Safety measures in place, insist taxi operators

Taxi operators in the City claim that they are following all guidelines and conducting additional checks to ensure that passengers have a safe travel in their cabs.

Rajiv Vij, Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Carzonrent India Pvt Ltd, said, “We have a very stringent process of attaching cars and hiring drivers. We filter our drivers who further go through a three-tier verification process.”

He said that the biometric verification of the drivers is conducted by a third party followed by a bank verification. The PAN card and driving licence of the drivers are secured before hiring them.

“All our cars are tracked and monitored by GPS system through our call centers. Our cars come with a “panic button” and the customers can press it any time if they feel suspicious. Also for any bookings done post 7 pm, there is a check done to understand if the customer is a male or female and then even more stringent procedure is followed to ensure there is a proper car and driver that is allocated to the customer.”

Siddhartha Pahwa, Group CEO, Meru Cabs Co Pvt Ltd, said that each of their driver had to get a police verification done. The company checks the address by sending a registered post. The biometric records of the driver are also obtained.

Training for drivers

“Each driver has to undergo four-day training and special course at Meru Training Academy on dealing with women passengers. The driver is put on the system only after he clears the test. Also customers can register for Trip Tracker Facility, which provides the passengers’ trip details to a trusted person assigned by the passenger and after every 15 minute an update on car location is sent to the trusted person”.

Anand Subramanian, Director – Marketing Communication, Ola, said, “ Even though we are not a transport service provider, we ensure that the partner driver who is using our software passes the stringent compliance check of his personal and professional papers. Each and every ride of ours is tracked and all records are maintained meticulously.”

He said that their customers have the option to share his/her ride details real-time with their loved ones. All cabs have a smart phone device for tracking cabs real-time.

“We have a 24x7 call centre where customers can call in case of any issue. In the light of the recent incident in Delhi, we are working on creating an additional layer of GPS tracking in all cabs on the platform,” he said.