4 April 2020
1. SMRT has partnered Fei Siong Group, KFC, Pizza Hut, GrabFood and GrabExpress to provide our taxi partners with delivery jobs. We aim to recruit more than 500 taxi partners to support our food and parcel delivery collaborations.
2. SMRT taxi partner Vincent Lee, 42, said: “The COVID-19 outbreak has drastically affected my earnings. I used to do more than 20 trips a day, but ever since the outbreak, I’ve only been able to do less than 10 a day. When I heard about the new trial to do food deliveries, I immediately signed up for as many slots as they could allow me. The additional income definitely means a lot to taxi drivers like me.”
3. SMRT Taxis will waive all rentals for our taxi partners from 7 April to 5 May 2020. The full rental waiver supersedes the earlier announcement of extension of daily rental rebates for the four weeks. This gives our partners maximum support to cope with the impact of the Government’s closure of all schools and non-essential workplaces in the effort to curb the spread of COVID-19.
4. Mr Tony Heng, Senior Vice President of SMRT Road Holdings, said: “This is an unprecedented and challenging time. It is the time for us to show our maximum support to our Taxi partners. With their rentals fully waived for one month, they can earn their living instead of worrying about overheads. Apart from the full rental waiver, we are also caring for them in several ways, including securing delivery jobs for our partners. We are thankful to our business partners Fei Siong Group, KFC, Pizza Hut, GrabFood and GrabExpress for coming onboard to work with us to provide jobs for our partners during this period. We stand together with our taxi partners and we will support them as best as we can.”
5. The full rental waiver will cost SMRT $7.3 million. Previously announced rental rebates will take effect after 5 May and continue to 30 September. In total, together with the earlier rental rebates announced, SMRT’s support for our partners now come up to $17.9 million.
6. SMRT is also working to help our taxi partners find short-term job options and opportunities for a career change to become Bus Captains with SMRT Buses. For those who are still driving taxis and limousines, we are generating more trips for them, such as working with business partners to buy taxi vouchers in bulk. Within SMRT, all staff have been asked to take SMRT taxis for their work trips if they are using point-to-point (P2P) services.
7. SMRT will also waive rental fees for our taxi partners should they be placed under quarantine by the Ministry of Health. In addition, SMRT Taxis’ Helping Hand Fund will also provide care and support to taxi partners who are affected in the current situation by a leave of absence, stay-home notice, quarantine order, or the illness. The fund was established in 2015 to help taxi partners in need, including long-term medical care for a driver’s family member under certain circumstances.
8. Since January 2020, SMRT has been distributing care packages to our taxi partners to safeguard their health and that of passengers. Each care package includes a pack of 10 surgical masks, a bottle of hand sanitiser, and a bottle of disinfectant. We also strongly encourage our partners to have their temperature taken twice a day at the screening centres that we have set up.
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