Are you running a taxi or non-emergency medical transportation (NEMT) company? Ready to take the next step in leveling up your operations? 

It’s time to work with a software company that can accommodate the needs of:

Customers

Today’s transportation customer comes with expectations of convenience, quickness, quality, with digital options for paying and booking.

Drivers

Drivers are the backbone of your company and their experience matters. Driver satisfaction and loyalty can be built through ease of accepting rides, collecting payments and easy ride management and scheduling.

Dispatchers

Making the job easier for dispatchers can allow your workforce to operate with less manpower if the dispatch team is given tools like smart/automated ride dispatching and ride assignment tools.

Ownership

The right software can make all the difference. Keep all of the ride data and financials in one place, where trends can be easily monitored and decisions can be made based on hot spots in service areas and driver performance data.

See the extensive features that SmartMove provides that will allow you to

SmartMove Systems was made for growing taxi companies.

With SmartMove, you can add on features as you grow your business — making for a more cost-effective option for transportation/taxi startups. 

Innovating since 1986. Supporting the taxi industry since 2002

Taxi Startups: Schedule a Demo Today!

Are you ready to learn all the ways SmartMove Systems can take your transportation business into the fast lane?

Schedule a meeting with our team, contact us online or give us a call to get an in-depth demonstration of how SmartMove works with your business.

Book a Demo  Contact Us ]]> https://smartmovesystems.com/blog/2023/04/28/best-taxi-dispatch-booking-system-software-transportation-nemt-limo-startups-app/feed/ 0 https://smartmovesystems.com/blog/2023/04/11/3-small-fleet-taxi-transportation-ride-service-business-management-software-scalable-solutions-united-states-us-best-dispatch-app-online-booker/ https://smartmovesystems.com/blog/2023/04/11/3-small-fleet-taxi-transportation-ride-service-business-management-software-scalable-solutions-united-states-us-best-dispatch-app-online-booker/#respond Mon, 10 Apr 2023 18:54:37 +0000 https://smartmovesystems.com/?p=1314 A Guide on Taxi Fleet Management for Small US Fleets

The transportation industry has changed dramatically over the last decade and continues to adapt to the ever changing demands of customers. 

1. Go for corporate contracts

Creates a steady stream of income. When drivers are depending on you to give them rides, you need ways to maximize consistency to not only grow your business, but to also keep your driver onboard. 

Target your marketing and sales towards businesses that have a high volume of regular ride needs for their customers, guests, patients, and employees. This could include: hotels, event coordinators, business travelers, retirement homes/skilled nursing facilities, and medical establishments in your service area.

Non-emergency medical transportation (NEMT) is a growing sector of the transportation industry. It would be very wise to target medical businesses and establishments that accommodate the growing geriatric population (baby boomers) that will be needing transportation assistance as they become older and in need of more specialized care. 

2. Create a company culture

Form a team of drivers that are motivated towards the same goal: success of the company. Show them they are valued and play a highly important role in business growth. Genuinely show interest in creating a positive work environment, check in on any feedback they might have and celebrate their wins. When your team of drivers feels a personal connection with the company they work for, they’ll have more motivation to perform their best and represent the business in a good light with every interaction.

3. Invest in optimal customer and driver experience

• Are you allocating your budget in the right places? In order for your company to scale, you need to invest in your main driving force — your drivers and your customers.

• Make it easy

• • How happy are your drivers? Invest in tools that make it easy for them to do their job. 

• • How happy are your customers? Invest in making booking for customers easy.

Invest in software that makes it easy for your customers to book/manage rides, and easy for your drivers to accept/manage rides.

SmartMove Systems is an all-in-one tool for running your transportation business. It’s a cost-effective option that carries all the features for customer booking (online booking and mobile app with your branding, call center services, more), dispatching (smart/auto dispatching, LIVE map of driver locations and status, more), and driver tools (driver app for accepting rides, view reservations, manage financials, more).

Learn more about SmartMove Systems and why so many taxi and transportation companies run their operations with us.

Our track record and growing

Don’t just survive, thrive in the transportation industry

Are you taking the right steps to build up your customer base and fleet? If you focus on the three professional business tips mentioned earlier, you’re headed in the right direction. Gather your major decision makers, and go through these points to make sound decisions every quarter. Your goals should always be growth, and executing regular changes to adapt to the everchanging transportation industry is a smart choice.

Connect with our transportation experts at SmartMove Systems to discuss the many ways we can help you optimize your customer and driver experience through online booking tools, dispatching software, and other customized features that make managing rides easy. 

Learn more about how SmartMove Systems works: Today’s Taxi Customer & Driver Experience Standards.

Are you ready to take your taxi or transportation business into the fast lane?

The first step is to audit your operations and processes to observe improvements in efficiency and effectiveness. If you haven’t already, make sure each aspect of your operations has a Standard Operation Procedure (SOP). What many growing transportation companies realize while tracing tasks is the fact that many of their processes are outdated, and many are being done manually and are ready to be improved or automated.

Common Challenges of Taxi Operations without Software Integration

• Unhappy Customers: There are a number of factors that make up a customer’s experience. This is important to address as their continued patronage keeps your business afloat. Losing customers to long wait times can be alleviated by SmartMove Systems’ real-time online booking tool and mobile app, along with the automated dispatching system.

• Unhappy Drivers: Drivers want an easy way to accept rides. They also want to be able to see their earnings records and ride details. SmartMove Systems provide drivers with an easy to use app, where they can accept rides and manage their payouts with ease. 

SmartMove’s Contact Center Add-On

Transportation companies that operate on the SmartMove Systems platform are eligible to also have customer contact (calls, chats, emails, social media, etc) and dispatch outsourcing to our transportation focused call center.

Pain points solved by SmartMove’s Contact Center Options

• Inefficient customer service: Oftentimes, growing taxi companies are taking calls from customers and unable to manage enough staff in-house to accommodate calls, leading to long wait times and unhappy customers. SmartMove Systems offers transportation companies the opportunity to work with experienced transportation call/chat agents that are experts in learning client service areas and local specifications.

• Rising minimum wage: Transportation companies in The United States are being hit with constantly rising minimum wage requirements, and this can shrink profitability significantly, especially when growing. SmartMove Systems is able to offer transportation contact center services at a fraction of the cost to clients. 

Are you ready to take the next step to improve your transportation company’s operations with SmartMove Systems? Our sales team is ready to help. We have options to support fleets of all sizes, big or small.

How do growing companies advance their operations to the next level? The answer is SmartMove Systems’s taxi dispatch software and solutions. There are a number of factors that make SmartMove the right choice for small fleet operations. Let’s explore those reasons.

Cost Effectiveness – SmartMove Systems can be modified to fit any budget. As you grow, you can add features as needed. We’re the platform of choice for small fleets with affordable options. SmartMove automation helps assign rides to the closest drivers, making for a better experience, requiring less effort and brain power for dispatchers.

Driver Features – Your drivers have access to SmartDriver, a state of the art app which allows them to handle bookings away from their vehicles. At the touch of a button SmartDriver will also be able to respond to messages, access shift reports, and fill in the logbook.

• Receive job offers, and interact with them.
• Send and receive messages
• Navigate to the next job using the phone’s gps
• View the ‘End of Shift’ report
• Fill in the logbook
• View flight Information
• View future booking information

Passenger Features – The SmartHail passenger booking app is easy to use and robust. The generic version is available for all fleets or the app can be easily branded to your fleet. The SmartHail app provides passengers with the ability to track the route taken in real-time giving peace of mind to parents or friends.

SmartHail also allows your passenger to quickly and easily order food or packages for collection and delivery. Tracking your incoming meal or package is now easier than ever.

With SmartHail you can be in your passengers pocket all the time and know every step of their journey.

• No login after initial setup
• Easy to use
• Fare estimates
• ETA and car tracking
• Pay using the app
• Deliveries – order food and goods for collection and delivery through your app
• Promo codes and vouchers
• Upfront payment authentication
• Choice of vehicle
• Select prefilled pick up or destinations based on the travel history
• Book for immediate pickup or pre-book
• Accurate etas
• Track the driver
• Rate and review the driver
• Digital receipts
• Safe ride tracking – send a link to a friend to track your arrival

Operator Features – SmartMove also handles your accounting, legislative and quality insurance requirements giving you detailed information on every aspect of every job. We call these innovative accounting features DocketKiller as they eradicate paperwork and save you time and money by streamlining your book-keeping processes dramatically. You can also assign promo codes at will for attracting more customers.

Call Center Integration – SmartMove provides you with simple cost saving options for the daily management of your call center. Using our SmartVoix phone system you can automate common tasks and you can easily eliminate data entry errors with the IVR (Interactive Voice Response) automatic booking systems.

Watch our SmartVoix video for more detailed information on this feature. You can choose to use the call center on a full time or part time basis to give you flexibility when you need it.

Implement a Real Transportation Operations System

In conclusion, it is a natural progression to grow out manually inputting rides and contacting drivers to accept rides. The amount of manpower and attached costs necessary to keep things going that way are wasteful and eat into your profit margins. Now is the time to explore the possibilities that lie in switching over to a platform that can handle everything you need to successfully run operations for a transportation company.

Get in touch with our SmartMove team and we can guide you through your journey of growth.

If you’re thinking of entering the world of transportation and taxi, the rest of this read should set you on the right track!

As of 2023, the taxi industry is estimated to be worth 42.6 billion dollars in the US alone. Easily, the taxi business is one of the most lucrative lines to get into with low upfront costs.

However, running a taxi fleet can be quite a challenge. It takes organization, efficiency, and proper planning to make sure everything is running smoothly.

That’s why you need a trusted fleet operation software to help you on your way to success — providing passenger, driver, fleet operation and owner operator solutions so you can keep up with the industry’s ever-changing demand.

Get Your Paperwork Done

Whether you’re contracting or employing taxi drivers, you need to keep track of accounting, legislative, and quality insurance necessities.

You might find these recurring tasks overwhelming. Fortunately, there are taxi software features out there that make dealing with paperwork a breeze.

For instance, SmartMove’s DocketKiller feature revolutionizes book-keeping and streamlines processes to save you time and effort.

Benefits for Drivers

• 100% paperless transactions.
• End of shift report is available immediately when the driver logs off.
• Calculates income, cash, statistics and amount payable to the driver.
• Expenses can be recorded in the vehicle and the end of shift report will make the appropriate adjustments.
• Fare discrepancy report is also available.

Benefits for Owner/Operators

• Summary of the account work done by a vehicle.
• Formatted as an invoice from owner to fleet.
• Invoices can be easily generated at the end of a month.
• No handling of dockets required. All the information needed is already in the system.
• Can be emailed.
• Owner can check details before invoices are issued to account holders.

In short, all information required for invoicing is right at your fingertips in one convenient system.

Looking After Your Taxi Drivers

Running a taxi business means that you not only need to look after your customers, but also the drivers behind the wheel. SmartMove understands the importance of your duty to provide top-notch care and ensure everyone is safe on the road.

Thus, we created a system that includes features like Duress Panic, Soft Meter, End of Shift Report, and more!

How to Get the Most Out of Your Taxi Business

Invest in advanced software solutions such as fleet management software. Their built-in customer and driver apps can really give your business a much needed boost.

At SmartMove, your drivers have access to SmartDriver, a state-of-the-art app which allows them to handle bookings away from their vehicles. At the touch of a button, SmartDriver will also respond to messages, access shift reports, and fill in the logbook. 

In addition, taxi drivers:

• Receive job offers, and interact with them.
• Navigate to the next job using the phone’s GPS
• View flight Information
• View future booking information
• Easy access to job & financial information

Choose a Low-Cost Booking and Dispatch System

SmartMove Systems is a global leader in booking and dispatch systems, serving Taxi Networks, Fleets, Rideshare Operators, Paratransit, Livery, and Shuttle service providers with lower-cost & scalable booking, dispatch, and integrated call-center solutions.

Book a Demo today!

Online ride booking software, how do you upgrade it for 2023? Keeping up with the latest in technology and trends is a necessity. One trend to watch out for is high inflation. In 2022, inflation hit record high at 9.1% and closed at 7.1%. Have a game plan to take it on by considering these dimensions in the taxi business.

GPS Integration

One of the things worth revisiting in your online ride booking software is how it integrates GPS. It’s one thing to have GPS but it’s another to use it effectively.

Online ride booking software that uses GPS to not only book rides but also gather important stats. Utilizing GPS best means using it for multiple objectives. See our write up here on the specifics. But in a nutshell GPS and its data should not just be for one purpose. It needs to serve every aspect of the business.

Online Marketing

The next dimension to prepare for is online marketing. There will be more competition in 2023. It will take a lot of effort to bring your business above the din. This is especially true if you’re utilizing an app to gain more bookings.

Your online ride booking software in 2023 must acclimate to different business models. That includes settings for corporate accounts, government transit services, school transport services, and on-demand bookings.

Call Center Support

Call answering and customer service roles are best outsourced. With the Great Resignation making it harder to find workers for jobs, outsourcing increasingly makes sense with lower costs and a wider talent pool.

Data Collection

Last but not the least is the means of making data driven decisions. Your online ride booking software should seamlessly integrate and collect data and report the data according to the needs of managers and fleet operators.

All-In-One Solution

The SmartMove that makes sense is to have online ride booking software that integrates functions that serve customers, aids drivers, and gives better control to fleet management. 

SmartMove Systems has the comprehensive expertise and decades of experience to make every choice the smart choice. Book a demo today!

It’s commonplace these days for transportation companies to use GPS. As part of taxi booking software, GPS brings plenty of benefits. It’s a feature that works for passengers, drivers, and taxi operators. It does this by giving more information and control for everybody around.

Taxi Booking Software and What Passengers Like

GPS does several things at once for passengers. First of all, it lets them track where their ride is. Secondly, GPS lets passengers know their Estimated Time of Arrival (ETA). These two alone were powerful benefits that brought in passengers. This is why app-based taxi booking software beats traditional methods.

A good example of this is SmartMove Systems’ customer solution, SmartHail. It’s a customer facing app that utilizes GPS Tracking. It tracks rides at every stage of the journey and can be shared by the passenger so friends or family can track them. SmartHail can also be white labeled by clients to fit their brand.

Taxi Booking Software and Dispatching Efficiency

GPS does wonders for reducing turnaround time for all drivers. By letting drivers know immediately where their potential customer is, GPS saves so much time. Not only that, drivers get directed to their destination immediately. While it’s not perfect yet on locations, it increases the possible driver pool to draw from.

SmartMove Systems expands on this functionality with a duress/panic mode to allow other nearby cars to respond quickly including emergency services. The SmartDriver App harnesses GPS to generate a soft meter, and a whole host of stats for their electronic logbook and End of Shift Report. With this, it maximizes the objectivity and fairness in earnings.

Taxi Booking Software for Fleet Management Operations

The more you know, the better you can decide. This is where GPS helps a lot for fleet management. Firstly, GPS enables operators and owners to know where every car is. GPS, paired with the right kind of taxi booking software, lets fleet management collect relevant data.

The possible data that can be collected includes stats like revenue per mile, average ride time, down time, number of accidents, and so on.

SmartMove System’s all-in-one solution powerfully puts a plethora of information at the manager’s fingertips to make the best data driven decisions. Data Reports and compliance can be customized and collated for client needs. Even better, SmartMove makes this data available to clients at all times from the get-go.

GPS Does Best When Used Right

SmartMove makes use of GPS in the best possible way by utilizing the technology to solve several problems outright. An integrated taxi booking software that does dispatching, reporting, compliance, and more will speed up operations and earnings better than disparate apps. Make the smart move today!

Contact Us and Book A Demo to see how it all works!

Although the taxi industry was set back by the global COVID-19 pandemic, demand is progressively returning to the market as less severe virus strains are dominant and mass vaccinations have spread worldwide. 

“Over the long term, the taxi industry is expected to grow due to increasing demand for ride-hailing and ride-sharing services, increasing demand from online taxi booking channels, and an increase in the cost of vehicle ownership. Compared to other modes of transportation, increasing traffic congestion and low taxi fare are the other major factors driving the taxi market.”

Source: Mordor Intelligence Taxi Market Analysis 

Innovation is key when growing your small fleet. Taxi, NEMT, & other transportation business owners need a transportation software system for integrating booking & dispatching.

Online Bookings are Driving the Market

According to a taxi market analysis by Mordor Intelligence, one of the primary factors fueling the market’s growth is the increased usage of online cab booking platforms, mostly because of the convenience they provide to clients. They also offer simple online payment options and the flexibility of choosing the pick-up and drop-off locations.

The ease of booking through an app or online booking portal has significantly attracted customers to prefer online booking over offline booking, with most of society using the internet and smartphones for almost everything. Additionally, the availability of information on the app like ride tracking, pre-estimated ride fare, driver contact, and vehicle details has further increased the customer preference for online booking.

Keeping Up with Competitors

As you may already know, the transportation industry has changed most notably as the ride-sharing players, like Uber, Grab, and Lyft have entered the game. The ease of online/app booking and automated dispatching changed the expectations society has for transportation management, and consumers look for that same convenience. 

Many taxi and other transportation owners have been resilient in their efforts to adapt, while others have had to close the doors on their businesses. The successful companies are always looking for new ways to provide a better service to their customers, a better experience for their drivers, and a cost-effective means to optimize operations.

Make the SmartMove

It can be overwhelming to choose the right taxi software for your business. Especially if you are starting with a small fleet, you need transportation software that can cater to your growth, without breaking the bank. That’s where SmartMove Systems comes into play.

SmartMove Systems is an all-in-one, one-stop-shop for all your transportation operation needs.

• Customer Solutions

  • Custom Online Booking & Mobile Application
    • No login after initial setup
    • Easy to use
    • Fare estimates
    • ETA and car tracking
    • Pay using the app
    • Deliveries — order food and goods for collection and delivery through your app
    • Promo codes and vouchers
    • Upfront payment authentication
    • Choice of vehicle
    • Select prefilled pickup or destinations based on the travel history
    • Book for immediate pickup or pre-book
    • Accurate ETAs
    • Track the driver
    • Rate and review the driver
    • Digital receipts
    • Safe ride tracking — send a link to a friend to track your arrival
  • Corporate account portals with customizable options

• Driver Solutions

Your drivers have access to SmartDriver, a state-of-the-art app which allows them to handle bookings away from their vehicles. At the touch of a button, SmartDriver will also respond to messages, access shift reports, and fill in the logbook.

• Receive job offers, and interact with them.
• Send and receive messages
• Navigate to the next job using the phone’s GPS
• View the ‘End of Shift’ report
• Fill in the logbook
• View flight Information
• View future booking information
• Easy access to job & financial information

• Fleet Operations Solutions

  • SmartMove provides you with simple cost-saving options for the daily management of your call center. Using our SmartVoix phone system, you can automate common tasks, and you can easily eliminate data entry errors with the IVR (Interactive Voice Response) automatic booking systems.
    • See our SmartVoix video here for more detailed information on this feature.
    • You can choose to use the call center on a full time or part time basis to give you flexibility when you need it.
  • SmartMove uses leading edge technology to quickly dispatch bookings to the most suitable cars; however, it also handles your accounting, legislative, and quality insurance requirements giving you detailed information on every aspect of every job. We call these innovative accounting features DocketKiller as they eradicate paperwork and save you time and money by streamlining your book-keeping processes dramatically.
    • At the end of every job, the driver is required to record how the fare was paid. This can be made compulsory so that the details of every payment are captured and used in the paperless reporting processes.
    • Benefit for Owner/Operator 
      • Reports available which summarize the account work done by a vehicle. 
      • Formatted as an invoice from owner to fleet 
      • Owner can check details before invoices are issued to account holders.

• Owner Operator Solutions

• • The live mapping functionality shows the location of all cars and their states, for example, if they are vacant or currently engaged. This map can also show the booking details.
  • With SmartMove, you have unlimited and full access to all of your data, all the time at no extra cost. We also offer customized and centralized reporting to ensure you get the information where and when you need it. We also give you real time access to your data and reporting tools that streamline your paperwork and reduce manual data entry.
    • Invoices to account holders for work done on account
    • Financial transactions for invoiced work and claims from owners can integrate seamlessly with MYOB or QuickBooks.
    • End-of-shift report providing a complete history of work done on a shift along with a financial reconciliation can be produced in a few seconds. This is particularly useful for fleet-owned cars.
    • An invoice from bailor (owner) to bailee (driver) for work done can also be generated to assist with financial reconciliation.
    • Web booking users can have jobs charged to their account. This might remove the need to justify claims as the users themselves have made the bookings.

Why Choose SmartMove Systems?

With over 17 years in the industry, we’ve helped taxi companies from big to small fleets (2–200+ vehicles) optimize their operations within their budget, allowing them to grow more easily. As they grow, they have been able to add more features as their budget allows, rather than spreading themselves out too thin at the get-go. Work with us for a personalized plan that fits your budget. Small fleets rave about the ease and advantages they experience with SmartMove Systems. 

Let’s Chat

Our team is experienced in providing cost-effective taxi/transportation software that make running your business easy. Schedule a demo with us, and we can show you what you can expect and what the easy onboarding process entails. 

Feel free to contact us with any questions you might have about our services, and we’ll be happy to provide answers. 

Contact Us Book a Demo Call 206-886-0620 ]]> https://smartmovesystems.com/blog/2022/11/10/small-fleet-taxi-cab-nemt-shuttle-business-operations-software-system-dispatch-app-call-center/feed/ 0 https://smartmovesystems.com/blog/2022/08/27/business-strategy-taxi-start-ups-small-fleets/ https://smartmovesystems.com/blog/2022/08/27/business-strategy-taxi-start-ups-small-fleets/#respond Fri, 26 Aug 2022 14:38:09 +0000 https://smartmovesystems.com/?p=1088 Ignite Interest

To properly strategize for start-ups or a small fleet, examining the fundamental needs of the business is in order. A staple in business schools and various strategists of all stripes has been Sun Tzu’s Art Of War.

And it had a gem worth living by: “If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.”

So in a nutshell, we need to know more to make better decisions, and we do that by identifying the present challenges facing start-ups and small fleets. That’s how a business strategy for taxi start-ups gets built.

If you’re starting out from scratch, here’s some food for thought:

Knowing Yourself

While there are a multitude of things to pay attention to in business, we’ll take a look at some challenges that a taxi start-up should consider when pursuing growth.

60 Second Summary Video of SmartMove Systems:

Profitability

The first and foremost consideration that makes all the others possible is profitability. There have been several ways to traditionally monetize aspects of a taxi business such as selling ad space to show on top of a vehicle or behind it and that’s still valid when feasible. There are also new business models that rely more on outside funding to sustain operations instead of organically being profitable like with ride-share companies.

The important thing when it comes to profitability is deciding how and when to be profitable. The ‘how’ means deciding the aspect of the business that makes money, and for taxi businesses, it can be finding out which areas are more profitable to have more cars in. The ‘when’ is typically related to your Return On Investment (ROI) which Investopedia states: “tells you how much money you’ve made (or lost) an investment or project after accounting for its cost.”

But more than that, a good rule of thumb to review your profitability is in the 2nd year and 5th year of operations as JP Morgan Chase notes in their research that a third of businesses quit in the second year and nearly half of all new businesses exit in their 5th year. 

When making business decisions with profitability in mind, see how these decisions can pay for themselves. For example, SmartMove’s lower cost, extensive features, and efficient & accurate reporting ticks all of the boxes including Sun Tzu’s advice about knowing yourself as a path to victory.

Staffing

The next important aspect in the taxi business is staffing — partly because, conceptually, you need to be able to trust those that work with you and for you, and partly because any enterprise that does not know its people might neglect those who deliver performance, and might keep dead wood.

The way to take care of your staff is to factor in pay, benefits, and working conditions for your drivers and management staff. Oftentimes, it’s more prudent to outsource customer service calls as they constitute a different kind of service that also requires a different set of pay, benefits, and accounting for working conditions which all require valuable time and resources that would be better spent on the core aspects of your start-up.

On that note, SmartMove provides a solution as call center operations are included and integrated in the service and can work with your own in-house call center should you wish to have your own in the future.

As noted in a book by the Transportation Research Board, compensation is the main detail that gets drivers, but it wasn’t just purely the numbers as compensation included earnings, benefits, and payment practices.

As for earnings, it might be a good idea to reference publicly available pay data as well as find out from competitors to get an edge in finding talent.

With respect to benefits, they come in two flavors: state mandated and employer provided. The former needs to be complied with so it’s important to get all above board, while juggling the conflicting needs of the staff, the state, the business, and the clients.

Now, the two dominant types in payment practices are the ‘percentage per ride deduction’ and the flat per-day/per-week lease fee, and it’s been shown that drivers have preferred the former. So to attract drivers, a percentage basis is preferable but such a system requires some software integration in the cars and the fleet operations. So another strategy for taxi start-ups here would be to use dispatch software that can record and account for rides accurately.

Customer Acquisition

The lifeblood of the business is in the customers, and while it sounds like common sense, it will take data-driven decision making to truly understand the cost of acquiring a new customer and retaining an existing one.

There are many a business strategy for taxi start-ups to find when it comes to this, and customer acquisition costs can be broadly divided into two categories: marketing expenses (ads, discounts, vouchers, social media, SEO) and operational expenses (incentives for drivers to take more rides).

While it’s important to research what works in this aspect, it’s also important to use the data generated from the business itself. Market research can be pretty expensive, and data like that can be found almost free in unexpected places like customer complaints, data generated from the dispatch software, driver inputs, and more. Integrated software solutions with many features can tie in together the different data to expand the bigger picture.

Customer’s Standards & Expectations

Last but not least, another consideration to know about as a start-up is what customers want. It’s become clear that app-based transportation is now the norm, and a lot of software-based features are expected of any modern sophisticated cab.

Features like tracking their rides, multiple payment options, and more are available with SmartMove’s SmartHail passenger app that can be white labeled to cultivate your brand.

Making the SmartMove

In each and every strategy for taxi start-ups, a lot of the success hinges on making informed business decisions. And the way forward to that is adopting a comprehensive all-in-one software solution that integrates the features and functions together to work seamlessly, efficiently, and affordably.

Make the SmartMove and book a demo today to find out more about how these challenges can be solved.

Best Features in Review

SmartMove has a ton of great features that’s worth exploring, so you know what you’re getting. There are four dimensions to consider when thinking about taxi cab technology, and that is: the fleet operations and accounting tools, owner or operator management access, passenger app and experience, and driver app and workflows.

Fleet Operations

The best feature among the rest is the DocketKiller tool that saves you a lot of time and money as well as integrating the accounting right as the transaction happens. It does this by recording the details of the payment at the end of each job while also auto-generating the invoice in the form that the client needs for regulatory compliance.

SmartMove’s reporting and tracking tools provide a unified approach to taxi fleet management, providing insights to improve operational efficiency and fleet performance, identify cost-cutting opportunities, improve rosters, and much more.

Any recorded date can be checked for regulatory compliance. You can also set a warning time frame and an action, for example. If the vehicle registration has expired, prevent account or vehicle use.

With how the DocketKiller keeps track and prevents potential headaches, this is definitely one of the best features in our review.

Owner/Operator

One of the best features for owners and operators is that you have unlimited and complete access to all of your data at all times — at no extra cost — letting you make better, more informed business decisions. We also provide customized and centralized reporting to ensure you have access to information when and where you need it and reporting tools to help you streamline your paperwork and reduce manual data entry.

Unlike other services we won’t hostage your data in additional fees.

Another feature for owners is the live mapping functionality that tracks all cars live and shows their status whether vacant or currently engaged as well as the booking details.

Driver’s App

There’s a lot of features for drivers to like, and the best among them is hard to pick.

A potential life and money saving feature of SmartMove is the duress panic function called SmartMove Track. In a nutshell, this will inform other drivers nearby, as well as the call center, and will send a text message to the designated number. The duress panic button would be installed somewhere inconspicuous and pressing it will have the cab be monitored by the call center in a one way call without the passenger’s knowledge. Once the emergency passes, the call center will have a two-way call with the cab to ensure everything is okay and possible next steps.

Another contender for best feature for drivers would be the electronic logbook that keeps track of work done. This helps in preventing any record conflicts as well as recording extra work and adding notes on each job.

What ties in all these benefits together is the SmartDriver App that lets you access all the above features and much more, and that’s the best kind of feature.

Passenger Experience

The best feature when it comes to the passenger experience is also a tough pick, with so many of the conveniences that passengers have come to expect from SmartMove. In curating the user experience, the SmartHail App that handles the passenger side of booking can be white labeled to match the branding that your taxi company wants to achieve.

On the company side of the customer experience, SmartMove provides support to any type of payment method thus ensuring that there’s no lost business on account of payment method.

Best Features in Taxi Cab Technology

While it seems all the above features are standalones, SmartMove does it smart by integrating them in an all-in-one package that accounts for your business needs the way you want it. Any and all transitions would be assisted by our capable team.

With our extensive experience in the business, book a demo and make the SmartMove today!