Around ten years ago, the world was a bit simpler in terms of inner-city transport. Generally, most cities and suburbs had some form of public transport (buses, trains, maybe trams), and private taxi companies to cart people from A-to-B with some hassle and delay in between, and nothing much else for short-distance travel. Cabs typically were uncomfortable for users, especially new, and public transportation has seen far better days since its inception, at least in the United States. Now, fast-forward back to the present and compare one of the additions we have with these transit systems, we now have the new staple of transportation with Ridesharing. Considering what’s grown, the current focus of what either company is doing these days since going public has been trying to make them profitable. The problem with maintaining focus on re-achieving profitability with any company, however, is profitable competition. This subsequently opens the potential for new competition to strive, and there’s a new competitor building its house on the block of the ridesharing community, with a backyard stretching across the border to the North. The household residents name goes by the name Capptin.

Capptin is a new and up-and-coming ridesharing service, catering to the North American Ridesharing market, specifically with the Greater Toronto Area in mind to launch in. Toronto, and really the GTA, is growing fast. Like, REALLY fast. Toronto has already been recently considered Canada’s Silicon Valley, and while the competition has already settled here, it’s never been a better time to start operating in Toronto.

Capptin isn’t founded solely by Canadians. However, Capptin’s founders, Shawn Bourgeois (COO) and Othman Dahlawi (CEO), hail from Québec, Canada, and Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, respectively. The third member, Preston Barski, hails from New Jersey, U.S.
With Capptin already being crafted from talented minds from around the world, and even here back at home, there’s one thing everyone on the team can agree on. Big competition is everywhere around the globe, and their problems travel with them. Given this, Capptin’s team isn’t shy of the issues which plague the opposition.

Capptin’s team has been identifying, tackling, addressing, and structuring around the existing and past issues from the competition, for both drivers and riders. They also have dedicated themselves to ensure ridesharing is safe, fun, and ethical for the community. Capptin’s goal isn’t to have ridesharing pricing and payouts, for riders and drivers alike, to be shrouded with blanketed charges and statements with only the user to break down the costs and overall pay themselves. Nor is their goal to make the rider unsafe with the driver they choose. Capptin’s ideals are aligned to ensure the community is being paid fairly and paying what they can see and understand, without hidden fees.

So, you might be asking yourself “What makes them different from other ridesharing companies?”

Let’s start with background checks. Each driver onboarded has it performed by Sterling Background checker services, and to the highest degree in an applicant’s records. Similar competitors background checks consist mainly of state-only or province-only history, e.g. the only province they applied in. Capptin runs an intensive nationwide background check history, of the applicant, to ensure the driver is the best fit for any of its passengers. No history, fewer risks, and that’s the idea. To give more insight to what their drivers go through before they officially get onboarded, they’re also subjected to a brief personality and written drivers test to ensure they’re the right pick for Capptin, and their customers.

To go a bit further, they’ve heard a lot of the complaints about rating systems and decided to change up the system a bit. Instead of the traditional 5-stars, it’s now a thumbs up/thumbs down/”meh!” system. Thumbs up, you did great! Thumbs down, not so much, and “meh” just means it was average for the service. It breaks down to more of a percentage rate, rather than the 5/5 rating system in place. This is shown to be less biased against users, as rather than having scaling negativity outside of 5 stars, it’s broken down to a simplified percentage scale. Stay about 70% or more above with the system, and you’re fine to drive, but if you get too many complaints, and you’ll be reviewed and even removed from the platform.

With the increasing acceptance of cryptocurrencies, the wide range of application for currencies alike is growing at an incredible rate. Capptin aims to support the ecosystem by allowing payments through Bitcoin (BTC) on its platform as well. Riders are able to pay for their total using Bitcoin. Tips can be paid using different payment methods, along with a range of other options including Google Pay, and Apple Pay. Drivers are not able to collect payments, or tips, through Bitcoin on the platform.

Capptin gives the option to their riders by allowing to choose who they want to be driven by. Riders and drivers are also in control of blocking each other if things don’t work out. If a rider doesn’t like a particular driver, they’re free to block them from ever being picked up from that driver again, and vice versa for the driver as well. Any complaint can be sent to Capptin’s support team for review as well if things go awry at any point.

There’s one other critical aspect for drivers too, and it’s the pay. Capptin is innovating a loyalty-based earning system, which will generally start at 20% commission taken by Capptin. The difference from the rest is the percentage isn’t fixed, but rather permanently scales down all the way to 15%. Along with this, any pilots approved before launch, or any new areas setting up launch in, will automatically be grandfathered into 18% commission and can work their way to 15% through reward-based systems in play. Essentially, giving yourself a raise as you continue working with Capptin.

Capptin aims to provide for the community and by the community. Although they still have a lot to prove, they’re listening to the ridesharing community’s opinions and problems, while developing to achieve what the community wants, not what they think it needs.

Keep an eye for their pre-launch coming up this summer. Perhaps sooner than you know, you too might be sharing a ride with your favorite pilot, daily!