In Lagos, ‘jumping bus’ remains a culture; thanks to the cheap rates and availability of those yellow buses. But another thing that comes to mind when you think of Lagos is ‘traffic’. It seems like it may never die out as it gets worse each day.
Over time, we’ve seen the role technology has played in helping out with traffic issues in Lagos. The likes of Google Maps adding traffic information on its platform, bike- hailing services emerging every day, start-ups trying to utilize the waterways in the state, and now, PlentyWaka.
What’s PlentyWaka about?
PlentyWaka aims to reduce traffic congestion in Lagos by leveraging on its technology-driven bus sharing solution. I mean, since there’s too many people in the state, and those people have cars they drive everyday which doesn’t help the traffic situation, the best way to make everyone happy is to make more people use one bus, that way, boom! Less cars on the road.
While PlentyWaka is not exactly a new service in Lagos, the mobile app just came with some updates, which we think are worth paying attention to.
What’s new on the app?
- Book more seats per trip: Say for instance, you want to book a trip for yourself and maybe a friend or your kid, the app now provides an option to be able to book more than one seat per trip. You can even book the whole bus if you’re feeling up to it! But as expected more seats = more cashhh.
- No more card details wahala: I think you’d remember there was a time people were calling out a certain e-hailing service on social media because their cards were being charged unjustly. PlentyWaka now aims to eradicate that fear by taking out the option of adding your card details on to the platform. There’s now the inclusion of ‘Waka Purse’ which is now the only way you can make payments on the app. So instead of having to add your card details, all you need to do is fund your Waka Purse and you’re good to go. The app lets you do that using Paystack; and Plenty Waka also says that more options such as mobile transfer will be rolling out soon. Another good thing about Waka Purse is that you can even transfer funds from your own purse to a friend’s purse. Great, right?
- Check in and Check out: With the new app, after booking your ride and confirming your details, a barcode will be generated which will contain your ride information and you’ll be required to scan the barcode just before boarding the bus. There’s also a check out feature which automatically checks you out on the app and charges you for the trip you’ve taken once you arrive at your bus stop. Now for extra-smart people that try to continue the trip even after the system checks them out, the bus conductor has the information of everyone on the bus plus their trip details so he gets an alert when someone’s bus stop is near. Somebody say amen?
Vehicle Partnership Scheme
Asides the app update, PlentyWaka has launched a Vehicle Partnership Scheme to allow individuals and organisations to include their buses and minivans on the platform; making it possible for such individuals to receive 70% of whatever the bus earns monthly – up to ₦800,000. Through this scheme, PlentyWaka aims to increase its fleet of buses to 100 and expand to other parts of Lagos.
My Personal Experience with PlentyWaka 2.0
Installing the app and signing up on the platform was smooth, without hassles. After signing up with your phone number, PlentyWaka prompts you to verify your account using a code that’ll be sent through a text.
Next, you can enter your pick-up bus stop, your drop-off bus stop and the number of seats you want to book. After a 3-minute wait time, you meet with your bus at the pick-up bus stop, confirm your ride details with the bus conductor and your ‘waka’ begins.
It was my first time of using the service and I was quite impressed with how things operated. Comfy seats, AC, and the fact that I could actually take out my laptop to work without worrying about that fish smell that goes hand in hand with the regular danfo, I’ll give the PlentyWaka service a 4 stars out of 5. The last star is for me.