Is ride hailing still a way out for middle-aged people? Online ride hailing | driver | middle-aged person
Introduction: From the data, the reason for the high pressure on drivers to accept orders and the decline in income is that on the one hand, the online ride hailing market is still in a recovery period, and the order volume has not fully recovered to the level of 2021 this year. On the other hand, transportation capacity is indeed constantly increasing.
In the past few years, ride hailing services have become a good choice for many car owners to transition to when they are unemployed, with flexible jobs that can bring in substantial income. However, recently many ride hailing drivers have reported a decline in income and increasing difficulty in accepting orders.
The first financial reporter recently interviewed several ride hailing drivers, and according to their feedback, even in first tier cities such as Beijing and Shanghai, the era of ride hailing drivers earning easily over 10000 yuan per month has passed. In second tier and third tier cities, ride hailing drivers face higher difficulty in accepting orders and an empty rate, with some times even more than 300 drivers competing for 21 passengers.
In the current economic environment, ordinary people are more eager for stable means of livelihood. Can ride hailing still fulfill this wish?
First tier cities: there will no longer be "easily over ten thousand"
According to feedback from ride hailing drivers in Beijing and Shanghai, ride hailing services are still a good job.
Mr. Wang, a 32 year old ride hailing driver from Shanghai, was laid off earlier this year due to a job adjustment in the company. Therefore, Mr. Wang chose ride hailing as a transitional option during his job search period. In Mr. Wang's opinion, the income of ride hailing drivers will not easily exceed 10000 yuan.
He told a reporter from First Financial News, "Personally, if my monthly income reaches 15000 yuan, it is actually equivalent to finding a job worth around 7000 yuan. With a monthly fuel fee of 3000 yuan and a personal payment of 3000 yuan, I only have 9000 yuan left. Considering that there will be year-end bonuses and various welfare benefits at work, ride hailing drivers do not need to deduct another 2000 yuan. In my opinion, ride hailing jobs earn around 7000 yuan per month."
Nevertheless, Master Wang stated that there are also many drivers around who earn over ten thousand yuan. He believes that the income of the ride hailing industry mainly depends on the workload of drivers. "If you can afford to work hard, go out at 6 or 7 in the morning, and run errands until around 11 pm to get home. The daily turnover can exceed a thousand, so the income is higher than working. I drive for about 10 hours a day, and the average turnover is around 500 to 600 yuan."
Meanwhile, Mr. Wang stated that he has found a new job but will continue to work part-time as a ride hailing worker. "I hope to have a stable job, so I will not continue to work full-time as a ride hailing worker. However, I will not give up on ride hailing after joining the company, as it can be used to increase income," he said
In addition, drivers who do not need to rent a car and run errands face less pressure. Shanghai ride hailing driver Zhao Shifu, 48 years old, told a reporter from First Financial News that she does not drive on weekends and only drives on weekdays to accompany her family. The average monthly revenue is around 13000 yuan. Excluding around 2000 yuan for fuel and 2000 yuan for social security, she currently earns around 9000 yuan per month. Due to the flexible scheduling of this job, Master Zhao believes that ride hailing drivers are a good choice. At that time, she also considered taking care of children and the elderly before choosing to resign and become a driver. "Currently, it's not easy to find a job that earns 10000 yuan per month. If a good platform is established, the vacancy rate will be relatively low."
Public data shows that in 2022, the per capita disposable income of residents in Shanghai was 79610 yuan, an increase of 2% compared to the previous year. Based on the actual income of the two drivers mentioned above, it is higher than the per capita disposable income in Shanghai.
From the feedback, both Mr. Wang and Mr. Zhao have stated that accepting orders is not difficult. They believe that if ride hailing drivers in Shanghai want to increase their income, they can strive to manage the platform's rating well and increase their time on the road.
Another driver who shares the same feeling is Mr. Zhang, a Didi driver from Beijing. Mr. Zhang, who is 31 years old this year, told a reporter from First Financial that he just switched from the food delivery industry to become an online ride hailing driver two months ago. At present, Mr. Zhang's monthly turnover is around 18000 yuan. Excluding the electric vehicle rent of 4600 yuan and the electricity bill of around 1300 yuan, Mr. Zhang actually receives about 12000 yuan per month. This income is related to the intensity of Mr. Zhang's work. At present, Master Zhang runs orders for up to 14 hours a day, with an average daily turnover of 700 yuan. Like ride hailing drivers in Shanghai, Mr. Zhang also believes that accepting orders is not difficult, but the quality of orders varies.
Recently, there has been constant news about the decline in driver income. Mr. Zhang said that he learned from a friend who has been engaged in ride hailing for 6 years that his income has declined compared to the past. The driver used to have an average daily income of around 1000 yuan, but under the same intensity of work, his daily income is currently around 900 yuan, a decrease of about 10%.
Second tier cities: 300 drivers matched with 21 passengers
Unlike the feedback from drivers in Beijing and Shanghai, ride hailing drivers in Foshan feel that the difficulty of accepting orders is increasing.
Foshan ride hailing driver Mr. Chen believes that the market is constantly saturated. Mr. Chen, who is 40 years old, told a reporter from First Financial that he runs orders by renting a car, with a daily turnover of around 400 to 500 yuan, and the order volume is not regular. Due to Mr. Chen's purchase of one-time rural medical insurance, he does not have the need to pay social security on his own. Excluding expenses such as rent and fuel, Mr. Chen currently earns around 6000 yuan per month.
Regarding this, Master Chen said, "This is the average income level in Foshan, mainly based on the individual's daily driving time. More work pays more." According to data from the Foshan Bureau of Statistics, the per capita disposable income of Foshan residents in 2022 was 64000 yuan, which is approximately 5333 yuan per month.
Mr. Chen is very anxious about taking orders and income issues, as he feels that the number of drivers in the market is constantly increasing.
Mr. Chen said that after the opening of the epidemic, more drivers are choosing to join the ride hailing industry, and the difficulty of accepting orders is increasing. Currently, his daily empty car rate is around 50%. Regarding this, Master Chen said, "Drivers are now making a living by extending their running time. The previous 10 hours of running water are now no longer worth more than 14 hours."
According to the chat records provided by Master Chen with the service staff of the rental company, the service staff stated that there have been over 100 new Didi rental drivers added to Foshan every week recently, and currently there are over 5000 rental drivers.
As the team leader of the Foshan Didi ride hailing driver team, Master Chen is also responsible for handling issues encountered by drivers while running errands. Mr. Chen told First Financial reporters that from his communication with other drivers, the difficulty of accepting orders is not an isolated situation. Mr. Chen provided a waiting page for orders, which showed that the reason the driver was unable to match passengers was "fewer passengers, more drivers." In the past 10 minutes, the driver had 21 passengers to match, while the number of competing drivers reached over 300.
The queue page provided by another driver shows that recently, when he was queuing in the driver queue area of the "Guangzhou South Station" express train, there were 1005 drivers queuing to receive orders. The online ride hailing driver who provided a screenshot is located at 738.
Regarding whether choosing to become a ride hailing driver after unemployment is a good choice, Master Chen said that he used to work in the automotive training industry. "When the ride hailing industry first emerged, drivers didn't have to work too hard and could easily earn over 10000 yuan per month. Because the platform's rewards were very strong before, attracting many drivers with cars to join. Now it's different. If you want to earn 400 yuan per day, you can't even achieve it without working for 14 hours, unless you're lucky enough to receive a big order."
In addition to the difficulty of accepting orders, a higher vacancy rate is also one of the problems. This issue is equally prominent even in the first tier city of Guangzhou.
After reviewing the monthly operation and management monitoring information of the online rental car market released by the Guangzhou Municipal Transportation Bureau in the past two years, First Financial found that in order to obtain close daily revenue data, Guangzhou's online rental cars currently need to run more kilometers per day. For example, in March 2023, the daily revenue of ride hailing services in Guangzhou was 354.77 yuan, and the average daily operating mileage of a single vehicle for that month was about 119.51 kilometers. In December 2020, the daily revenue of ride hailing bicycles was about 363.58 yuan, slightly higher than the revenue in March this year. However, at that time, the daily operating mileage of ride hailing bicycles in Guangzhou was about 93.62 kilometers, far lower than the current 119.51 kilometers.
For example, in November 2020, the daily revenue of ride hailing bicycles in Guangzhou was about 406.19 yuan, and at that time, the daily operating mileage of bicycles was about 101.48 kilometers. In February 2023, the daily revenue of ride hailing bicycles in Guangzhou was approximately 406.07 yuan, which is almost the same as November 2020. But the daily average operating mileage of bicycles in the city in February 2023 was about 129.44 kilometers, an increase of 27.6% compared to the data in November 2020. This data indirectly confirms that if one wants to obtain the same income, drivers currently have a longer running time.
From the daily revenue, the average daily revenue of ride hailing drivers in Guangzhou this year is not much different from the past few years. For example, the daily revenue of ride hailing bicycles in Guangzhou in January 2021, January 2022, and January 2023 were 314.95 yuan, 395.28 yuan, and 438.8 yuan, respectively. The daily average revenue of ride hailing bicycles in Guangzhou in October 2020, October 2021, and October 2022 were 345.14 yuan, 354.89 yuan, and 380.31 yuan, respectively.
From the above data, it can be seen that in recent years, the daily revenue of ride hailing services in Guangzhou has been between 300 yuan and 450 yuan, which is closely related to the epidemic and peak seasons, but has not declined overall.
Supply and demand imbalance: Over 2 years, 2 million driver's licenses have been obtained
From the data, the reason for the high pressure on drivers to accept orders and the decline in income is that on the one hand, the ride hailing market is still in a recovery period, and the order volume has not fully recovered to the level of 2021 this year. On the other hand, transportation capacity is indeed constantly increasing.
According to statistics from First Financial, the overall order volume of the industry is recovering. According to data from the online ride hailing supervision information exchange system, the platform received a total of 735 million order information in May this year, an increase of 39.5% compared to 527 million orders in May 2022. However, the current order volume has not fully recovered, and the order volume in May 2023 decreased by 8.2% compared to 801 million in May 2021.
Although the single volume has not yet fully recovered, the transportation capacity is constantly increasing.
As of May 31, 2023, a total of 5.584 million online ride hailing driver's licenses have been issued in various regions. As of May 2021, a total of 3.441 million driver's licenses for ride hailing services have been issued in various regions, an increase of 62.3% over the past two years. However, considering that many drivers have also chosen to switch careers, this number does not mean that the current transportation capacity has increased by 62.3% compared to two years ago.
From a single platform perspective, the growth rate of active drivers on the platform is much faster than that of active users. According to the annual report released by Didi, as of March 31, 2023, Didi's active users in the domestic travel market reached 411 million, and its active drivers reached 19 million. According to Didi's previous prospectus, as of March 31, 2021, Didi has 377 million active users and 13 million annual active drivers in China. By comparison, within two years, Didi's active users increased by 9%, while active drivers increased by 42.6%, far exceeding the growth rate of active users.
From the perspective of car rental, drivers also have a similar perception. Mr. Zhang said that even though he heard that the market is not good, there are still many drivers entering the industry. "My electric car was subleased by someone, and I heard it's difficult to rent a car now."
In response, Ji Xuehong, director of the Automotive Industry Innovation Research Center at Northern Polytechnical University, told First Financial reporters that according to the data released by the regulatory platform of the Ministry of Transport, the number of ride hailing drivers is constantly increasing. As a more flexible employment option, ride hailing services have greater mobility. If there is a decrease in income in other industries or some personnel overflow, many people will choose the ride hailing industry.
In response to this situation, the regulatory authorities have also taken measures to regulate it. On May 4th, the Transportation Bureau of Sanya City issued a notice stating that in recent years, the number of ride hailing platforms and vehicles in Sanya City has grown rapidly, and the transportation capacity is approaching saturation. In order to further maintain the market order of the ride hailing industry and protect the legitimate rights and interests of passengers and other operators, after research, it has been decided to suspend the acceptance of ride hailing business licenses and transportation license issuance. Starting from midnight on May 5th, the acceptance of online ride hailing business licenses and transportation license issuance services will be suspended.
In addition to pressing the pause button in Sanya, cities such as Zhuhai, Jinan, and Suining have issued risk warnings for the online booking taxi industry since the beginning of this year, reminding the public that the number of online car hailing services in the city has reached saturation and the industry's economic situation is approaching the warning red line.
From the perspective of industry development, Ji Xuehong stated that ride hailing services were previously a rapidly developing industry, and during the rapid growth of the industry, driver income was relatively high. After years of development, the industry has transitioned from a period of rapid growth to a period of stability, and in some places has even entered a saturation period. Once entering the saturation period, both driver income and industry attractiveness will decrease. Since the beginning of this year, the industry has been in a phase of rapid recovery, and the order volume has approached the normal level in the past. However, it is also difficult for the industry to undergo significant changes, as the pressure in the current environment is quite high.
