ComfortDelGro to halve taxi rents for June

COMFORTDELGRO Taxi will halve taxi rents for June as Singapore starts phase one of its reopening plan.

Rental waivers will range from S$45 to S$86 depending on the make, model and age of the taxi, disclosed ComfortDelGro Corporation in a regulatory update on Thursday.

The move is expected to push ComfortDelGro Taxi further into the red. It had warned in March that the S$80 million being spent to extend daily rental relief for cabbies until Sept 30 would effectively cause the taxi operator to post a full-year loss for 2020.

It will also be the first time ComfortDelGro Taxi posts full-year losses.

Taxi demand, while expected to pick up somewhat, is not expected to return to normal anytime soon, said ComfortDelGro Taxi chief executive Ang Wei Neng on Thursday.

"Although the circuit breaker will end on June 1, safe-management restrictions are still in place in the first phase of reopening. Many will continue to work from home and a large number of businesses will still remain closed," he said.

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To boost driver income, ComfortDelGro Taxi plans to ramp up efforts to secure more delivery jobs for cabbies through its delivery platform and other similar platforms. This is given that delivery services will continue to be allowed until end-September 2020.

To date, the taxi operator is working with close to 50 food and beverage outlets such as McDonald's, KFC and Pizza Hut to offer cabbies delivery job options.

Around 2,000 taxi drivers have been successfully onboarded to participate in delivery services for more than 800 food partners, and another 400 cabbies have been redeployed to alternative jobs.

ComfortDelGro Corporation shares were trading 1.3 per cent or S$0.02 lower at S$1.51 as at 1.10pm on Thursday.