The next time you need to help your non-tech savvy family members or even a friend find a ride somewhere, you may turn to Uber. Uber recently introduced a new feature that lets you easily request a ride for your loved ones right from your Uber app.
With the update, whenever you set a pickup location away from your current location, Uber will automatically ask if the ride is for you or for someone else. If it’s for a family member or friend, you will be able to select the rider from your address book, set their destination, and request the ride on their behalf. Uber will send the driver’s details to the rider, and the driver will also be able to see the rider’s name, and contact them directly.
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Sure, before this update, you could still request a ride for your family and friends, but it was troublesome because you would need to manually notify the driver and rider of any updates. With this new feature, everything will be automated, and you can have a peace of mind knowing that your loved one are on the way to their destination.
This is especially useful if you have a senior at home who needs to go out for appointments or to run errands. Uber says that nearly 10% of the global population consists of people aged 65 and above, and with this update, they can make their service available to more people, even if they do not have a smartphone.
“On the product team, we’re focused on making Uber accessible to everyone in the family, and on making people’s lives easier around the world. What we’ve learned through research is that at a macro level, people want an easy way to request a ride for a loved one. This was in particular a big request for riders internationally, whose loved ones maybe don’t have smartphones or good connectivity, with also a specific emphasis on seniors.” – Kyle Miller, product manager at Uber.
This new feature is currently being rolled out to over 30 countries including Malaysia; just make sure you are running on the latest version of Uber app.
(Source: TechCrunch, Uber)
