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A man in Singapore booked a Grab Premium ride for his mother but realised the car was not moving after waiting for some time.

Vexed, he decided to take matters into his own hands and launched a "hunt", only to find the driver eating at a coffee shop.

Booking accepted but car was a no-show

The 43-year-old man, Karim Sadali, aired his frustration in a Facebook post on Jun. 3, 2023.

Karim said he booked a Grab Premium ride for his mother as he was too tired to send her home.

The booking was accepted, but the designated car failed to arrive after the pair waited for six to seven minutes.

During this time, Karim noticed that the car had not moved from its original position.

He decided to find out what happened and got into his own vehicle to take his mother to the driver.

Found driver "enjoying his dinner"

Karim found the driver at a coffee shop "beside the road where he parked his vehicle".

He said: "The driver [was] just wasting time enjoying his dinner and waiting for me to cancel his booking so that I will get the fine instead and he could profit from it."

However, he was not surprised by the turn of events, explaining that this was not his first encounter with such incidents.

He even seemed prepared and said, "Lucky for me I decided to record this whole 'Grab hunt' from the moment I left my car park to the moment I caught him red-handed leaving the coffee shop and entering his vehicle."

"I have the full video non-edited continuous recording from [the] car park to the moment I confronted him," he added.

"Saga" took more than 20 minutes

Karim approached the driver when he saw the latter entering his vehicle.

He confronted the driver and showed him the Grab booking, which he said was still active at that time.

The driver was taken by surprise and told Karim, "Sir, I don’t know", before he cancelled the booking and left the scene.

The whole saga took more than 20 minutes before the booking was cancelled.

Karim said, "I’m sure there are many times consumers have to cancel [a] booking because of the waiting time 'grab driver no show'."

He added, "The Grab booking system is flawed when it comes to us the consumers and again this wasn’t my first similar experience."

In his Facebook post, Karim urged the public to tag Grab so that the ride-hailing platform "will thoroughly review their booking procedures".

Driver temporarily suspended

In response to Mothership's queries, a Grab spokesperson said they have looked into the matter and temporarily suspended the driver.

"We are sorry to learn about this incident. Following a review of this incident and past records, we have reasons to believe that the driver-partner deliberately did not head to the pick-up point and hence we have suspended the driver."

According to the spokesperson, Grab drivers have the option of going offline when they need to take a break.

Mothership understands that rides are automatically accepted by default for Grab drivers who are online.

Grab has measures to safeguard riders' interests

The spokesperson added that there are measures in place to safeguard riders' interests and prevent such errant behaviour among driver-partners.

"First, our cancellation policy ensures that passengers will not be charged when our app detects that the driver-partner is not headed towards the pick-up point or does not arrive within the three minutes of the estimated time of arrival.

Second, we review any suspected stalling behaviour among driver-partners and take necessary action against them."

Mothership understands that the Grab system detects such errant behaviours through reviews and automatic detection via the driver's GPS pings.

"As such, the vast majority of our driver-partners do not engage in such practices," the spokesperson assured.

The spokesperson added that drivers may have legitimate reasons for late pick-ups.

"We encourage driver-partners and passengers to be understanding and check in with each other via a call or GrabChat before cancelling."

Mothership has reached out to Karim for his comment.

You can read his post below:

Top image by Rolando Garrido from Unsplash