We've all heard of the Get and Uber apps: the ability to order a taxi by phone and even pay through it has benefited many of us, as well as the taxi drivers.
But for ultra-Orthodox businessmen, operating these types of apps involves a halachic problem: Shabbat. These apps are operated by paying a commission from the taxi driver to the app developers, and such a payment is, of course, forbidden on the holy day.
This is precisely where the Ryder company comes in, whose story was featured on the Calcalist website.
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Rider, controlled by the ultra-Orthodox Emanuel family of London, has launched a ride-hailing app in Israel that will compete with Gett and Uber, but it has found a solution to the halakhic problem without 'religious coercion.' The app operates as usual on weekends, to the delight of potential passengers, but the company does not charge drivers who work on Shabbat, so as not to make a living directly from its desecration.
Rider drivers receive their salary from the company they work for, but Rider helps them with quick orders. For this, it charges a commission, and on Saturday it simply waives this commission.
Rider, which cooperates with the taxi association and the stations themselves, has another advantage over competing companies: the company charges drivers a commission of 3.50 shekels for each trip, but in an attempt to win them over, it exempts them from paying for the 101st trip each month.
In addition, it allows them to charge passengers a booking fee of 5.20 shekels, which Gett has declared war on in the past.
