Someone just created an aggregator app for all the taxi aggregators
How often does it happen that you open the OlaCabs or TaxiForSure or Uber app and you instantly find the cab in Bangalore? Now, try answering this - how many times have you tried opening the other apps(out of the three mentioned) when the first one is not able to provide the cab?
The process of opening multiple apps not knowing which one will have better availability not only consumes time and mind space but a little frustration inadvertently seeps in too. What if I tell you there's an aggregator app for all these taxi aggregator apps?
Basically, an app which makes your cab hailing process smarter by comparing availability and real time ETA of cabs across different cab services/aggregators like Olacabs, Uber and Taxiforsure. Precisely, that's what ScootApp is all about. Launched few minutes ago, ScootApp is nothing short of the master key to your woes of switching between multiple apps.
Masterminds
ScootApp is developed by Gunjan Thakuria and Sagar Yarnalkar as a side project. While Gunjan is an IIT-Madras alumnus who has previously worked with Carwale after exiting from his venture zophop.com (a multi modal transit app combining various modes of transit); Sagar is a graduate from BITS Pilani Goa campus. They only gave two hours daily for 3-4 days to build this app.
While UBER and Ola had open APIs, they are still talking to TaxiForSure about the permission. This doesn't seem to be a for-profit venture by the duo and since they are eventually driving traffic and conversions to the respective apps, they don't expect any major objection too.
Gunjan shared the app in a Facebook group sometime ago. He also mentioned,
I am a regular user of Ola, Uber and Taxi for Sure and always find it very painful to juggle between different apps to find the nearest available cab. Hence I decided to do something about it and created a simple aggregator of these 3 apps to show me real time ETA of all of them. I have been using it myself for couple of weeks and found it very useful, so thought of putting it out for others too for use, so published it on play store yesterday( even though discussions are still going on regarding usage of their API, but what the heck its very useful and hurts nobody, since it's landing traffic to their apps).
So, how does it work ?
The app functions in following ways:
- It takes the pain out of juggling between multiple apps to find the nearest available cab, and brings all information in one simple screen.
- Once you have selected your nearest cab, the app will lead you to the relevant service providers app to complete the booking
- In case you do not have the service providers app installed, it will take you to the play store to install the relevent app to complete your booking
- Currently it shows nearest available cabs across Olacabs, Uber and Taxiforsure
You can download the ScootApp from the GooglePlayStore.
[The article has been duly updated after speaking to the developers of the app]