My Strange Experience With E-Hailer Bolt

In the course of my work as a Property Renovator, I occasionally e-hail to make site visits. And for a while now, Bolt has been my first choice for such visits. 

And so it was that on Friday, 26 November, 2022, I e-hailed a Bolt to Glen Marais, Kempton Park for a project preparation meeting with a client.

However, something quite odd transpired both on the outbound and inbound trips and I'll explain in a moment. I have to state, however, on the outskirts that, I'm loathe to summon a car and have the driver waiting unnecessary. In fact, even when I have to travel with my wife, who - because of a motor vehicle accident, years ago - walks with the aid of a crutch, I always ensure that we're both on the kerbside before summoning a car. Really, I loathe to have a poor Bloke turn up only to find that the the customer isn't yet at the rendezvous point.

And so, this drizzly Friday afternoon, I went to my pavement and summoned a Bolt, watched it start off from wherever it was, drive to my location and, just before the Driver turned into my street, I crossed the road, all the while looking at the registration plate to confirm it was the right car and, as soon as it pulled up, I got on board. And from my vantage point, sitting as I was in the front passenger seat, I had a clear view of the Driver's mobile phone on the dashboard and, I could clearly see the trip fee on the screen, corresponding to what was indicated on my app. However, when we arrived at my destination, the driver pointed to his screen and announced a higher than expected figure! I queried this and he responded by saying that, it was because the area we were is boom gated! Somehow, this did not make sense to me but, nonetheless, I paid him and alighted from the car.

An hour or so after my meeting with the client, I again summoned a Bolt and, as per custom, the Driver found me waiting and, I boarded without delay and headed Home. 

Upon arrival, however, the Driver (another Driver altogether) shows me a higher than expected fee! Again I paid, got some change back and, alighted.

Then, moments later, I decided to contact Bolt Support Service to seek clarification for these discrepancies. However, upon seeing that no response was forth coming, I decided to check the trip receipts and I was shocked with what I saw. Both receipts included a waiting time fee! 

Armed with this insight, I escalated the matter, if you will, and detailed my observations in a second custom message to Bolt Support Service. And to my astonishment, no sooner had I pressed "send" than a message came through offering a discount - roughly equivalent to the amount that had been surcharged on my trips earlier in the afternoon! I couldn't but conclude, these were automated messages!

Not really sure what to do, since everything seemed to be perfunctory, I clicked "Okay" and sure to my suspicion of the messages being automated, another "click" option came, asking me to rate the service I had just experienced; almost like asking me to legitimize the apparent fraud! For once, throughout this episode, I froze and opted not to participate in this manipulative charade. Hours passed. 

But then, late in the evening as I was catching up on the news of the day - the newly discovered Omicron Covid-19 variant - a light bulb, suddenly lit in my head; chances are, this Bolt experience earlier in the day, might actually be a racket being perpetrated these Drivers! However, the question is, what does Bolt know about this. And this question becomes even more pertinent in light of the automated messaging from Bolt Support Service. Bolt did not respond to my initial generic query. It was only when I specified what had transpired that I got a response and at that, a seemingly automated one. It's almost as if, this is a routine occurrence for them.

And so, I turned to the app again, went to my earlier exchanges with Support Service, outlined my suspicions but, when I tried to submit the message, an automated message came up indicating that, the issue was resolved and therefore, closed.

That's when the idea of a blog on the issue, became appealing to me and, within hours I was drafting the blog on my Device and never stopped till I had the gist of my story ready.

I will post this account on my my Blog Page and seek a response from Bolt but, most importantly, I would like to hear from others who might have had similar experiences when dealing with Bolt and its Drivers.

(I later contacted Bolt again through their Twitter handle where I was invited to email either, communicate through the app or by email. With the perfunctory responses I earlier had on the Bolt App, I opted to email my concern and directed them to this Blog. I have since not heard from Bolt).


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