is normally only done when there’s no car in the area and only then will it send either the nearest car or a nearby car that’s been waiting the longest. You could have been sitting in a complete dead spot for the equipment but then you wouldn't have seen your rank position changing so I’d say that the system was probably on manual dispatch.

Over the last twenty years or so we've spend huge amount of time developing systems that are balanced to be fair to drivers while providing a quick service to the customer. It really miffes us off though that having gone through all this, we find many users choosing not to bother using this and sticking to the old way they've always used.

I think you probably got that right!!!

Bill

If that car was on a 'no job' then they'd be first in the queue despite your datahead saying you were first (their datahead would also say they're first or have an asterisk to indicate it).