Cabify shields its return to Barcelona by using the traditional VTC model
MadridUpdated:
Cabify operates since last Thursday in Barcelona under the legal form of the most traditional vehicles with driver (VTC) companies and, therefore, considers that his return to Barcelona is legally supported, according to the documentation prepared by the legal services of the company he has had access Ep.
According to this legal and operational form, which is the one applied to the traditional VTC services used by clients such as hotels or other companies from different sectors, the pre-contracting of the 15 minutes that the Generalitat has imposed is not applicable at the time of requesting each trip, a differentiated procedure of the contracting of the transport service.
Sources of the sector consulted by Ep point out that the return of Cabify to Barcelona «is very well armed and legally supported, It has been the subject of very thorough work and if it were questioned or any action taken against it, in practice, it would have to do the same with the other traditional VTC companies that continue to operate in Catalonia normally. "
The service provided by Cabify in Catalonia to its users «is transport -and not the travel agency, which is the one that had been used until now in Barcelona and is still valid in the rest of Spain- in the same conditions that traditional companies in the VTC sector have been doing, whose survival the Generalitat itself has declared who wants to guarantee ».
To start up this new model, Cabify acquired a transport company, VTC Prestige & Limousine, which is the society through which he has begun to provide his services since last Thursday in Barcelona. Cabify has subscribed with this company the cession of the brand and the use of the APP to contract its services.
In practice, this means that the service that has begun to be provided in Catalonia is transport, with a different legal regime from the one I had been using, travel agencys.
According to the company's legal documentation, which has been shared with the rest of the members of the VTC association, "users who want to travel to Catalonia must accept terms and conditions through which VTC Prestige & Limousine he is obliged to lend them a service of leasing of vehicles with driver ».
These services may be provided by the Prestige & Limousine itself, its cars and drivers, or other VTC companies, which in this way may join this new way of operating, by signing a contract for the provision of the same service through the operating company of Cabify in Catalonia.
"According to the business model described," says Cabify's documentation, "it can be argued before the Generalitat that the contracting of the transport service by the user it is carried out when the latter accepts the conditions of the transportation service that will be offered through the Cabify application, so that it is at that moment that the 15-minute period between the contract and the start of the journey ».
Moment of hiring
This statement is found in the article 4 of the decree law approved by the Generalitat, which states that "for the purpose of guaranteeing compliance with the conditions of provision of the service of article 182.1 of royal decree 1211/1990 and, in particular, of the pre-contracting of the service, there must be a minimum interval of 15 minutes between the hiring and the effective provision of the service ».
For Cabify, «It is evident that the decree of the Generalitat refers to the hiring, and not to the request for services, as the moment from which the fifteen minutes are computed "and, therefore," the formula chosen to operate in Catalonia is 100% compliant with the regulations in force and has been defended by the Generalitat for traditional VTCs , which is how Cabify is now operating in Barcelona ».
Despite promoting this new business model, Cabify itself highlighted in its statement that this legal modality is not the most suitable, since it is more burdensome, to have to incur greater costs to implement it. In fact, he also affirmed that the previous travel agency model that he used in Catalonia up to the decree law of the Generalitat, and that he continues to use in the rest of Spain, allows a much better service for users.
In just 24 hours, Cabify reached more than 50,000 users They accepted the new terms and conditions and have started to use their services again, without any incident. In an initial phase, the company expects to operate with a fleet of close to 300 vehicles, although it trusts that new VTC companies, which had paralyzed their operations in Barcelona following the decree of the Generalitat, will join this new way of operating through Cabify.
