Autonomics

I never thought that the level of economics could be involved in the Autoric of Bangalore and to top it the entrepreneurs of this business perfectly understand it and communicate it. It has been more than nine years in Bangalore and I had been an avid auto user since then. Of late all of us have been complaining that Auto drivers have gone crazy and bad. Yesterday I could crack with the help of an Auto driver; it is that they have been driven this way because of the tremendous economic change which Bangalore has gone thru. Let me put the economics point wise:

1. Time is money: We have all seen Auto guys cribbing about the traffic. Actually earlier when Bangalore traffic was manageable they were able to take more money home then they could do it now. They spend quite a lot of time actually spending on the traffic which is loss of revenue for them. Taking Inflation into picture which has gone up several times but the revenue is going southwards for them. This could be the possible reason of them going mad about the revenue stream and doing the corrective actions from their side.

2. Location and competition matters: If you are an auto user, I am sure you would have noticed that to certain part of city they will be any way asking for extra, and it could be true for most of the drivers. For other parts they will meekly agree and will go on meter. This is decided on two accounts 1. The Bus service: areas where the bus service is better or good they tend to respect the competition. It’s quite logical if bus service is good you need to surely take bus, if it’s fair consider seriously using them as often as possible. 2. Affluence: Certain parts of city people are more affluent and can pay more. Hence by default they try to more there to cross subsidise the loss on other counts.

3. Other: I am sure some of them are street smart and some are absolute cheats who try to gain more from their customer. There are some time windfall gains like Rains, Late night etc. etc. One of the other major factors that change the pricing structure is the timing like peak hours and off peak hours.

4. Competition and threats: The immediate threat is the new Bangalore airport. They say the autos will not be allowed to the new airport and firstly it will not be possible for the auto to travel that fast to that far. This is estimated as 40% reduction in their business. Second major threat is the Bangalore Metro; they say it would wipe off their business quite a lot. I tend to disagree here completely as I feel it would mean less traffic (hopefully) hence they should be more profitable and they will get small haul drop to and fro form metro stations. I also believe the shorter hauls are more profitable if it is within the minimum chargeable range.

5. Largest customer base for them is women. Hence in peak hours when autos are scarce they will prefer to give preference to this loyal customer base.

I could have not reached to the above conclusion if I have not met "Srinivas" the auto driver who drove me home last night. There were other lessons of life learned too " Sir Life is very simple , but you have to actually study it , understand it , then only it is possible for you to lead a happy life " he says this in good English . He adds “Sir, I do not have any property, my father was a wealthy person but lost everything to his bad habits of gambling and drinking, today I have a son and all I care for is giving him good education “. Probably he has studied his life carefully and drawn the line of happiness.

I hope this could guide you to know how to negotiate with the auto driver next time you hit the road for the same. I might be completely wrong but these are only my views based on my interaction with various auto drivers and observations, you are free to accept or scrap it.