Public taxi companies have started raising the passenger transportation fees by 50 percent on Eid night, in one of the most important seasons for these companies.
A number of taxi company owners have confirmed that new companies in the field of public transportation and limousines have appeared suddenly, at a time when the traditional transport companies are expected to declare bankruptcy in the coming days.
Abdulhadi Al-Qahtani, a member in the Taxis Committee at the Jeddah Chamber of Commerce and Industry (JCCI), said: “The new taxi companies of various kinds have suddenly appeared on the market without setting their goals, while the traditional public transportation companies are dying and ending up, and I expect them gradually to declare bankruptcy.”
Al-Qahtani noted that traditional companies will have a specific path along with the new companies, and that comes because supply in the public transport market has become more than the demand, and now all of those having a car can work in the public transportation without controls.
He added: “In the past, we used to work on the so-called ‘Jeddah taxi’ like Dubai and Turkey, to enable the customer to order a cab by phone, as is happening now in the modern and new companies, but we found obstacles and controls that stopped us from doing this.”
About stopping the public taxis in the Saudi market, a member in the Taxis Committee at the Jeddah Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Maj. Gen. Farooq Zahran, pointed out that such news is baseless, and there is no room for the cancelation of public taxis for many reasons, including the safety found in the taxis which may not exist in some other companies.

Source: Arab News