TO break men’s monopoly in the motorbike e-hailing business – or rather to circumvent religious/cultural sensitivity or inappropriateness – LadyJek which is very similar to its bigger brothers Go-Jek and GrabBike was rolled out in Indonesia back in 2015.
As its name suggests, would-be female passengers who are particular about the gender of the rider can order a motorcycle ride through the LadyJek app and be assured the rider arriving to pick them up will also be women.
Although proven to be successful in Indonesia and Thailand, motorcycle e-hailing services have yet to receive the Government’s nod due to safety issues.
To re-cap, Go-Jek and home-grown Dego Ride have attempted to offer these services in the past as they would appeal to those who can’t afford to pay for taxis or car-based ride-hailing services such as those offered by Grab and airasia Ride.
If LadyJek can be used as a gauge, international ride hailing service provider, Maxim Malaysia, who considers itself as an advocate motorbike e-hailing in Malaysia, believes “the same gender ride” policy can be replicated in its app.
“Yes, definitely this is possible for us,” Maxim Malaysia Director Ahmad Khamal Abd Manan told FocusM.
“For example, we have such a feature in Iran where female drivers can only take orders from female passengers. Although, currently we do not have such a feature in Malaysia, we can surely activate such a feature in our app to enable female users to choose female drivers for their rides.”
With a bit of tweaking, Khamal said female passengers can have the option to choose their drivers during a booking.
Female passengers will also have the option to decline an order if they are not comfortable with a male driver and instead wait for a female driver to be assigned.
“If need be, we can emulate our Maxim Iran experience whereby female drivers are only allowed to pick up female passengers,” he suggested.
“In fact, the demand for women drivers there is quite high so much so that e-hailing becomes an important income stream for the women in the country.”
On the issue of safety which is a chief concern judging from reckless riding of food delivery riders, Khamal described it as “moral obligatory duty” for an e-hailing operator to ensure their riders have a safe trip.
“We are strict with riders who are reckless and who violate traffic rules. As soon as complaints are received from passengers, our user support department will immediately remind the riders to obey traffic rules.
“Riders who are repeated offenders will be blocked from completing any orders or have their account suspended.”
Although Malaysia is unable to match Indonesia in terms of motorbike e-hailing popularity, Khamal is hopeful that the Transport Ministry, the Road Transport Department (JPJ) and other relevant authorities would approve e-hailing on bikes in the near future.
“We believe the nitty-gritty pertaining to licensing is being ironed out by the relevant authorities and hence it’s just a matter of time before motorbike e-hailing becomes a reality in Malaysia,” he reckoned.
“We believe that Maxim Bike is a must in Malaysia because there are lots of benefits in store for both the public and the Government.
“The service can alleviate our traffic jams especially during peak hours in big cities and also complement our existing mode of public transportation with high affordability in mind.” – Sept 6, 2022
