Careem, Uber stop select cab services in Dubai

Ride-hailing services Uber and Careem on Sunday announced that they have stopped select services in Dubai.

Uber has stopped its UberX operations in Dubai, while Careem has discontinued its Careem Go service.

"UberX has been operating as a pilot in Dubai for the last two years, subject to RTA discretion and approval. As per the recent decision by the RTA to bring this pilot to an end, we will be ceasing the operation of UberX in Dubai," a spokesperson said in a statement.

"In collaboration with the RTA, the GO car type was launched as a pilot project in 2017 and is now coming to an end. As of today, this option will no longer be available in Dubai," an email from Careem said.

Commenting on the closure of the services, RTA told Khaleej Times: 

"Uber X and Careem Go were introduced as short-term pilot e-hailing services for customers seeking an economy option. All this was done to compare and evaluate existing and new e-hailing services in the city and check on the feasibility of such technology and services in the market.

As a result, RTA decided to incorporate the entire fleet of over 10,000 taxis onto the platform. This includes all the taxi franchise companies in Dubai through Hala, an economical ehailing service. Other economical ehailing services like UberX and Careem Go, which operated as pilot, were thus requested to cease operations, with a set deadline over a few months ago.

Currently there are 5,500 taxis available through the Hala service with fares equivalent to taxis. These can be e-hailed or hailed on the street as well, with the expected time of arrival (ETA) being under 5 mins. More taxis will be added in phases until the entire fleet is covered."