From the moment we landed in Bangalore to meet our driver we lost any confidence in Savaari’s ability to provide the service they promised. To make the 4 day booking in the first place, Savaari were of course super quick to take my money to secure the journey. After confirming with the company days before that someone would be waiting at the airport to meet us with a name card, we arrived to no such thing. We had no idea where to begin to find the driver and after several phone calls, a great deal of walking, we found him about an hour later. During our trip, our driver appeared disorganised, unclear of our itinerary, asking us more than once where we were going and for how long. He also appeared to not know the way and occasionally got lost accumulating unnecessary kilometres.
It was difficult to communicate due to language differences however we sensed from the beginning there was an issue and this made us uneasy. The journey itself was very stressful as the driver continued to text and make calls often taking his eyes off the road even while overtaking, resulting in swerving and some near misses. He frequently made calls on loud speaker to a number that would end in a recording that stated the number was either switched off or disconnected. He called this number continually for the entirety of our journey.
Once at our first destination, we rang Savaari to tell them of our overall experience with unsafe driving being our greatest concern. They said they would discuss this with the driver and that the arrival issue at the airport was probably due to a miscommunication. In retrospect, I suspect there was no communication with the driver in the first place.
On our last day, an estimated 7 hour drive to our final destination, our driver again drove while texting, made calls to the same unanswered number and did not concentrate on his driving. We politely asked him to refrain from texting/calling while driving as we felt frightened and encouraged him to stop on the side of the road if the calls were important and work related. He apologised, however appeared agitated and unsettled. He continued to make these calls and we continually asked him to stop on the side of the road. When we enquired after his well-being he said there was no problem.
About four hours away from our final destination things rapidly deteriorate and our journey went from an uncomfortable and unpleasant experience to a nightmare and potentially dangerous one. At a major highway toll point our driver made a u-turn and stopped the car in the emergency lane and got out to make a call. After 20 minutes he came back to the car distressed, telling me to call Savaari because he hadn’t been paid for this job and he had been attempting to get in contact with the company who commissioned it, but the number was switched off(hence the constant calls from the beginning of the journey). When I rang Savaari they asked him to keep driving and assured him they would rectify this payment issue however he refused and we remained on the side of the road for over one hour. I continually called Savaari who eventually asked me to pay the driver 5000 rupee cash to finish the journey and that I would be reimbursed by the end of the journey. When I asked Savaari several times and in several different ways HOW I would be reimbursed I was continually met with ambiguous answers. Such as ‘don’t worry ma’am, we will get back to you’ or ‘don’t worry ma’am we will work it out with the driver’ or ‘ma’am we will call the local office to resolve it’. I had no confidence in these answers as there was no commitment to a solution. They even refused to pay it into my paypal account at the time. I had no choice but to give the driver money as we feared we would be left on the highway, two foreign women in an unknown country, no idea how to get around, with 3 hours left til sun down and several hours away from our destination - very, very vulnerable and worried. Our situation further deteriorated when we got to the state checkpoint where a state tax payment of 250 rupee was required to enter. Our driver was insistent we pay 2500 rupee which seemed ludicrous and excessive and did not reflect the prices on the signage. I offered to go with him to the cashier but he was very evasive and refused. I gave him the money because again we weren’t moving and it was now sunset with 2 hours left. I asked for a receipt. In the meantime Savaari did not call me back as promised to explain how I was to receive my reimbursement. While the driver was at the cashier, I rang Savaari enquiring about the state tax fee and the status of my 5000 refund. I asked them to research the state tax cost, they put me on hold stating they’ll contact the ‘local office’(a regular response to my enquires). Be warned people there is no ‘local office’ it’s a way of buying time or calling the driver, who had left his phone in the car while paying the state tax entry fee. The operator informed me he was unable to get through to the non existent ‘local office’ and when I confronted him about this lie he was very apologetic because he was caught out(note: this was the only time a Savaari apologies). This behaviour confirmed to me that Savaari did not have the best interest of the customer in mind and was deferring to the driver every time there was a problem with the driver. Insanity!
There are so many issues with this situation that it will take too long to explain the rest. However after independently researching state entry tax it was evident it only cost 250. After viewing the driver’s receipt we realised we were being made to pay a 2000 rupee fine because the car was not registered to go across state. We emailed a photo of the receipt to Savaari and they held the position that this was a normal cost to the customer and that the word ‘fine’ meant tax(seriously!). Either Savaari is very ill informed which would be surprising considering what they represent or they think all customers are stupid.
With one hour before our arrival, several phone calls to Savaari, being hung up on, placed on hold, spoken to rudely, spoken over, not having my questions answered, being evasive, being lied to, hearing the call centre say to the driver ‘the customer is complaining, complaining, complaining, complaining, complaining’, wouldn’t you complain if you were practically held at ransom to pay 7225 rupee for the total incompetence of Savaari and their terribly appalling management of the situation? Once at our destination and with the pressure of the hotel manager who was aware of our predicament before we arrived because we emailed him the receipt and explained what happened, we got our 2250 back(minus 250 state tax) by refusing to get out of the car and from pressure from the hotel manager and other taxi drivers.Savaari eventually agreed to pay the 5000 into my account a few days later. Savaari told me ‘we are a reputable company ma’am’, ABSOLUTELY UNTRUE, you exploit both your drivers and your customers and you were incredibly uncooperative, and showed no concern for our safety from the moment we did a u-turn on the highway. My recommendation is NEVER EVER use this poor excuse of a ‘reputable’ company. The reviews say it all!