There is also the thing that cabs in Germany always _have_ to provide service, regardless of vacation, weather and so on. A private might decide to operate only at those times of the day with a lot of potential customers but that is not possible for official cab companies. The same goes for heavy rain and snow and so on.
> There is also the thing that cabs in Germany always _have_ to provide service, regardless of vacation, weather and so on. A private might decide to operate only at those times of the day with a lot of potential customers but that is not possible for official cab companies.
In my experience as a German waiting for a taxi after midnight in a suburban area (but with a major road going through), this is a merely theoretical construct. I've called 3 taxi providers in the rough area; the result was a brisk 1.5 hour walk home because they did not seem all to interested in dispatching a driver to that location at that time. I might have a theoretical legal handle on this behavior, but I doubt this has ever been successfully challenged in court (since the providers can always weasel out by claiming the did not have and free drivers at this moment).
You don't have to challenge this in court. There's a regulation authority that you can report the case to. That's unlikely to help in an individual case, but if there's multiple cases it will trigger a reaction.
Who are you going to write the negative review to if no driver decides to pick you up? All of them that didn't show up? On what grounds? No Uber driver is required to provide service to any area at any time, whereas at least under the current german regulation someone is, namely the owners of the taxi license(s) for that area.
