September 28, 2020, 05:08 PM
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A woman recently cancelled a Grab trip after noticing that the driver would have to travel 23km to get to where she was to pick her up.
In a Facebook post shared to Complaint Singapore, Joyce Zhuang said she had booked a Grabcar from somewhere in Sembawang.
Her trip fee was S$6.
The driver, who was coming from town, was approximately 29 minutes away according to a screenshot shared by Zhuang.
Joyce Zhuang/FB
Zhuang said she texted the driver, who allegedly told her that this is not the first time he has been assigned such jobs.
She claimed that she eventually cancelled the trip so the driver would not have to drive 23km just to "send her somewhere nearby".
Zhuang also clarified in the comments section of the post that she was not charged any fees, presumably because she had cancelled within the five-minute window.
In response to her post, some commenters pointed out that it could be a glitch in the Grab app or a problem with the driver's GPS.
The question was then: Why did the driver accept such a job in the first place?
Some suggested that it is likely he enabled the Auto Accept feature, as drivers are disincentivised for opting out.
As of July 2020, drivers who opt-out of the Auto Accept feature will no longer be eligible for the Grab Performance Rebate and Locations to Avoid Feature.
Additionally, Grab also has a far pick-up bonus of S$3 for drivers if the trip fulfils certain requirements.
The radius of this far pick-up feature, however, is unclear.
[Update Sep. 30, 4:03pm: Inserting statement from Grab]
Grab: Issue with driver's device's GPS
In response to Mothership's queries, a Grab spokesperson clarified that the driver was assigned to the ride request as "his vehicle location was not updated in a timely manner due to an issue with his device’s GPS".
To avoid such incidents, Grab sends their driver-partners regular communications to ensure that their phone device operating systems and their Grab driver app are of the most updated versions.
Driver-partners are also encouraged to clear their GPS cache on their phone if they notice any discrepancies, the Grab spokesperson added.
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Top photo via Joyce Zhuang/FB
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