On the 6th of June 2019, Uber discontinued their API giving developers a week’s notice to find alternatives. A recurring theme in the mobile sharing platform with similar competitions (e.g Lyft) following the same pattern. Given the recent change in API policy 4 days before the launch of the Vivus app beta version there would be a few changes to our ride request feature.
During the development, the initial plan was to offer users the opportunity to request rides without leaving the app, providing ride request data before confirmation and avoiding surge prices. A viable decision, given the stable release of the API but recent changes in Uber’s policy, has sadly prevented us from implementing this. Rather, basic information such as the cost, estimated time, duration and miles will be provided but the request action will launch the uber app with pre-filled information. We do apologise for the inconvenience, we know a lot of you were looking forward to it.
The next step for us is to apply for private access and update this blog when we receive notable changes.