The European ride-hailing company Bolt officially commenced operations in Sri Lanka yesterday, on the 24th of November. The company has stated they are committed to providing affordable trips while keeping driver happiness in mind. The service is currently available in Colombo, with an initial fleet of 2,000 drivers. The Bolt app can be downloaded for free from the Apple App Store, Google Play Store and Huawei App Gallery.
The app’s user interface and experience is similar to those offered by Uber and PickMe: you just have to select a starting point and destination, and the app shows available drivers and ride types in your vicinity. It shows an upfront cost estimate for the ride. Currently, the company has 4 types of rides: Economy, Bolt (4 seaters), Tuks and Motorbikes. Payments are facilitated via cash, with more payment methods to be introduced in the future.
Interestingly, Bolt was the first transportation app in the world to allow customers to pay for their trips via mobile carrier billing. Thus, we can expect Bolt to enable payments via local mobile carriers such as Dialog and Mobitel in the future. In face of the current pandemic, Bolt strongly advises all drivers and customers to follow the local health authority guidelines and WHO instructions.
Bolt Comes with Work Profiles
A nifty feature available in Bolt is the ability to set up a Work Profile. This allows users to track work-related travels and get email receipts to a designated company email, making it easy to track personal and work expenses separately. After setting up the Work Profile, users can select whether a ride is personal or work-related, each time they travel.
For the first six months of its operations, Bolt has claimed that they will not charge a commission from drivers, and that passengers will be able to enjoy fares that are 20% less than the competitors. While these measures are certainly welcome, it remains to be seen how long they can sustain them with the established players in the market. Interested drivers can sign up with the platform by visiting their website at https://partners.bolt.eu/driver-signup, or via the Driver app available on Google and Apple app stores.
While having operations in 35 countries across the world, Sri Lanka is Bolt’s first South Asian market expansion. In March 2020, Bolt was ranked 3rd in the FT 1000: Europe’s Fastest Growing Companies 2020 list published by the Financial Times. It currently has a valuation of $1.9 billion, with investments from big names such as Daimler and the European Investment Bank. Apart from on-demand rides, Bolt also offers electric scooters and food delivery (Bolt Food) in Europe, the latter of which we can expect to come to Sri Lanka eventually.
Ride-hailing in Sri Lanka – A Cut-throat Business
The on-demand transportation market in Sri Lanka has seen a proliferation of service providers over the past few years, with Uber and PickMe leading the pack. While customers appreciate the convenience of ride-hailing, serious security concerns have been raised due to harassment incidents reported in almost every platform, calling for regulatory intervention. Furthermore, regular taxi drivers – especially in tourist hotspots -have shown vehement opposition to ride-hailing services, going so far as to physically attack ride-hailing drivers in certain cases.
Bolt conducts criminal background checks and in-person training in their overseas markets, and one can only hope they implement the same here.They also have a strict zero-tolerance policy against alcohol and drug use. Bolt has chosen a somewhat difficult time amidst the Covid19 pandemic to start operations here, with the firm belief that people still need to move around in the city.