[Thad E Ginathom]

Originally Posted by Chetan_Rao

... ... ... Difference? It costs a LOT to trash a rental in the US.

A badly dented panel on a rental car once cost me several hundred UK pounds.

(The only other time I returned a UK rental car in more than one piece, I had taken the insurance. Phew: it was a small company, which I continued to deal with, and they told me that the repair had cost two thousand GBP)

[Chetan_Rao]

Originally Posted by Thad E Ginathom

A badly dented panel on a rental car once cost me several hundred UK pounds.

(The only other time I returned a UK rental car in more than one piece, I had taken the insurance. Phew: it was a small company, which I continued to deal with, and they told me that the repair had cost two thousand GBP)

Contrast that to what's prevalent here.

Most self-drive rentals don't charge a security deposit anymore, insurance is included (I won't be surprised if it isn't comprehensive) and liability capped to a small number, though there are reports of customer being charged for damages. Given the state most cars end up in, I don't think a penny of any damage fines recovered from renters actually go towards repairs.

Revv recently tried to charge me for fuel I'd already paid for upfront, on a sparsely used rental (their genius delivery agent had parked on a incline before taking pictures). Charges promptly taken off my bill when I called them with 'if you believe your car drinks a quarter tank of diesel for 25kms running, you have much larger problems than a fuel bill'.

[moralfibre]

It is a cultural thing where we believe anything that isn't owned by us can be abused. Very few are impudent towards other's property. This is true not only for vehicles owned by others but also public services that we as citizens use. Look at our trains, streets, etc.

Ola will have to employ significantly high grade tech to score their customers. It's obviously going to be a tricky path but I don't see any other alternative to sustain in this high risk business.

A bunch of startups are already building tech in this field:

- Affectiva

Here's an interesting blog on how they used IoT framework to ingest logs into IBM's Watson cloud to analyse driver behaviour. This data is then contextualised with data sets from autonomous vehicles to derive information on a physical driver v/s an autonomous one for comparison. - Link

[Hayek]

Great that Ola is entering the self drive rental game. I think it is a business that is ripe for take off, and needs a well funded player to jump start it.

However, I don’t see how this can be a business focused on luxury cars. The availability of luxury cars here is probably similar to how Uber launched with rides in 5 series - something to generate hype and attract customers. But the fact is that most Indians will want to spend only enough to rent a Swift Dzire - and it is that segment that will become the focus for Ola Rentals over time. The fact is that those of us who want to rent BMWs (or for that matter even Skoda Octavias) are a tiny and irrelevant minority for any business that wants to build scale. And Ola is certainly not a player that will pussy foot out here - it will look to build scale.

[kiku007]

Originally Posted by Samurai

Ola will have to build a rating system for renters. Car abusers should get negative ratings, and once they hit certain threshold, they can't rent anymore.

Otherwise, this business just won't survive. The abusers will destroy all the cars, and good drivers will loathe to rent bad cars.

Originally Posted by GTO

I so agree with this . But they'll have to handle any potential backlash carefully. On Uber, the ratings are peer-to-peer. It's a completely different matter for a company to rate its customers!

Originally Posted by GTO

This line made me think & the likes of Ola + Zoom should definitely take it further.

Instead of penalising bad drivers, reward the good ones. Give them additional discounts for "good behaviour" or similar. Indians love discounts and the minute they see a carrot big enough, they'll drive the Ola / Zoom Car like they do their own.

What Ola can leverage is something like the below Insurance App,

https://ubicar.com.au/ubicar-for-safe-drivers/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BK0NgMY-QEw

Basically, reward good drivers and penalise bad drivers and passengers. Of course, Ola will still need to perform visual inspections and then accord points for that as well.

Deduct points if people aren't belted I'd say.

To this date, I don't approve of eating inside the car. But the least people can do is to clean up the mess they leave.

[ajmat]

So last night, Vid6969 and I went for Ford Vs Ferrari at Vega mall.

We were astounded to find half a floor full of rental cars in pretty good shape. The numbers were consecutive in some cases. We spotted, Swits, i10, D'zires, i20's, Innovas, Cretas and Capturs.





They looked too good to be Zoom, so we collared the supervisor. These were all part of the Ola Car hire. Some points:

• The fleet is located in 5 places

1. Vega Mall
2. Forum Mall
3. Forum Shanthiniketan Mall
4. Total Mall Murugeshpalya
5. Garuda Mall

• A lot of i10's and compact sedans are refurbished cabs or cars which Ola drivers discarded - with a wink, we were advised to hire the other cars
  
• The android Ola app allows you to hire the cars
  
• We told the supervisor that you should put strict liabilities on damage etc. considering the experiences of Zoom
  
• No Zap type nonsense, all the cars are owned by OLA - we even looked at the car papers!
  
• 5 big locations with quality staff makes a lot of sense compared to many small obscure locations.

Its a brilliant way to pivot considering the taxi segment is facing a shake out due to social, regulatory and other pressures!

[mtnrajdeep]

Originally Posted by ajmat

• The fleet is located in 5 places

1. Vega Mall
2. Forum Mall
3. Forum shanthiniketan Mall
4. Total Mall Murugeshpalya
5. Garuda Mall

I also see these Ola Drive rental cars parked at Forum Shantiniketan mall in Whitefield.

[Shivam]

What is the current situation of self drive luxury cars? Is anyone still offering those?
I am looking to replace my ertiga with a bmw X1, but my family feels it may not be as passenger friendly as ertiga. Thinking of renting one for a weekend to practical understanding.

Any suggestions?

Thanks!

[speedmiester]

Self Drive Experience with Ola Drive

We had planned a three day temple run trip. We were 5 adults and 1 4 year old kid with car seat.
Since I am not comfortable with my son traveling without car seat, opted to get a self drive car for our trip.
Though I have used self drive cars in the past, I was apprehensive about getting one post covid phase. My Mother doesn't travel much due to bad knee and motion sickness and my Father is 80+, though he loves to travel, he needs a comfortable car. Hence decided to a get a 7 seater preferably with captain seats.

Decision:
Looked at all the options and found very few which provided 7 Seater Crysta.
Ola was the cheapest and had newer fleet since they have been in the business for less than 3 years.
There were very few reviews on Ola and this was a cause of apprehension whether to go ahead with the booking or not. Still took a gamble and booked with Ola for 3 days with total bill coming to around 17K including fuel for 900Kms and home delivery.

Booking process:
Ola drive can only be booked on their app. Though it is smooth and user friendly, I hate to install an app just for one single purpose. Deposit is 3000/- which is quite good. Refund and cancellation charges are also very reasonable.
Another point is Ola allows us to choose the number of kms as per our requirement. This is a good move as one need not pay extra for additional mileage. I had opted for 900Kms package and drove a total of 883kms when I handed over the car

Delivery and Handover:
Though I received a call from Ola the previous night on possible delay in delivering the car, I received the car on time. Handover process was smooth and was completed in 10 minutes. I took video and photos of the car from all angles.
Got the car picked up an hour early, return process was again smooth and was completed in under 10 minutes. Within 30mins of pickup, I received the msg regarding deposit refund minus the toll charges.
I uploaded the fuel receipts on the app and the amount was credited back in a days time.

About the car:
I received a 2019 Crysta G manual version with captain seats which has done about 64000Kms. The body had it's fair share of scratches and interiors were in decent condition. Though the car was free of dust and muck, I wouldn't call it clean as per my standards. Tyres were in good condition with about 50% tread left on all 4 tyres. Spare was also in good condition.
I spent an hour sanitizing the car and wiping down all seats and interiors.
Mechanically, the car was in good condition, clutch was a bit hard but nothing to complain about. There were a few rattles, again nothing alarming.
It had a entertainment system from Ola which has inbuilt navigation through google maps and 4g connectivity.
All in all had a very comfortable drive through highways, ghat roads, bad roads and curvy roads. Fastag worked without any hitches.

Ease of Booking: 5/5
Handover and Pickup process: 5/5
Cleanliness: 4/5
Car condition: 4.5/5
VFM: 5/5
Deposit and refund: 5/5