Car rental firm's mobile app now triggers SOS message

An online car rental company Thursday added a safety feature to its mobile phone app through which a passenger can trigger an SMS and an e-mail to three previously registered mobile numbers and signal a distress or emergency call.

Through the app termed 'SOS', the company bookmycab.com says an SMS without location can also be sent if the person is in an area where no mobile connectivity or Global Positioning System (GPS) facility is available.

In that case, a simple SMS will be sent to the registered mobile users as well as to the company with the last known location of the car.

"We are also working on installing the SOS or Physical Panic button in our cabs. This will be in addition to the existing SOS button that we have introduced in our app," company CEO Avinash Gupta said.

The company said it has added more safety features such as alerting police by automatically placing a phone call to the number 100 - the police helpline - and also alerting the company's control room.

"The control room will pull out all details of the taxi used by the passenger on a real-time basis. This information is also shared with all the three registered mobile numbers via SMS and email," the company said.

"We have always kept passenger safety in mind and added many other innovative features in our mobile app," Gupta said.