Taxi Hailing via Incheon Local Currency Platform... Lower Fees than KakaoT

'e-eum Taxi' Pilot Operation from the 8th
Taxi Industry App Payment Fees 1.2~1.4%
Automatic Payment with Incheon e-eum, 10% Cashback

Incheon e-Eum Taxi Call Flowchart [Provided by Incheon City]

[Asia Economy Reporter Park Hyesook] A service to call taxis through the local currency platform (Incheon e-eum) has started in Incheon.

Incheon City announced that it will pilot operate the public taxi platform "e-eum Taxi" from the 8th to reduce the commission burden caused by the local taxi industry's subscription to private taxi platforms such as KakaoT and to enable citizens to conveniently use taxis.

e-eum Taxi allows Incheon e-eum users to call taxis by clicking the "e-eum Taxi" button on the main screen of the Incheon e-eum platform without installing a separate app or going through a membership registration process. Users can also receive a 10% cashback benefit when using the service.

e-eum Taxi is a public taxi platform introduced to prevent the adverse effects of monopolization by large corporations such as Kakao Mobility in the taxi industry.

In the case of KakaoT, in addition to payment fees, affiliated taxis pay 3.3% of monthly sales, non-affiliated taxis pay a membership fee of 39,000 KRW per month, and passengers are also charged call fees. On the other hand, e-eum Taxi lowers the payment fee to 1.2~1.4% and does not charge any other fees such as call fees or membership fees.

According to the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport's "Taxi Call App Status" data, as of the end of August this year, 92.8% of taxi drivers nationwide (226,154 out of 243,709) and 98.8% of taxi drivers in the Incheon area (13,318 out of 13,458) use the KakaoT platform.

The city plans to promote the e-eum Taxi service step by step, with the first phase being a pilot operation through the current Incheon e-eum operating agency, and in the second phase, which will begin after selecting the operating agency through a public contest next month, the taxi call service will be included as an additional service of Incheon e-eum for the main project.

An official from Incheon City said, "e-eum Taxi will lower commissions compared to private taxi platforms and increase user benefits through cashback to build an ecosystem where both small business owners and consumers can coexist," adding, "We will continue to discover citizen-friendly additional services so that Incheon e-eum can establish itself as the national representative local currency platform."

Meanwhile, Incheon e-eum currently has 1.62 million subscribers and has surpassed a cumulative issuance amount of 6.8 trillion KRW.

Incheon City has temporarily expanded the e-eum card cashback benefit, which was up to 4%, to a maximum of 10% since March this year to revitalize the local economy, which has been stagnant due to the COVID-19 pandemic. In particular, for this month only, as part of participating in the "2021 Korea Sale Festa," the 10% cashback limit for Incheon e-eum was raised from 500,000 KRW to 1,000,000 KRW.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.