In a major development, the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways (MoRTH) has issued strict directives asking all cab aggregators to remove the pre-ride tip feature from their apps and ensure strict compliance with the Motor Vehicle Aggregator Guidelines, 2025. The transport ministry in it’s directive said that the attention of this ministry has been drawn to the display by certain ride aggregators of prompts/options such as “Advance Tip”, “Choose an Add-on”, “Improve your chances of quicker ride confirmation”, “A driver may be more likely to accept this trip if you add a tip”, or similar interface elements prior to acceptance or completion of a ride.
Such features shall be visilbe only after ride
The government said such features shall be visible only after the journey is completed and shall not be available at the time of booking, before the commencement of the journey, or during the journey.
“No tipping feature or mechanism shall be provided in the App that is misleading, manipulative, or otherwise in violation of the Consumer Protection Act, 2019 and the rules and regulations made thereunder,” the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways (MoRTH) directive said.
This means passengers cannot be made to pay extra upfront. Tipping will remain entirely at the passenger’s discretion.
Tipping does not guarantee a ride
The government has also clarified that the app should not contain any message, option, or interface that suggests that a tip will result in faster confirmation, driver acceptance, or better service. This means that linking tips to ride confirmation, driver allocation, waiting time, or service quality would be against the rules.
The driver will receive the full amount
The government’s directive also includes important rules regarding tip amounts. If a passenger leaves a tip after the ride is complete, the driver must receive the full amount. The aggregator cannot make any deductions. Furthermore, the app must not have any tipping features that are misleading, coercive, or violate consumer protection laws.
“Accordingly, no feature, prompt, message, add-on, payment option, or user interface element should be displayed before completion of the ride that directly or indirectly encourages, induces, or creates an impression that payment of any additional amount may improve ride confirmation, driver acceptance, driver allocation, waiting time, or quality of service,” it said.
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