Originally Posted by
chipmaster
Didi is as easy to use as Uber, afterall you know who they spy to make sure they get all the good features.
I've had it linked to my US CC for a longtime, no issues. Like you I can speak, but can't read, so I love the English Didi options. As to Didi you can book taxi with them, or private cars ( more Uber like ), generally find minimum difference with the private car options and the better thing with them the car/driver are in general better than the taxi drivers, but less interesting people to talk to IMHO
I'm probably in the minority with this opinion but generally I prefer the taxi drivers to DiDi drivers. I get that taxi drivers can be evil at times, but for my general usage of getting to/from the office, here in SZ, I'd rather a taxi driver than the Didi driver. These are short trips, the fare is usually 13-16¥. Even when taking longer trips, I see very little difference between the Didi and taxi fares.
I find that many of the Didi drivers seem inexperienced and are timid drivers. They follow the GPS blindly, probably need to follow GPS by Didi rules, and as a result seem to have limited knowledge of alternate routes in case there's some need to be creative. Maybe it's because I'm an old impatient fart but I routinely find myself backseat driving the Didi drivers. With the taxi drivers, I never do this and usually trust them to get my to my destination the quickest. Mostly they know the roads very well and understand traffic patterns, construction detours,etc.
I do use Didi a lot because I can't speak Chinese and the English version of the Didi app works great. I can speak enough to tell the taxi drivers how to get to my office. So in the morning it's a taxi to work and if I go back to my girlfriend's apartment, I need to use Didi since I can't relate the location properly to the taxi drivers.
I guess I'm a little old school. I get the benefit of using Didi but in practice I feel the taxi drivers are consistently better, at least my experience in SZ.