Unverified driving licenses, vehicles larger than expected and drivers exhibiting dangerous behavior: users of the Amigo Express carpooling platform denounce a lack of supervision of the journeys offered on it in order to improve their feeling of security . The company ensures that it takes this situation seriously and responds to reports made by passengers.
Founded in 2006, Amigo Express has since carved out a prominent place in the carpooling market, its platform now having more than 680,000 members. In exchange for a small user fee, passengers have access to a multitude of carpooling options that the company assures, on its website, are “reliable and secure”. However, the Amigo Express service is not infallible.
The duty was able to easily offer a ride on this platform in minutes by entering the license plate number of another driver’s vehicle, before calling Amigo Express to have it removed from the website. Several passengers also said they noticed, in interviews, that a different vehicle than the one registered in the application showed up at the agreed meeting place.
In one case, that The duty was able to document, a driver registered with the ride-sharing platform was to offer a ride with a 2015 Toyota Sienna, which has seven seats. The driver nevertheless reserved 10 places in the application for passengers, before showing up at the meeting place in Quebec with a van that can accommodate 15 people and has a license plate number distinct from that registered on the platform .
Amigo Express, however, limits the number of passengers who can book for the same passage on the platform to five, while the Law concerning the remunerated transport of people by automobile indicates that carpooling is only permitted in passenger vehicles which, by definition, cannot accommodate more than nine occupants at a time.
“What you are describing to me is a fraudulent use of the platform and that is not tolerated,” responded the president and founder of Amigo Express, Marc-Olivier Vachon, in an interview. “It’s a case of banning” from the platform, he continued, while calling on passengers to report their driver when he or she behaves suspiciously.
“Illegal” carpooling
Some drivers also appear to offer regular trips on the Amigo Express platform for commercial purposes, which contravenes the legal definition of carpooling, which requires that the pick-up of passengers by a driver is “incidental” to a trip, and not not his main motive. “They go back and forth and often what happened was that I found that the vehicles did not inspire me with confidence,” notes Élisabeth Maheux, who on several occasions found herself in “old vans” in poor condition which offer repeated journeys on this platform.
“There are people who want to carpool illegally, but these people are ousted [de la plateforme] », assures Marc-Olivier Vachon, who specifies that a driver cannot display more than one round trip per day on the Amigo Express website.
Jean-François Vézina, for his part, had the misfortune of finding himself last week in the same vehicle as a driver who was “texting non-stop” at the wheel while driving at 120 km/hour on the highway, in a journey between Montreal and Quebec. “We came close to having an accident two or three times,” says Mr. Vézina, who reported the behavior of this driver to Amigo Express. “I dreamed of being arrested [par la police], but unfortunately this did not happen. »
Passengers also point out that drivers have made several journeys while having a driving license “not verified” by the company. On this subject, Marc-Olivier Vachon explains that only driving licenses issued by Ontario and Quebec are verified by the company.
A regulatory issue
According to Pierre Barrieau, lecturer at the University of Montreal and expert in transportation planning, the concerns raised by Amigo Express users demonstrate that the sharing economy, which includes carpooling, is poorly regulated in Quebec. .
“That leads to a lot fewer checks, validations and therefore that leads us to this kind of slippage which was not only predictable, but which was planned,” says the expert, according to whom a tightening of the rules surrounding carpooling is necessary , like the measures imposed in particular on the taxi industry and that of interurban transport.
In this sense, the co-founder of the Quebec Mobility Factory, Elsa Bruyère, believes that Quebec could take inspiration from France by setting up a register of proof of carpooling. This measure would allow the Quebec government to apply different quality standards and ensure follow-up with drivers, while offering financial incentives to those who thus contribute to fighting against the use of solo driving, as the France.
“I see an opportunity to provide travelers with the right information so that we see carpooling as a great optimization of the use of solo cars” by increasing passengers’ feeling of security, notes M.me Heather.
At the time of writing, the Quebec Ministry of Transport had not commented.