HoFo Blog

Back in the mid-1990s when my job mandated a fair amount of late-night cabs, Beck Taxi was the operator I would call. So imagine my surprise and delight to find out that they, like me, have embraced the 20th century [edit: 21st] with a compelling alternative to Uber and Lyft.

Like Uber and Lyft their smartphone app allows you to summon a car to your current location, but you can also just hop into any available cab and use the app to pay, via a QR code on the driver's terminal. This is especially handy because in downtown Toronto Beck taxis are literally everywhere.

You won't need to register for an account, just provide an email address where Beck can send the receipt for your ride. And to respect your privacy you can use PayPal for payment.

The drivers I spoke with said that Beck's entire fleet is compatible with their app.

One obvious difference between Beck and the other ride-sharing apps is the fares; there is no available estimate of what you'll pay because taxi fares are calculated by distance and regulated by the city. I'm actually fine with this, because with a metered cab I won't ever have to worry about surge pricing.

Another difference is that with Beck you can't rate your driver. Surprisingly I'm also okay with this, only because of recent and uniformly terrible so-called "five-star rides" with Lyft—I'm talking dirty cars (with baby seats and other unnecessary clutter) and drivers who are great at mashing pedals but terrible with directions, were it not for the large navigational aids mounted directly in front of their faces.

So fellow Torontonians, rejoice! There is yet another, possibly better way to get around the downtown core.

Links: Beck Taxi on Apple App Store / Google Play Store

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Andrew Currie has been blogging about mobile phones since 2001, smartphones (depending on how you define them) since 2002 and smartwatches since 2014.
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