Certainty and Safety

Gaps Identified:

Safety or security is one of the vital aspects that must be taken into consideration by a company like Grab that is providing direct customer service. Security concerns everyone involved as incidents related to safety or security in the ride sharing companies are quite frequent and sometimes not even reported. This is directly related to the company goodwill and perceived value to the customers and any bad PR can severely damage the organization. Bellini et al., (2005) stated that tangibles like the safety and convenience for customers and it representative as company’s image and quality (Zeithaml et al., 2006). Safety concerns should be taken into serious consideration by any organization like Grab who has a larger stake in the market and has the potential to lose the market leadership due to any unforeseen incident. According to the research conducted by Balachandran et al. (2017), the second most influential factor to customer satisfaction is Safety and Security, after comfort. Hence, e-hailing services like Grab should focus more on the safety and security issue in order for them to ensure optimum consumer satisfaction and adding value to their service.

Among the gaps identified, one of the major issue recognized is the lack of safety of the passengers, especially females as well as Grab should invest in training their drivers through taking more ownership. People in Malaysia are vastly dependent on Grab for their day-to-day travel as it is the only e-hailing service available now. Everyday large number of people are using the Grab services and a significant number of the users are females. The female passengers do not feel very safe to ride the Grab cars for transportation especially in night or travelling alone or both. There is also an issue of development of the drivers, as Grab needs to take more ownership in the aspect of training and educating their drivers. Grab should focus on a basic and standardized but short training and development program to ensure a level of service provided.

Survey Findings:

Based on the survey results, it is clear that over the half of total respondents find that safety is important while choosing a mode of transportation. This can be interpreted in a manner that people will prioritize safety over waiting time or travel time as well. This is a very important aspect and needs to be addressed accordingly. In response to the question of whether Grab is a company prioritizing safety, nearly 47% of the respondents remained neutral where only 41% respondents agreed with the statement. It is evident from the responses that the users do not usually associate Grab with safety and security of the passengers.

From the chart on the right, it is clear that the passengers want to ensure the safety of the female passengers by Grab. Nearly 47% of the respondents strongly agree with the idea that Grab should take actions to ensure safety of the female passengers. Under the survey question of whether, Grab needs to improve its approach to the safety of its passengers, nearly 48% of respondents agreed with that statement.

Nearly 44% respondents in the survey also believe that Grab should work into the training and development of its drivers. Grab should increase the ownership with the drivers and device up a unified plan to provide a development program to ensure better customer experience and to add value to the service itself. In order to increase the value to its customers, Grab need to ensure the customer safety as well as increase the customer experience by developing the drivers.

Recommendation and Limitations:

Recommendation: In order to ensure safety, Grab can take some actions in collaboration with the drivers. Some Grab cars have cameras inside which records inside and outside simultaneously. Grab should make the use of camera obligatory and share a portion of the initial cost. In case of a reported accident, it will be easier for Grab to identify and take actions against the party responsible.

Grab should also focus on the training and development of the drivers to ensure that the drivers are friendly, vigilant and cooperative. Grab is providing a very delicate service and the drivers are a very important part of it. In order to add value to the service that Grab is providing, drivers needs to be educated so that they provide the service with high standards.

Limitation: However, installing cameras to all grab cars will be costly and some drivers can resistant to the idea at first. Grab should device a plan to share the cost between Grab and the drivers as this will benefit both the parties and through discussion, this can be attainable. Major security companies can provide the security solutions at a discounted price in exchange for advertisement facilities or proportional activities that can be useful to both parties.

However, this is going to cost Grab a significant amount of money but in the end, this will benefit Grab to get competitive edge and also to get more customer satisfaction. Grab can provide training to some drivers, not all, based on user reviews targeting the areas where needs development. Reputed universities and/or training institutes can be engaged for short training and development at a discounted price in exchange for promotional activities and for academic purposes.

Additional Recommendation: We also recommend introducing a service especially for the female passengers as there are many female drivers and passengers using Grab cars each day. A specialized service, for example ‘Grab Pink’, should be launched with only female drivers and for female customers. Like the competitor Riding Pink, this will make the female passengers feel safer while using Grab in their day to day life.