Ride Safe India: Ola amps up vehicle safety standards with hygiene kits and mandatory fumigation

Ensures strict adherence with regular checks and mandatory vehicle fumigation every 48 hours at 500+ fumigation centres.

Extending its ‘Ride Safe India’ movement with resumption of operations in 200+ cities, Ola, India’s leading mobility platform and one of the world’s largest ride-hailing companies, has launched a new initiative to improve vehicle standards. The newly launched initiative is aimed at ensuring all driver-partners have access to quality safety equipment such as masks, sanitizers, and disinfectant liquids, as they begin serving the mobility needs of citizens in their cities. This development comes shortly after Ola committed INR 500 Cr towards enabling a safe mobility experience for both citizens and driver-partners across the country.

To meet the highest standards of safety and hygiene, Ola is mandating a comprehensive safety protocol across 500+ fumigation centres in the country. This includes a mandatory fumigation of vehicles every 48 hours and a driver health-check. Simultaneously, dedicated Ola executives ensure that drivers have access to hygiene materials such as hand sanitizers, masks, disinfectant liquids, amongst others. These materials are funded by Ola and drivers can also choose to get them reimbursed. Ola’s driver-partners are also provided regular training on following personal hygiene protocols such as washing hands, and wiping car surfaces including high touch points using a disinfectant liquid.

Ola has also mandated installing a transparent plastic screen separating the driver and passenger seats and wearing masks for ensuring additional safety and peace of mind. This will cover all modes of Ola’s offerings, including point-to-point, rentals and outstation services. Ola is also using its proprietary selfie-authentication technology to ensure driver-partners wear masks at all times while serving on the platform.

Speaking on the enhanced vehicle safety standards, Anand Subramanian, Spokesperson for Ola, said, “With the ‘Ride Safe India’ initiative, we want both customers and driver-partners to be able to travel with the highest levels of safety at all times. Our network of fumigation centres will help ensure strict adherence to vehicle fumigation, and while enabling our driver-partners with safety equipment such as sanitizers, disinfectants and masks. All Ola vehicles will also comply with social distancing measures with the use of PVC screens between the driver and passenger seats. We are committed to raising the industry benchmark for safer mobility and our fumigation centres will help track and monitor the compliance standards across 200+ cities in the country.”

About Ride Safe India Initiative:

Ola unveiled the ‘Ride Safe India’ initiative last week with an aim to enhance safety in mobility in the fight against COVID- 19. The company has committed a sum of INR 500 Cr towards various safety initiatives which include highest levels of driver standards, a host of technology advancements including a newly designed COVID-ready app, hygiene and safety benchmark for vehicles and an industry-wide collective mission in its fight against COVID- 19. ‘Ride Safe India’ centers on Ola’s commitment to go beyond and enable customers and drivers partners to collectively enjoy the highest standards of cleanliness with prevention and sanitisation protocols. This will cover all modes of Ola’s offerings, be it 4-Wheelers, 3-Wheelers and 2-Wheelers.

(We got this information from a press release.)