Heaptalk, Jakarta — A Research and Development Agency (Balitbang) of Indonesia’s Ministry of Transportation has surveyed online drivers’ progress in Indonesia, specifically regarding their earnings.
This study was carried out from September 13th to 20th, targeting Jakarta, Bogor, Depok, Tangerang, and Bekasi areas. Adopting an online-based survey scheme, the agency entailed around 2,655 online transportation users and 2,016 online driver partners as the respondents of this research.
As explained by the Head of Advocacy and Community Affairs at the Central MTI, Djoko Setijowarno, the daily earnings of Indonesian online drivers are equivalent to their operational budgets, with the average daily income only reached to around Rp50,000 – Rp100,000 (50.10%) and their daily highest operational costs attained Rp50,000 – Rp100,000 (44.10%).
A similar report also disclosed that online drivers in Indonesia are dominated by gentlemen (81%), with an age range of 20 – 30 years old, or approximately 40.63%, and the joining duration of less than a year reached 39.38%. From the final result, Djoko also affirmed that respondents performed this activity as their primary job, attained 54% and a side job at 46%.
As it is known, Indonesia’s Ministry of Transportation raised the new tariff for online transportation on September 10th, 2022, delivering to the online driver partners’ income diminishment. According to the study, drivers could tackle their orders around five to ten incoming orders, or approximately 46.88%, before the increased rates. However, the new regulation issued by the Ministry has decreased their order number to no more than five orders, or nearly 55.65%.
“With the implementation of the new online transportation expenses, numerous online transportation consumers determine to reduce their use of this transportation service and switch to other public transportation with reasonable costs,” Djoko said.
Another factor that influenced the dwindling of online driver earnings is the rarity of gaining extra payment from multiple online transportation applications (52.08%). Further, the survey participants also affirmed they have never obtained their commission from various applicators, achieving 37.40%. Simultaneously, the outcome also disclosed the respondents rarely earned order rewards from their passengers (75.79%).
Regardless of these multiple factors that Djoko revealed, he also asserted that online drivers’ daily incomes are almost equal to their daily operational expenses, influenced by the online driver-partners amounts that have climbed in the country.
In terms of the respondents’ earnings, the average income of drivers is lower than Rp3.5 million, with a working duration of around 8-12 hours. Perceiving the instability between supply and demand, Djoko looks forward to the restriction for online drivers’ amounts would increase their returns.
Through this study, the respondents also grant suggestions on how the government and private sectors entity can enhance the welfare of online drivers in Indonesia, spanning tariff adjustment, extra payment procurement, service improvement, a reduction rate of the applications, and oil-fuel price diminution.
