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LTV warns against collaborating with platforms – dependence instead of orders?
In Thuringia and Saxony-Anhalt, there is currently a quiet structural shift underway. It is not playing out on the streets, but in hospital administrations and at desks. Platform providers like QRaGo are courting hospitals and taxi operators for a digital collaboration. What at first glance sounds like an efficiency gain triggers a fundamental debate within the industry.
More elderly people, less public transport
However, the starting position for the industry is by no means bad. In both federal states, the population is declining, while the share of people over 60 is set to rise in the coming years to around 40 percent. Mobility in old age is becoming a key issue, while public transport faces financial and political pressure. Especially in rural areas, services are being withdrawn, thinning out the coverage. Taxi and rental-car companies could fill this gap.
At the same time, the number of businesses and vehicles is shrinking – in Saxony-Anhalt faster than in Thuringia. Fewer providers meet growing demand. „The cake is bigger, the pieces are smaller,“ reads the letter. The perspective: There is enough demand, provided the industry unites and acts strategically.
Why the taxi industry is at a crossroads
But it is precisely here that the LTV sees a problem. Platforms promise streamlined mediation, relieve hospital staff and bundle orders digitally. For hospitals, that's convenient. For individual entrepreneurs, it seems attractive: more rides, less customer acquisition. In the short term, that may be true. In the long term, however, the balance of power shifts. Whoever obtains their orders through a platform loses the direct line to the customer. The actual client is no longer the passenger or the clinic, but the platform. It controls the mediation, defines procedures – and sets the fees.
Platforms promise efficiency - Example QRaGo
QRaGo started, according to the association, with a service fee of around €1.60 per mediated ride. In the meantime, a distance-based model applies: €0.95 for trips up to five kilometers, €2.25 up to 20 kilometers, €4.50 up to 75 kilometers, and €8.95 beyond that — all net. The company justifies the adjustment by investments in algorithms, processes and support.
For businesses that already operate with narrow margins – especially for patient transport with fixed reimbursement rates from the payers – every additional fee puts further pressure on the cost calculation. Revenues are regulated, costs are rising. Those who then remit a portion of turnover to an intermediary reduce their own room for maneuver.
Large companies preferred
In addition, a structural shift: larger companies with office structures can accept orders more quickly, single-vehicle operators fall behind. Those who do not constantly monitor the screen miss rides. Digital efficiency creates a new competition within the competition.
The LTV warns of a development known from other industries. Platforms grow by bringing providers and customers together. With increasing market penetration, their bargaining power increases. Fee models change, dependencies arise. In other markets, brokerage commissions are up to 30 percent.
The trade sector faces a decision
Individual optimization or a collective strategy – a firm “No, thank you” to platforms, according to the association's thesis, would suffice to maintain direct collaboration with hospitals. Because in the end, not algorithms drive patients home, but locally based entrepreneurs.
The appeal is economically argued, not nostalgic. It is about value chains and ownership of the customer. Whoever gives up their interface to the client loses room for maneuver – and entrepreneurial autonomy. Cooperation among competitors, fair agreements and joint digital solutions could be an alternative.
The platform economy does not have to be
The LTV announces that it is working on such concepts. The aim is to use digital processes without relinquishing control to external capital providers. Whether this succeeds depends less on technology than on unity. The platform economy is not a natural phenomenon. It only works if enough providers participate. For the taxi and rental car trades in Thuringia and Saxony-Anhalt this is not a theoretical question but a strategic one. It is about more than brokerage fees. It is about the role of the entrepreneur in their own business.
Content automatically translated.
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