Grab rolls out bike app in Phnom Penh
SINGAPORE-BASED ride hailing app Grab has added motorbike taxis to its inventory in Phnom Penh, becoming the first app of its kind to offer the popular motodop service.
“We’ve seen a lot of people in Phnom Penh using motodops, and we thought we could help the drivers by letting them use the app to find customers,” said Wee Tang Yee, Grab’s country head for Cambodia and Thailand.
“With traffic here, too, motorbikes seem a lot more useful [than tuk-tuks or cars] if you want to get somewhere quickly.”
For now, GrabBike is only in beta and the service was launched exclusively in some central parts of the capital. Yee said the company had signed up about 100 motorbike drivers, all of whom had attended a safety and training session in addition to providing ownership documents and a valid driver’s licence.
Yoeun Ratana, one of Grab’s new drivers, showed up on his personal motorbike, sporting a Captain America shield emblazoned across the front.
Ratana has a full-time job as a technical assistant, but he signed up with Grab about a week ago to make extra cash.
“It’s really easy to use the [Grab] app, and it only took me a day to train to be a driver,” he said.
The base rate for GrabBike drivers in Phnom Penh is currently set at 2,500 riel, or $0.63, for the first kilometre, with customers charged an additional 1,000 riel, or $0.25, per kilometre after that.