Bolt company was ready to manage different scenarios because Ukraine had been at war since 2014. Launching our service in 2018, we took all the risks and the possibility of a full-scale military invasion into account. With this in mind, Bolt continued investing in the development of its services in Ukraine no matter what.
After February 24, the entire Bolt team retained their jobs and full pay and received additional financial support for evacuation and relocation. The safety of our employees is our top priority, so since the beginning of the full-scale invasion, we have enabled our employees to work remotely and have covered the costs of setting up home and mobile offices.
We started every single day with a status check of the staff to see if everyone was okay or if any help was required. It was especially important in the first weeks after February 24. While the main part of the team stayed in Ukraine, we also created a hub in our office in Poland to help those who fled abroad with registration, transport, and housing.
The flexibility of the company's structure ensured resilience and effective operation despite the significant drop in rides and orders. We did not need to rebuild or change the structure, we just installed some updated synchronization rules and created several communication channels to quickly process and address a huge amount of information regarding working conditions (curfews and orders of military-civilian administrations), as well as the provision of volunteer and humanitarian projects.
We believe that helping people get to safer places and giving drivers a chance to earn some money when they have lost other sources of income during these turbulent times is very important. Thus, we expanded the radius of the service to cover the entire territory of Ukraine because millions of people were forced to flee their homes and needed a ride to get to a safer place.
On March 1, we launched the Support category in our app where anyone could provide or request a free ride. In 9 months, Bolt secured and provided 130K+ free rides for volunteers and medical specialists.
The Kyiv office operates as usual except for air raid alerts. In case of the threat of airstrikes, the office is closed, and the employees must move to an equipped shelter. The recommendation for drivers and passengers who are caught by an air raid alert during a ride is to end the ride and proceed to a safe place, but this is at the discretion of the driver and passenger, as each situation is unique. The support service is always ready to help and respond in case of any issues.
Each employee received a Survival kit +1 with means of protection against radiation and chemical threats, as well as a power bank, a flashlight, and reflective elements for safe movement in the dark. We hope our staff will not need protection against radiation and chemical threats, but it is better to be prepared. Moreover, after the victory, these survival kits and hazardous materials suits will become a part of our unforgettable corporate event.
We are proud to support and help Ukraine people inside the country and abroad and will stand with Ukraine in its fight for its independence and the future of the democratic world until the war is won.
