Ola Slashes Base Fares By 20 Pct For Cabs in Chennai

BANGALORE: Ola, India’s leading mobile app for personal transportation, announced a fare reduction in its mini and sedan category in Chennai. The fares have been reduced by 20 percent from a base fare of 99 for the first 5km to 80 for the first 4km for Mini and Sedan category. Per km fare will remain the same i.e., 10 for mini and 12 for sedan category. However, on applying the code “FIVE”, customers can ride in a mini/sedan for as low as 5/km. This is the second time in the span of two months that the company has reduced its fares owing to increased operational efficiencies.

Ola currently has over 20,000 cars across its three categories viz., Mini, Sedan and Prime in Chennai. With rapid adoption of cabs as the preferred mode of transport and increased inventory on the Ola platform, the Estimated Time of Arrival [ETA] of cabs in Chennai has reduced to as low as 5 minutes. This has in turn minimized the number of dry/unpaid trips for drivers. Economies of scale and operational efficiencies have ensured that on one hand, more customers are able to get a cab through Ola’s mobile app at reduced fares and on the other hand, drivers are able to do more paid trips every day.

With growing demand for Ola cabs, drivers in the city are joining the Ola platform in large numbers. Ola recently conducted Driver Mela in the city to enable driver entrepreneurs to buy cars at lower than market prices. The Driver Mela brought together popular car manufacturers including Tata, Maruti, Toyota, Chevrolet, Mahindra and financiers like SBI and Shriram Transport Finance Company, under one roof. Over 2000 drivers participated in the 3-day mela and booked hundreds of cars.

According to Ravi Teja, Business Head- Tamil Nadu at Ola, “This price revision is possible since we have been able to achieve efficiencies from the scale of operations in the city of Chennai. The cut will further boost demand for our service in the city and will be extremely relevant for taking short trips within the city. Instead of burdening themselves by driving in crazy traffic within the city, we are confident a lot of our customers will now just take an Ola for those short commutes for shopping, eating out and partying.”

Coupon code usage:

Customers can download and signup on the Ola app, available for iOS, Android or Windows phones. On the booking confirmation screen, first-time users can apply the coupon code CHN200 to avail of a flat discount of 200 on their first ride. This offer is not valid for customers using a referral code during sign up.
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