China to demand ride-hailing fee caps, transparency this year

The plan to rein in commissions and offer more transparency was signalled in guidelines issued in November by several government agencies and mirrors Friday’s request for food-delivery services to also cut fees. — AFP

Ride-hailing firms and online trucking platforms in China will have to set reasonable caps on their fees and make their pricing rules public this year, according to Wang Xiuchun, a senior official at the Ministry of Transportation.

The plan to rein in commissions and offer more transparency was signalled in guidelines issued in November by several government agencies and mirrors Friday’s request for food-delivery services to also cut fees. President Xi Jinping’s “common prosperity” agenda has prioritised helping small businesses and individual operators, such as ride-hailing drivers, to navigate the challenges of the pandemic, which has increasingly come at the cost of big Internet service operators.