Grab Wants To Make Carpooling Easier With Its Latest Service
Time fill up those empty seats in your car.
By John Lim — 06 May 2016, 01:15 PM
Carpooling is one of the easiest ways to travel. If the end goal is to reach the same destination, it makes perfect sense to travel in the same vehicle, right?
It helps save cost too!
With that in mind, ride-sharing platform Grab has launched its latest service - GrabHitch - a door-to-door service that matches passengers and drivers who are heading to the same destination
"This latest service caters to both drivers and passengers who are cost-conscious. Drivers with extra space in their vehicles have the option of picking up passengers who are going the same way to offset the cost of his/her journey, whilst passengers only need to pay for a fraction of the cost compared to other option of transportation," said Ngiam Xin Wei, regional head of GrabHitch.
To begin, a Facebook account is needed to use the service. Drivers will share their routes and destinations with passengers.
The app will then match the driver with passengers going the same way, at around the same time. Passengers will, however, need to pre-book their ride seven days in advance or up to two hours before pick up.
Drivers will have the liberty of choosing passengers based on built-in preferences including gender, destinations and mutual friends on Facebook
Once that's done, the service will also launch a GPS navigation system to show drivers where to pick up and drop off passengers.
As for the fare, it will be based on the driver's travelling distance. Variable costs like petrol and tolls will be including in the fare as well.
According to Grab, a 15km ride from SS2 to KLCC would cost RM15, compared to other services that would cost RM30. That's 50% percent cheaper! From Shah Alam to KLCC which is around the distance of 30km, it would cost about RM52 by using other services, whereas hitching a ride would cost about RM21.
GrabHitch is currently open for drivers to sign up via the Grab app. To sign-up, just click on the “GrabHitch” icon, select the “Driver Signup” button and follow the instructions.
For passengers, rides can only be scheduled via GrabHitch on 15 May 2016.