80% of Taxi Passengers Say "Fast Dispatch Is Most Important When Calling"

Eight out of ten taxi platform users consider quick dispatch to be the most important factor.

On the 25th, Kakao Mobility announced the results of the "User Perception Survey on Taxi Mobility Culture" to understand taxi usage patterns and identify areas for service improvement. The survey was conducted by Kakao Mobility through the mobile research firm Open Survey, targeting a total of 953 adult men and women residing in the Seoul metropolitan area over a week starting July 26. The respondents were users who had experience with roaming taxis and had called a taxi via a platform within the past month.

Among 800 adult men and women living in the metropolitan area, when asked about inconveniences experienced with traditional roaming taxis (multiple responses allowed), the answers were ▲the process of going out to a main road to catch a taxi (61.9%) ▲unpredictable waiting time until boarding (61%) ▲long wait times for taxi dispatch (59%) ▲ride refusals (56.6%) ▲inability to predict time and fare in advance (48.9%).

Most of these inconveniences were found to have been resolved with the emergence of taxi dispatch platforms. Regarding improvements after using the Kakao T taxi dispatch service, respondents answered ▲predictability of time and fare (85.8%) ▲pickup time predictability (82.8%) ▲payment convenience (82.4%) ▲boarding at desired locations (81.6%) ▲quick dispatch (65%) in that order.

When asked about the most important factor in their taxi ride experience through a dispatch platform, 81.9% of respondents answered "quick dispatch." This was followed by ▲accuracy of destination (51.1%) ▲fare (47.9%) ▲driver friendliness (35.6%) ▲payment convenience (26%) ▲vehicle cleanliness (21.6%) ▲others (0.6%).

Regarding the time periods when users give up on calling a taxi due to lack of alternative transportation options during early morning hours or in outlying areas, the rate sharply increased starting from "3 minutes or more." The rates were 1.4% and 3.9% for 0-1 minute and 1-2 minutes respectively, but rose to 25.1% for 3-5 minutes and 35.6% for 5-10 minutes, showing a steep increase in call abandonment after 3 minutes. This suggests that even when no alternative transportation is available, taxi services that dispatch after 3 minutes fail to meet user satisfaction for those who want quick dispatch.

Meanwhile, a separate empirical study on the "average time taken from taxi call to dispatch completion" showed that Kakao T was the fastest. The results were ▲Kakao T (1.02 minutes) ▲Platform A (1.22 minutes) ▲Platform B (1.46 minutes), indicating that Kakao T was over 40% faster than competitors. Based on the critical "3-minute" mark when user call abandonment sharply rises, the matching rates within 3 minutes were 92.2% for Kakao T, compared to 83.7% for Platform A and 80.1% for Platform B, showing a higher rate for Kakao T.

The empirical study was conducted by separately interviewing 153 adult men and women residing in the metropolitan area who were actually in the process of boarding taxis and analyzing their boarding records.

Ryu Geung-seon, CEO of Kakao Mobility, stated, "It has been confirmed that the platform dispatch market formed through Kakao T has not only enhanced customer convenience throughout the taxi experience but also helps users move quickly with advanced dispatch technology." He added, "We will continue to listen to users' opinions to improve taxi service quality and focus on introducing new features and advancing technology."

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