China: Issued Notice on Regulating the Management of Online Car-hailing Aggregation Platforms

On 25 April 2023, the Ministry of Transport, alongside the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, Ministry of Public Security, State Administration for Market Regulation and the Internet Information Office of China, published a notice on Regulating the Management of Online Car-hailing Aggregation Platforms. The notice applies to car-hailing platform intermediaries and requires autonomous regions, provinces and municipalities to ensure compliance with the requirements. The ministries aim to standardise business behaviour, protect the legitimate rights and interests of passengers and drivers, consolidate corporate responsibility, and maintain fair competition in the market. In particular, the notice requires online aggregation platforms to verify online car-hailing platform companies and not to connect to online car-hailing platform companies that have not obtained a local online car-hailing business license. Further, it requires online car-hailing aggregation platforms to display information, such as the company name of the cooperative online car-hailing platform, the business license of the online car-hailing platform, and the method for complaints.