SINGAPORE — A disagreement between a private-hire driver and his customers has ignited a discussion online: Is it acceptable for a customer to ask for pick-up at a different location than the one they booked?

A picture of the exchange was uploaded to popular Singapore Facebook group “Complaint Singapore” last Saturday (March 23), garnering over 150 comments as of Wednesday. 

The conversation started with a request by the passenger to be picked up at the sixth floor of a multi-storey car park.

This provoked a snappy reply from the private-hire driver, who asked: “Are you handicapped?”

He continued that it would cost S$5 for him to drive up as the passenger had indicated the wrong pick-up location.

The passenger then replied that they would come down instead, to which the driver retorted: “Don’t be entitled. We are not your personal driver.”

The post did not mention which ride-hailing app that the driver was working for.

RUDE DRIVER OR ENTITLED PASSENGER?

The conversation had netizens split on whether the driver was justified with his curt reply to the passenger’s seemingly “entitled” request.

The online debate seemed to lean towards the driver as netizens reasoned that there is extra effort and costs borne out of driving up and down six floors of the car park. 

“Can understand how the driver felt. Passenger appears self-entitled. Can you imagine the driver turning round and round to go up six levels?”, commented a Facebook user.

“Private-hire vehicles' fare structure are from the building pick-up point, so any additional distance, time and petrol are borne by the driver,” another user added.

Facebook user “Recon Refresh” pointed out that passengers are not entitled to drivers going an extra mile beyond the pick-up point: “Listen, all riders: drivers only pick up and drop off at the designated building drop-off and pick-up point. If the driver drives to your basement or level six, it's a bonus for you and not an entitlement.”

User “Bernard Chua” noted: “ComfortDelGro ComfortRide flat fare now (includes a) S$5 surcharge if you request for pick-up/drop-off at basement or at upper floors other than the street level usual pick-up point, and this is legit so riders take note.”

On taxi operator ComfortDelGro's website, it is stated that there is an additional S$5 charge for “deviations from the exact pick-up location stated in the booking, such as requests for pick up at guard houses or mall pick-up points”.

Ride-hailing platform Tada's website also specifies that additional distances travelled will be charged at S$5 per stop for distances of or below 5km for economy rides. 

Both Grab and Gojek charge a S$3 fee for "change of drop-off" requests for regular ride options, without specifying distance limitations.

Some netizens seemed to relate to the incident: “He expressed the voices of many drivers.”

On the flip side, some felt that the driver’s brash response was uncalled for.

“Not wrong for the passenger to request, especially if it was remarked upon during the booking. Driver should have just kept comments to himself,” said one Facebook user.

A second user agreed: “It is a request. If the driver doesn't want to, he can just reply firmly but nicely. Don't have to be rude.”

Others felt that it was the driver that was displaying entitlement: “I’m a driver. Nothing wrong with this request. I will drive up to pick up the passenger. Some drivers just want to act high-up and self-entitled. A job is a job, just drive.”

Some commenters took neither side, but rather, advocated for more kindness and understanding from both parties.

"No need to play the blame game," one netizen said.

"Graciousness and kind consideration from others start from (you and) me."

Another referred to Malaysian comedian Ronny Chieng’s rant about Singaporeans last Thursday, a sad reminder that perhaps Chieng was right when he said "Singapore’s a country of small island Karens."

Similar incidents have occurred in the past with other private-hire drivers.

Last year, a driver was temporarily suspended from ride-hailing application Grab after he requested for extra charges to pick up a woman from the third floor of a car park.

The customer had taken to TikTok to express her dissatisfaction, explaining that she had made the request as she was in crutches and it was raining.

"It is against the driver code of conduct to ask for additional charges, and we have temporarily suspended the partner's account," said Grab, in a statement to Mothership. 

In another case that happened in January, a passenger shared that a Grab driver had requested for an additional S$5 charge to drive from the guardhouse of her condominium to the basement lobby. 

A Grab representative said that the driver has received a strike on record as a corrective action, reported The New Paper.