Operations Management for Ingogo: Analysis and Recommendations

This paper provides an in-depth analysis of the operations of Ingogo, an online taxi booking service in Australia. It discusses the aspects of operation, including quality, cost, speed, flexibility, and dependability. The paper also provides recommendations for the organization to improve its operations.

Running head: OPERATIONS MANAGEMENT
Operations Management
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Author Note
Word Count: 1600

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Executive Summary:
The paper is focused in discussing the business operations of a small organization in the
name of Ingogo. The paper provides an in depth analysis of the operations of the organization
and along with that it provides schematic diagram for the operations as well. The paper is
significant in analysing the various aspects of the operation like the cost, quality, speed,
dependability and flexibility. In addition to this, the organization, the paper portrays some of
the loopholes in the operations of the company and provides recommendation for the same as
well.

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Table of Contents
Introduction:...............................................................................................................................3
Operations of Ingogo:................................................................................................................3
Operational Process:...................................................................................................................6
Aspects of Operation:.................................................................................................................7
Quality:...................................................................................................................................7
Cost:.......................................................................................................................................7
Speed:.....................................................................................................................................8
Flexibility:..............................................................................................................................8
Dependability:........................................................................................................................8
Recommendations:.....................................................................................................................8
Conclusion:................................................................................................................................9
References:...............................................................................................................................10

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Introduction:
The modern business market is significantly focused towards the small and medium
scale business. As the viability of a new business is difficult to predict for the new entries into
the business world, the entrepreneurs and small business owners are significantly focused in
the identification of a profitable business. One such significant business opportunity in the
modern world is in the form of the online taxi boking (Singh, Teng and Netessine 2017).
However the concept is pretty new but the people of the modern generation is observed to be
significantly adapting to it. The need of such a business is generally the speed that it
introduces into the life of the people. It is well known that the modern professions require
significant amount of time and that is the main reason behind the strict requirement of speed
in the other operations. The transportation is major part for the employees of modern day and
they prefer the consumption of time in this aspect to be as limited as possible and hassle free
so that they can operate with high level energy in their workplaces or houses (Urry 2016).
The paper is focused in specifying Ingogo’s operations with precise focus on the speed,
quality and flexibility. In addition to this, the paper also provides some important
recommendations for the operations of Ingogo as well.
Operations of Ingogo:
Ingogo is a renowned organization in the online taxi booking industry. The
company is currently focused in conducting business in the Australian territory but the
management is considering the plan of business expansion in the new regions as well. The
service that the organization produces is significantly reliable and fast as well. The
organization primarily has two way for the receiving of the payments which are a mobile
application in the android phones and other one is through the debit cards (Petrie 2016). The
organization uses GPS enabled booking system. The system is significant in allowing the

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Inputs Transformation
Process
Employees Government Suppliers
Banking
organizations Shareholders
Outputs Outcome
taxis of other taxi association of services to take fares (ingogo.com. 2018). Hence it is
growing in a significant manner. The operations or the business conduction of the
organization is significantly interesting and benefitting for the customers as it is having a
business strategy which claims that the organization has a fixed pricing policy. It is observed
that the surge pricing is generating significant amount of headaches for the people across the
boundaries of nations. It is even observed that at times the traffic jams or the impact of the
natural disaster creates such trouble that the surge prices exceeds the actual price of the fare.
In such cases the passengers are observed to suffer a lot. Ingogo had this loophole of the
industry covered with their promise of not charging any money in the name of surge pricing
for the traffic jams, natural disaster or even the toll charges. In fact the organization was the
first transportation service company to avoid the surge charge (atia.com. 2018). In addition to
this, the organization faced the need of securing customers as early as possible and in order to
serve the need of the customers of pre booking, the company restructured their operations in
such a manner that enables the customers to book the taxi in advance of at least two days.
Inputs:

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The inputs for the organization will be the taxis, the fuel for the taxi, the government
permits for the transportation.
Employees:
The drivers of the taxis, the people in the administration and the people handling the
orders and payment sections.
Government:
The government agencies for the monitoring of the proper business conduction,
transportation qualities (Australia.gov.au. 2018).
Shareholders:
Hamish Petrie, Australian Federal government and investors like Brad Shofer, co-
founder of MYOB (Myob.com. 2018).
Suppliers:
The local petroleum and the automobile organizations were the primary suppliers and
in addition to this, the local driver association was also a major supplier of the drivers for the
organization.
Output:
The uninterrupted transport service that the organization was offering to the
customers of it in the country, Australia.
Outcome:
The organization was able to create considerable amount of revenue after the
preliminary struggling period just after the initiation in the year 2011. It was able to create
significant amount of satisfaction among the customers with the lucrative discount offers and

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the concept of fixed pricings which gained it the maximum attention in the online taxi
industry of Australian (Khuong and Dai 2016).
Operational Process:
Customer
Enquiry
Data
Transmission
No order
Customer
Order
Payment
Options
Ready for ride
Identification
of Availability
Exchange of order
information
Destination
Reached
Feedback on
Service

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The operational process for the organization is pretty simple. It is expected that the
customers will be conducting an enquiry of the price of the fare for their desired destination.
Hence the organization is liable to address the queries in accordance to the price chart of
them. After that, if there is an order for the taxi, then the organization will ask the customer
for his or her preferred mode of payment out of debit card or online payments by
smartphones. Now after the payment option, the system will automatically search for the
available vehicles for the customer and with the identification of the taxi, the organization
will share the order details to the driver of that particular vehicle. After receiving the details,
the driver will pick up the customer and will drop the customer to his or her preferred
destination. After the whole process, the organization planned for a feedback from the
customer regarding the service experience and the performance of the driver. The feedback
will be the primary basis for the rating of the drivers.
Aspects of Operation:
Quality:
The quality of the service in Ingogo is managed from the feedback of the customers.
The online feedback that the organization receives is significant in the assessment of the
quality that the company is able to offer to their customers. The organization is observed to
conduct internal meetings regarding the feedbacks that they receive and after consultation,
they forms strategy for the improvement.
Cost:
The costing or pricing of the organization is significant as it is observed that the
company charges its customers as per the standard kilometre pricing. Over the years the
intense competition in the Australian online taxi booking industry is forcing the organization
to have a significantly competitive pricing policy. As mentioned above the USP of the service

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of the organization is the fixed pricing (Hall, Kendrick and Nosko 2015). Many of the
competitors of the organization were not able to avoid the surge pricing whereas the company
strategized their pricing policy in such a manner that they were able to generate profit even
without charging any sort of taxes or toll charges to their customers.
Speed:
The speed in the operations was visible for the organization as the organization
followed an automatic electronic method for the taxi booking and the payments. The
organization is observed to divide the zones for its operations and that was significant in
reducing the time consumed for the identification of the available vehicles.
Flexibility:
As the organization had no issues in allowing taxis of other services take fares
through their service, the flexibility for the concerned organization was notable. Apart from
this, this was significantly increasing the speed of the operations as the waiting time for the
passengers was observed to decrease in a notable manner.
Dependability:
The organization had its operation in alignment with the concern of the customer. For
the emergency situations, the organization had a 24*7 operational toll free number for the
communication and help. Apart from this, the organization was able to manage the
cancellation of the orders in an effective manner with money back policies which increased
the satisfaction of the customers and was instrumental in the formation of the customer
loyalty.
Recommendations:
The Australian society is significantly facing the impact of online fraud activities and
the people are panic-stricken by this in the last 2 to 3 years (afp.gov.au 2018). As the

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organization is following the debit card method for the payment, the customers are bit
hesitant in taking the service. The organization is also observed to be significantly affected by
this and needs to strategize in such manner which will eliminate this concern. In order to
reduce that, the organization can come up with a scheme where a card like the debit card will
be generated from the part of the organization and each of the vehicles will have a recharge
machine for the transfer of money which will be used for the for the transportation. The
recharging process will be hassle free and will not need any sort of exchange of the banking
details of the customers. This will be significant from the part of the organization in reducing
the concern of the people regarding the banking and online frauds.
Apart from this, the organization is in need to introduce the sharing cab concept
where the taxi will take passengers for each available seats and the customers can have
different destinations as well.
Conclusion:
On a concluding note, it can be stated that the Ingogo is having a significantly
attractive business policy for the customers but the company is in need to increase the
innovative operations in the payment sections. Apart from that, the organization will have
significant business with the introduction of the sharing cab concept. In addition this, the
organization still lacks a strong formation of the brand and in order to address that concern, it
needs to undertake several promotional campaigns which will highlight the good work of the
company.

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References:
Afp.gov.au (2018). Australian Federal Police. (2018). Online fraud and scams. [online]
Available at: https://www.afp.gov.au/what-we-do/crime-types/cyber-crime/online-fraud-and-
scams
Atia.com. (2018). ATIA. (2018). ATIA. [online] Available at: https://www.atia.com.au/
Australia.gov.au. (2018). [online] Available at: https://www.australia.gov.au/
Hall, J., Kendrick, C. and Nosko, C., 2015. The effects of Uber’s surge pricing: A case study.
The University of Chicago Booth School of Business.
Ingogo.com. (2018). ingogo | Taxis done better. For Passengers, Drivers and Businesses.
[online] Ingogo.com.au. Available at: https://www.ingogo.com.au/
Khuong, M.N. and Dai, N.Q., 2016. The Factors Affecting Customer Satisfaction and
Customer Loyalty--A Study of Local Taxi Companies in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.
International Journal of Innovation, Management and Technology, 7(5), p.228.
Myob.com. (2018). Business Software & Solutions | MYOB Australia. [online] Available at:
https://www.myob.com/au
Petrie, H., INGOGO Pty Ltd, 2016. Public Booking and Payment System. U.S. Patent
Application 14/100,376.
Singh, J., Teng, N. and Netessine, S., 2017. Philanthropic campaigns and customer behavior:
Field experiments on an online taxi booking platform. Management Science.
Urry, J., 2016. Mobilities: new perspectives on transport and society. Routledge.

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