Uber in Beijing
 

Sorry, if this thread has been discussed somewhere already, but I couldnt find the revelevant thread.

I will be arriving to Beijing next month and I was planning to use UBER for my hops around town. Unfortunately both on my cell and tablet, when I input (while still being here in Europe) any location in Beijing the UBER app crashes with an unauthorized message popping up....

Is this only because I am located in Europe, but trying to input a Chinese address (thus will work once I am physically in china?) or does it mean I need to get a Chinese SIM at the airport once I arrive or is it caused by something else?
I have a an European UBER account with a European Mastercard linked to it.

Many Thanks for the advice

Uber is really good in Beijing, but you should also download 滴滴. Check out our Shanghai Uber thread.

I think you told me in another thread that Uber is being bought by another company? Is that still happening? Any updates on that?


The Uber fare estimate does work for me from here in the US. It shows about Y20 from the Doubletree (where I'm staying) to the Forbidden City. Does that sound like a fair price? How is traffic, or would it be better to take the subway?

I read, that it is being bought, but will continue to run under the UBER brand with everything...

and what happens on your phone, when you choose a pickup location (just choosing the pickup spot, not calling the car) in Beijing (for example PEK airport), because in my case, it causes the app to immediately crash

That fare sounds reasonable.

One of the reasons I've shifted to 滴滴 is because Uber stopped taking my credit card (and, customer service is not helpful on this point).

滴滴 is much less user friendly than Uber (e.g. they can thrust ride sharing upon you in sneaky ways), but they do have more cars.

Avoid airport pick-ups in both cases unless you know the lay of the land.

with 滴滴 you mean this? http://www.wandoujia.com/apps/com.sdu.didi.psnger

Yes. I don't know of any ways to get their Android app apart from using wandoujia (which, I despise). If you have an iPhone, you can get it easily though.

do you think a a person that understands absolutely no Chinese (me) will be able to use the 滴滴 app? if its worth the hassle of downloading it to my phone.

Thats why I was hoping to get UBER working

Thanks

If you join our Wechat group, chances are one of us will be available to assist, but my general feeling is that you will have a tough time if you don't know basic Chinese (e.g. 王府井 as destination).

Thank you for your help, but i speak absolutely no Chinese, so that means I wont even try...

So getting Uber to run will be a priority, I have tried 3 different phones with 3 different uber account, all of them crash and quit when I input an address in Beijing, so it probably means china uber blocks users with location outside of china (or with non-china phone number)

Hopefully once I buy a China/HK Sim card or am physically in Beijing, uber will work

I am guessing Uber will work for you in Beijing, possible credit card issues aside, but your lack of Chinese skills will pose a problem:

1. You need to enter a destination address in order to book Peoples these days
-it's okay if you change this on the fly, but choosing an address in the vicinity of your destination is good manners
-the good news is that pinyin works pretty well for popular destinations: e.g. sanlitun, wangfujing, tiananmen

2. The pin function is not perfect, so you should expect phone calls from your drivers in order for them to find you

I strongly prefer Uber/didi to taxis, but in your case, I think taxis might end up working best.

ETA: As I've mentioned in the Shanghai Uber thread, taxi drivers are far less likely to get lost than Uber drivers, and they are guaranteed to have Shanghai/Beijing plates. This is a big deal during rush hour. Whenever I get a driver who doesn't have Shanghai plates, I cancel if I'm pressed for time (it's faster in the end to get a taxi because Shanghai plated cars can use the elevated roads).

Nothing wrong with taxis.

I've used Uber in other countries, most recently Brazil and Vietnam, and had no issues with any crashes. And those were with an old iPhone 5S (I've upgraded since).

In Vietnam most major tourist places and hotels were in both English and local languages (I think also in Brazil). In Vietnam I mostly rode on Uber-Moto (motorcycle) so there wasn't much speaking between the driver and I.

Very true, and I've found it is always handy to get a business card (or several) from your hotel to have handy just for this purpose. Get in a cab, hand them the card, and they'll take you there.

not saying there is something wrong, but:
1, there will be 4 of us, dont know if regular beijing taxis take 4 peopele (opposed to uberXL)
2, prefer cashless payments (i know, stupid, especially in china)
3, i usually distrust taxi drivers in areas i am not familiar with (dont know how dis/honest beijing drivers are to foreigners)