40,000 MyCar registered users from Sabah
KOTA KINABALU: MyCar, an up and coming local e-hailing company is determined to work together with the taxi drivers to prevent the latter from being left out in the country’s developing e-hailing industry.
“We are in the midst of spreading our wings in Sabah. (At the same time) we do not want taxi drivers to be marginalised from our plan. We want taxi drivers to be a part of this e-hailing industry - to grow together with MyCar. We had always opened our doors for taxi drivers to work together with us,” MyCar founder Mohd Noah Maideen said.
“We do not want the taxi drivers to think that we are interfering with their jobs (rides). E-hailing is a lifestyle that is very much liked by the people, especially among the youths,” he told reporters when met at MyCar Sabah’s gathering on Thursday night.
Currently, MyCar has over 50,000 registered drivers in the whole of Malaysia with nearly one million registered users, including 40,000 from Sabah.
Noah revealed that MyCar would be meeting with Chief Minister Datuk Seri Shafie Apdal to assure the State Government that MyCar came in peace and would provide an equal opportunity for both personal drivers and taxi drivers in the state.
The meeting is expected to be held within the next two to three weeks. Noah also said that MyCar has been building rapport with all the relevant federal ministries such as the Transport Ministry, Communications and Multimedia Ministry as well as the Tourism, Arts and Culture Ministry.
“In Kuala Lumpur, MyCar Now is quite popular. This is where all e-hailing requests would be given the same priority, regardless of whether it is a personal car or a taxi. Each driver will have the same opportunity as long as they are they are close by to the customer,” Noah said.
In other words, MyCar Now is a concept where the driver who is located closest to the customer would have an upper hand as that driver would be the first to receive the customer’s request.
On the safety features, Noah said that the MyCar app has an SOS button and that both the driver and the passenger would be able to use this function.
The app also uses a live GPS tracker. This means that, as long as the driver or passenger is connected with the Internet, that person’s location can be tracked with the live GPS tracker. The person’s location will be tracked as the car is moving.
This live GPS tracker feature can even be shared on other platforms such as Whatsapp; this would enable a person to share their exact location with their family and friends, for safety precautions.
The tracker would include the driver’s name and contact number. In Sabah there are about 1,000 registered MyCar drivers and there are 30 taxi drivers who have registered with MyCar.
Noah explained that MyCar would be focusing on Kota Kinabalu, Sandakan, Tawau, Keningau, Tenom, Beaufort and Tambunan.
When asked how MyCar would benefit its drivers, Noah said that the company practises a 15 per cent commission deduction while other e-hailing companies would usually deduct 20 to 25 per cent.