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1. 

   asha chaudhry January 15, 2014, 7:19 am

   pawan,

   I LOVE THE NAME CHARPAHIYA!!!! and this is a very interesting question!

   let me see – there was a rodinhooder who runs a taxi service in delhi if i’m not mistaken – i’ll try to connect you two. perhaps he could share his perspective and give you some insights.

   some basic questions:

   for case #1, have you done groundwork on whether any of these 400+ cab service providers would want to be a part of your database? i’m presuming here revenue would come from commission from the cabbie service providers? 

   and in case #2 – your revenue would come from the customer or the cab service or both??!! 

   pls share a little more info about your environment for others to offer you suggestions. is there any such other website that provides a solid database for cabs or would you be the first to solve this problem in patna? have you conducted a survey amongst your target audience? 

   check this quick survey abhik has done for another rodinhooder – https://www.therodinhoods.com/forum/topics/what-do-you-want-in-life

2. 

   Bodhisattwa Biswas January 15, 2014, 3:41 pm

   Pawan,

   nice idea…and of course the name ‘charpahiya’ is very catchy.

   Anyway, what I think regarding your first idea — if you gonna implement this way, it will still be a offline booking system basically. It’s just that the customer is gonna get the details for offline booking from your website. Whereas your 2nd idea seems more fascinating. But for that you should go for good groundwork initially, because I think it would be difficult to get all the service providers under your umbrella. So you might wanna check at first whether you could meet up the customer requirements to an acceptable extent with the service providers agreed to work with you. If you are targeting to generate the revenue from only the customers, then it might be a bit easier to implement initially. But in that case I doubt whether the revenue would be enough to sustain your project in long run. That’s why IMHO at first it’s better to go for a target people survey considering these points, if you have not conducted one yet.

   AND All The Best for your endeavor…

3. 

   shreyansh baid January 15, 2014, 5:23 pm

   How about recruiting drivers of your own …..and deploying them with fleet owners…revenue sharing on mutual agreement…you will have better control and fleet owners will be tension free..

4. 

   Pawan Kumar January 15, 2014, 5:31 pm

   Dear Biswas, 

   Thanks for your suggestion. I have done some survey and discuss the second concept with around 7-8 service provider those are working properly in patna. Some of them are appreciating my concept and want to become a member. Some of them are not assuring me for last minute booking unless i will assure them for business of 1-2 lacs per month. Also a price war is main factor. I want a win-win situation for everyone me, service provider and as well as consumer. 

5. 

   Pawan Kumar January 15, 2014, 5:50 pm

   Dear asha, 

   Thanks for showing your interest. At first i would like to tell you that Bihar is growing as tourist hub and in last five year there is huge growth in tourist numbers. There is approx 15+ flight landing and also 200+ trains arrived to patna daily. Apart from these, there has been conducting huge number of seminars and meeting in patna. These numbers are continuously increasing. So there is huge space to in.

   apart from Google, Just dial & sulekha, i think i m only one who is thinking a database only for car booking. I m not taking a survey among target audience. But i m preparing for it and will do with in 1-2 weeks.

6. 

   asha chaudhry January 16, 2014, 3:40 am

   pawan,

   pls ping jitender – he is the co-founder of TaxiPixi.com – he is keen to connect with you!

   https://www.therodinhoods.com/profile/JitenderKumar

7. 

   Pawan Kumar January 16, 2014, 5:59 am

   Shreyansh, 

   Thanks for your opnion. it is mark-able.. Surely i would like to implement this. 

8. 

   Abhinav Prashant January 16, 2014, 10:04 pm

   Hi Pawan,

   First of all congrats for the impressive name “Charpahiya”. 

   As you have mentioned in your question that there are more than 400+ service providers who are offering cab services for both local as well as for outstation trips. My First question is for you is that have you done any market research for the same? If yes then i would like to answer your first business model in which you are talking about the site having the database of all the cab driver. If you will go through this business model then how will you insure the customer that if you will choose “XYZ” Cab services then the services will be 100% upto your expectation level. The Travel agent may start overcharging the customer and again the pain point will be same because you are not owning the vehicle and the listing which you are doing may or may not interest them.

   According to me you should focus on the 2nd business idea in which in the early days you should only tie up with the selected travel agent and start dealing directly with the customers. Once you will start getting good number of bookings you can increase the no of travel agents. (This will help you in creating your own brand image in front of customers)

   There are few things which you have to keep in minds while starting this business as you will completely rely upon the third person for your business so kindly go through the below points and try to come up with an answer:-

   1  If you don’t operate on your own how you ensure your usps?

   2. What is the way through which you will manage the competition?

   3. If you will take a cut money over prices proposed to you by operators – how you will be price competitive?

   4. Will you use GPS? How the cabs will be monitored on any route? (In these Days Safety is the biggest challenge). 

   5. What will be sla for cab drivers/owners and what type of agreement?

   6. Like you contract with drivers/cab chains and start getting booking from clients, how will you match and fulfill the requirements – how payment/back office satisfied. 
   
   

   These are the basic questions which you have to deal with in the early days. Travel industry is one of the best industry to start your career with so if you have made your mind to start the charpahiya.com then go and do a market research and start working on the same.

   If you need any help you can reach me any time. My name is Abhinav Prashant and i am the founder of Delhi based online Car Rental Aggregator company “YatriCab.com”.

   All the Best for the Future 🙂

9. 

   Sanchita Dutta January 17, 2014, 4:58 am

   Just sharing a nightmarish experience i had whilst booking a CAB on a website called taxi4sure. we were on our way to Chennai from Bangalore for the evening flight from where we had an expensive Chennai to Port Blair flight next day early morning (25K for a 2 hour flight-AI!!). Since the name was so ‘assuring’, thought lets try it out instead of usual Mega or Meru cabs. Rates were comparative. Got ditched in the last moment and it was pouring in Bangalore. Had to struggle mightily with two kids to handle to reach airport on time!!

   Thats when i thought lets read about this site online (mouthshut being the first choice) and then i realised that there r tonnes of complaints of poor service against the company. wished had seen that before booking it. would have saved a lot of heartburn.

   Ok, why i m telling this story? just like that since you too are looking to enter this space. there is a proverb in hindi, “bud se badnaam bura” and it couldn’t be truer for companies who primarily exist on-line. 

   Whenever you start in whatever capacity and size, pl make sure that you grow confidently and operations are in full control. because, God forbid, if u get into a situation where the users have experience like I and many others had, the fall will be hard and irrevocable. Best Wishes

   Sanchita ‘hometreprenuer’ Dutta (http://www.indiacod.com) 

10. 

    Alok Rodinhood Kejriwal January 17, 2014, 6:09 am

    Check this linked in update of mine

    			T. SRINIVAS RAO LOOKING FOR NEW ASSIGNMENTS IN LOGISTICS/FLEET MANAGEMENT/ROAD TRANSPORT/CAR RENTAL/PHONE FLEET TAXI BZNS. OPERATIONS.
    	Dear Mr. Alok, Thank you very much for accepting my request. I am glad to get connected with highly experienced professional like you. I have more than 25 years of experience in Travel, Car Rental, Radio Taxi business Operations, fleet management, road transportation, driver management. I had some thing new idea about Indian road transport industry. I am looking for some one like you, who can help to build a common platform for fleet operators, brokers, freight forwarders, shippers, with a online freight bidding module. I have 26 years of experience in road transport industry with good net work and healthy relationships in industry. Let me know if you have any interest to work together. Thank you once again. Regards  T. Srinivas Rao  Mobile: +918499952626 Email address: srisripune@gmail.com My suggestion – write to Srinivas!

11. 

    Abhishek Verma January 17, 2014, 10:07 am

    Hey Pawan, great idea and Charpahiya reminds me of litti-chokha as well 🙂

    In the taxi industry, we have 2 different models currently: One is Meru cabs which owns the fleet and pays the drivers Rs.1000 – 1200 daily. Only ~3500 of the approx 5000 cabs are operational currently therefore Meru is under huge losses and the other is Ola cabs & Taxi for sure which are basically cab operator aggregators which operate only under the brand name Ola cabs.

    However, I would like to pose this question to every rodinhooder: Do you think there is room for RedBus type model; where the taxi operator would operate under its own name but would pay a commission for each booking to RedBus. This might be cheaper to the taxi owners as well. In turn, RedBus would provide technological platform for the operators. This might also prove to be capital intensive as sales people would have to be hired to bring operators under one umbrella.

12. 

    Darshan Bhambiru January 17, 2014, 3:09 pm

    Anything to do with Online has to Go the Social Way. Get more Insights so you can make your own decisions for the Required Opportunity to Explore rather than more Technically as you are thinking of going. .

    Private Taxi services go purely by Word of Mouth or having the Taxi made ready and available to negotiate with On the Spot Walk In customers, or rather Pick up Points of Travelers like the Bus depots or Railway Stations and Airports, where the FootFalls are more so it does not Dilute the similar other opportunists pouncing on the opportunity at the same time in the same trade too. This is if you do not manage and maintain your own Fleet of Taxis as the other way of doing the same business. These are rented mostly if not owner as Drivers, so they work on a day to day basis for the Days Returns and Cost coverage too.

    Do a bit of homework on the ones which are already into Car Pooling or also the Car rental and Taxi / Cab services in the other cities to see if this is with the efforts, we have a few listed already as part of the Almost 7000 RH’s a quick search with the right keywords should get them to be reachable too to take things further on a personal required level. Do your Own Survey from the Customers Perspective so you would also get the opportunity to see it happening Live whenever a Potential Customer walks near a Waiting Standing Taxi to check for the destination and the ways this can be made easier for all Involved with revenue part understood too.

    The required investments as well to take things further, It Also depends on your own Personal Experience, or Someone guiding you as well for the purpose to work in the domain in related fields and the Will to explore more in the New Business market too to understand the various Niche areas it may not show on the surface as well too 🙂

    Always makes sense to not Bite more than You can Chew, so accordingly if you do not have the experience and expertise with the required Funds to go Full Headlong right in the start as you may not know the various PotHoles on the Way practically too, phase it out by starting if you have to with Engaging the ones already doing it on a Per deal commission basis Sharing part.

    Everything takes Time, Time takes Everything.

    When nothing goes Right, Go Left!!!

    Failing to Plan, is Planning to Fail!!

    

    Good Luck, Cheers!!

13. 

    Pawan Kumar January 18, 2014, 1:26 pm

    Hi Abhinav,

    Your questions are very helpful to me to define my strategy. Can u please share your mail id/contact number to pawan@aayam.in ? So i can be in touch with you. Thanks

14. 

    Abhinav Prashant January 18, 2014, 3:13 pm

    you can reach me at “abhinavprashant@yatricab.com”.

15. 

    Rahul January 19, 2014, 2:20 pm

    This kind of service is already in market and they are doing very good .

    You can visit http://www.cabcrazy.com

16. 

    Pawan Kumar January 20, 2014, 11:00 am

    Thanks to all rodinhooder who has suggested me. Now i have started survey among the service providers but i m confused to start survey among customers. How can i proceed ? Where should i go ? How can i know customer experience? Which type of survey cost I prefer so that minimum amount should be invested because i have no mega budget

17. 

    Amarjeet Sahoo February 7, 2014, 8:09 am

    Hi Pawan, 

    Its definitely a nice concept to start booking services in tier2 cities like patna. I guess you must aware that there are some local players like Saavari, Maruyaan , who have some kind of hold in this sector, Though i tell you they have not a good quality of service( as i have some not-so-good experience in last visit to patna ). So Quality, timeliness could be your USP. 

    But the most important thing is consumer awareness, unlike Metros there is a less exposure to internet, 3G , smartphones. So i guess you really have to think out of box way to penetrate the market. and If you are a local guy of patna i do not think you will face much trouble to negotiate with the local taxi communities.

    All the best and i hope i would enjoy the ride of Charpahiya on my next visit to Patna. 

18. 

    Pawan Kumar February 9, 2014, 2:28 pm

    Dear All, 

    I have updated this discussion with adding sample survey form Service Provider Registration Form. 

    Please review it and give ur valuable suggestion. Also suggest me how can i design a survey form for taking target audience feedback .

19. 

    Pawan Kumar February 9, 2014, 2:32 pm

    Thanks amarjeet,

    for giving ur suggestion. Would you like to elaborate the term Quality ? Is it in the sense of Service Quality or something else ? You may write me to pawan@aayam.in. Also you may send me list of problem faced during your ride. So i will prepare for same which my customers will never face.

    Surely you will enjoy the ride of Charpahiya when u come to patna.

20. 

    asha chaudhry January 8, 2015, 5:42 am

    hey pawan,

    any updates on charpahiya?

21. 

    Kevin Pitter September 7, 2018, 9:32 pm

    Hello
    Greate tips,

    I have applied these techniques with Travel Mind. Really happy.

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