Delivery rider unable to withdraw earnings makes police report, Grab says delay caused by system outage
A Grab food delivery rider couldn't withdraw his earnings for nearly a month due to a system outage and made a police report.
Stomper Ken has since received his money, but the delay caused him much distress.
"I am the sole breadwinner of my family and rely on my monthly earnings to cover our essential expenses," said the Stomper, who makes an average of $2,800 a month.
But on March 26, he discovered that he was unable to make his withdrawal.
"Despite several visits to Grab's office and countless inquiries, I was not provided with a valid reason for the rejection of my withdrawal," recounted the Stomper.
"Finally, after a lot of back-and-forth, I was able to get confirmation in writing from Grab that the transaction was successful, along with the transaction details.
"However, when I went to my bank, I was informed that the transaction ID provided was invalid. I called Grab again, and they gave me a new transaction number, but the bank rejected it once again, stating it was also invalid."
On April 16, the Stomper made a police report, which was seen by Stomp.
"While it is true that I finally received my payment on April 22, this only happened after I was forced to make a police report and go back and forth between the bank and Grab for many days," said the Stomper.
"It caused me significant distress and even forced me to stop working temporarily, which affected my income further.
"What's more troubling is that when I spoke to a Grab officer, I was told that I'm not the only one going through this. Apparently, this is a common problem among riders. Many of us are unaware of our rights or unsure of where to seek help. We work long hours - some of us up to 17 hours a day - just to earn enough to support our families.
"Delays like this, especially when there is no clear explanation, are not just inconvenient, they are deeply unfair.
"It took me almost a month of chasing, reporting, and struggling just to get my rightful salary. I was lucky. But what about those who are still waiting? How long must they suffer in silence?"
In response to a Stomp query, a Grab spokesperson said: "We understand how important timely access to earnings is for our driver-partners, and we apologise for the experience our driver-partner had to go through.
"As soon as the driver-partner reached out to us, we began looking into the issue to understand what had happened.
"Grab's system had shown that the withdrawal request initiated by us had been successful, and our payment vendor had provided a transaction ID confirming this. However, due to a system outage with the driver-partner's bank, the transaction did not go through.
"Grab was informed about this outage on April 21.
"As this issue involved checking with numerous external parties, it took some time before we could identify the root of the breakdown.
"We have since informed the driver-partner accordingly and have also received confirmation that the money has been successfully withdrawn."
