
Uber Is Ripping Off Frequent Riders and Here’s How to Avoid It - imartin2k
https://therideshareguy.com/uber-is-ripping-off-frequent-riders-and-heres-how-to-avoid-it/
======
maxxxxx
That's one thing I have noticed in general. I used to think that as a long
time customer you are valued and get better deals. But this seems to have
changed to the opposite. Long time customers are viewed as something a company
doesn't have to compete for anymore and instead more money can be extracted
from them. See cell phones, TV cable, car insurance and others. Almost like
employment where now the only way to get a raise is often to change jobs and
not to stay.

It's a weird development and I wonder what the long term effects of this
attitude will be.

~~~
Consultant32452
The anecdote that comes to mind for this phenomenon is the more frequent flyer
miles you have the more like you are to get a negative experience such as
being bumped from a flight. This is because they know you're invested in their
airline and are more likely to come back. A new customer might decide to take
a different airline next time.

Edit: Apparently this was an old wive's tail or something. Oh well...

~~~
CaptainZapp
That's absolutely not logical.

With a lot of frequent flier miles you are very likely a status customer and
airlines will bump those last and, depending on the status, will bump other
low revenue passengers to make space for a high status customer.

I know a bit about aviation and if an airline really needs to involuntarily
bump a passenger (which is quite rare) they will chose an infrequent flier
with a cheap ticket.

Unless you can provide a source for your assessment I call bullshit.

~~~
JumpCrisscross
> _airlines will bump...low revenue passengers_

This is accurate per everyone I know at airlines. The reason is it’s trivial
to shift one’s loyalty. If an airline goes to shit, I’ll switch from spending
cash with them to burning down miles while I book work trips with someone
else.

------
njarboe
This behavior is as old as civilization. When you went to a market and wanted
to buy something from the owner/operator of the business stand, none of the
prices were marked. You asked the owner the price of something and he would
respond. Or maybe he would try to hawk you something by giving you the price
of something first. Then you start haggling. If you have a lot of time and
like the game, you might get a very low price. If you are his cousin, you get
a good price, no haggle. If you are in a hurry (your time is valuable too you
at the moment) the price is likely to be higher. All sorts of bullshit/fun-
time-shopping.

At some point in the 1600? the Quakers decided that a person morally should
only get some fair markup on something they were selling and that to charge
more was wrong. On thing they were selling they put fix prices on and no
haggling. Lots of people liked this way of shopping. You save time and don't
feel ripped off. This idea really spread, department stores took off, and
fixed pricing was around for quite awhile. It is a much better way of selling
things for society in many ways.

This fixed price for everyone has been eroding for awhile. Coupons have been
around for all of my life. Not sure when they started or if they always
existed since the first newspapers. In any case, with computers, businesses
are able to change the price at will and everyone is carrying smartphones
leaking their identity. I wouldn't be surprised to see digital prices in
supermarkets that change depending on who is next to the tag. Sets the price
when you pick it up. Amazons automatic stores could easily do this. I really
like Trader Joe's because it does not do all of this coupon, sales, huge bulk
discounts, etc stuff.

~~~
zawerf
> I wouldn't be surprised to see digital prices in supermarkets that change
> depending on who is next to the tag.

I think safeway already does this with their just-for-u coupons which gives
personalized deals on frequently bought items.

------
rayiner
This is basic market segmentation—charging more to people who pay more.
Although I think rate regulation is a stupid idea, taxi rate regulation was
designed to prevent exactly this sort of thing. (It’s also why taxis can’t
compete “fairly” with Uber. They have to charge everyone the same all the
time; surge pricing and price discrimination allows Uber to offset the cost of
cheaper service for some people against increased revenues from other people.)

~~~
awakeasleep
Wow. I didn't think about it like that but Uber is transforming itself into a
pirate taxi (G*psy cab) company.

Thats pretty crazy.

~~~
smt88
Uber started as a pirate taxi company and has used enormous amounts of money,
shady tactics, and market pressure to turn itself into a legitimate taxi
company.

~~~
sgregnt
And provided very valuable service that has improved life quality for many
costumers and drivers.

~~~
vkou
Many taxi drivers are of the opinion that they'd rather quit then work for
Uber's rates.

~~~
ric2b
They're free to do so.

------
amr137
First time commenting...I found this article highly reaffirming. I'm a
frequent uber rider with almost 800 trips on my personal account alone. I take
uber M-Th to and from work. The same exact end points. And I've noticed
changes with pricing but ALSO with route times:

Pricing - yes it's going up - both from a "this seems higher" perspective but
more concretely in the 30 day "pass" I buy that locks in a flat fare for 30
days between 2 specific endpoints. My flat pass fare when up 50 cents a ride
between last month and this month. I believe it's gone up in the past as well
but don't have my receipts readily available.

Route Time - I believe the uberpool route is no longer (if it ever was)
calculated purely on efficiency. Instead, I suspect the individual riders are
assigned a priority and then the route is calculated. And I'm guessing the
flat fare pass riders are assigned a low priority. My ride times have
increased dramatically over the last two months, with 8 rides marked as "late
arrival" meaning they took longer than the longest time estimated by the uber
app. These rides are approaching 1 hour to go 7 miles (that's right, that's an
efficiency of 7mph if you will). The most egregious was a route that literally
passed by my block (my home was 3 houses away from the intersection) and took
me 10 minutes further out to drop off a co-rider and then 10 minutes to return
to the intersection. (I realized too late to jump out.)

So I am guessing they are testing people's tolerances both for 1) pricing and
2) duration. I have some wiggle room with pricing and am willing to stomach
some increases. However, I can't stomach the ridiculous routing and excessive
ride times. I may be unique in that Uber is the only rideshare app I've used
to date but I'm now planning to try out Lyft, read about Waze Carpool, and
investigate any other rideshare solutions out there... :)

~~~
gnicholas
Seems crazy that they would allow routes that are this obviously inefficient.
It's as if they're just catering to new folks and not checking to see if the
route can be even slightly adjusted to increase total rider efficiency by
large amounts (i.e., dropping off another passenger with a 30 second detour,
saving 10 minutes).

------
philipodonnell
This is fairly similar to the way airlines can charge lower prices for a SFO-
NYC-BTV route than they do for SFO-NYC. They know certain routes (SFO-NYC) are
used by business travelers.

Some people try to game the airlines in the same way that the article
describes, getting a price based on one route (SFO-BTV via NYC) and then
actually taking a different one (SFO-NYC). I expect Uber will eventually
prevent this the same way the airlines do: penalizing you for taking a trip
that doesn't match what you told them you were doing by refusing to allow you
to continue once you deviate.

~~~
usaphp
I did not know that airlines penalize you for that. What happens when you have
a sfo-nyc-btv flight and decide to get out in NYC?

~~~
speby
People do this a lot. This is a well-known and old issue known as "Hidden City
Ticketing" and goes by other names, as well. It is against the typical
Contract of Carriage agreement passengers have their airlines, though it's
hard to actually enforce:
[https://travel.stackexchange.com/questions/17984/is-
leaving-...](https://travel.stackexchange.com/questions/17984/is-leaving-
airport-at-a-stop-before-the-final-destination-illegal)

Note that while this tactic can be money-saving and useful in practice, it
does have certain downsides, like if you need to check luggage, or if you
expect to collect your airline miles and segments (typically requires
completing the full itinerary, though not always).

~~~
waqf
The big one that nobody's mentioned is that the airline _will_ cancel any
remaining flight segments on that ticket, without recourse unless you are very
good at begging favors from customer service.

So don't book a round trip SFO-NYC-BTV-NYC-SFO on one ticket and skip the NYC-
BTV segment, because you won't be able to rejoin either for BTV-NYC or NYC-
SFO.

------
bad_user
I hate companies doing this.

Uber is profiling passengers, it's been known, which is why I stopped using
them. As convenient as they are, I hate being profiled.

I'm from Romania and our alternative over here is
[https://taxify.eu;](https://taxify.eu;) the app is as polished, the cars and
drivers are actually a little better due to being less popular and thus less
noisy. And they do charge higher prices in rush hour, but their pricing is far
more predictable.

I don't care if this is legal or not btw. It's my money, so fuck Uber.

~~~
praneshp
Looks like you need a phone/login. Am I incorrect about that?

That means there is at least a simple object representing your profile of you.
Unless you mean profiling in the racist sense.

------
paublyrne
This makes me wonder aloud ... why shouldn't we charge people who are more
affluent more than those who are poor? We apply this idea already in our
income tax systems.

I'm not sure I subscribe to this idea, but I notice I don't feel morally
aghast at this story.

~~~
cryptoz
Uber has no idea if you are poor or not. Even if you want more price
segmentation (maybe okay) you certainly can't ask each passenger their income.
And Uber isn't indicating if a price is cheap or not, creating a very large
disadvantage to the poor as they are unable to accurately judge the expected
value of the service before planning their method of transportation somewhere.

~~~
dboreham
>Uber has no idea if you are poor or not.

Seriously? Of course they do. They have your online id and your credit card so
they know more about you than you do.

~~~
cryptoz
No, they don't. They have indicators and clues about your income based on your
rides and credit spending at uber, but they _do not know_ if you are poor. All
those indicators could and often are very wrong if that is what they draw
assumptions from.

Their indicators can be wildly off because they do not know the person
themselves and they can only make guesses.

Also,

> Seriously?

Yes, seriously. Of course seriously. Stop being insulting and rude.

~~~
wlll
I would have thought that they know enough to make a decently accurate guess.

Not that I know what they do of course, but without much thought I can think
of a model that would allow me to predict income.

\- They're using Uber, that cuts out a decent chunk of poor people.

\- What areas do you visit and at what times?

\- Property prices in those areas, are they workplaces or urban commuter
areas? Can likely predict value of someone's house if they use it from home.

\- Type of Uber taken

\- Size of tip

\- Frequency of travel

\- etc. etc.

I reckon that given some time and some people's ride data I could estimate
their income, house value, and even perhaps job. I would guess Uber have done
this and then some.

Of course it's not going to be 100%, but Uber don't need that.

------
pithymaxim
Not an Uber fan but this just seems like price discrimination with better
data, which in principle could subsidize rides for poorer drivers. Student
rush tickets to the opera could be framed as price gouging of non-students (by
probing into their personal lives, no less). But in reality more students get
to go to the opera this way. Hard to judge without knowing the tradeoffs.

~~~
frgtpsswrdlame
>which in principle could subsidize rides for poorer drivers.

I don't think you can specify this. In principle this could subsidize rides
for some people or it could increase profit and even if the money were put
towards subsidizing rides there is no guarantee it's going to subsidize rides
for the poor, there is no law that says the poor are going to receive these
subsidies - frequently they don't because they don't because they're a lower
priority for the company due to their decreased spending power, have less
information about the marketplace and are less able to substitute between
alternatives.

------
kaitari
I tweeted a couple of weeks ago about Uber Eats charging me way more than my
wife for delivery. I use the app way more than her. Related? My tweet with
photo comparison
[https://twitter.com/kaimallea/status/974819433322557440](https://twitter.com/kaimallea/status/974819433322557440)

~~~
smilekzs
> (@uber_support) We're here to help! Please send us a note here;
> [https://help.uber.com/h/c4699569-e59a-4e8e-950a-1ac0aa1bb6c1](https://help.uber.com/h/c4699569-e59a-4e8e-950a-1ac0aa1bb6c1)
> … and our team will be able to help.

/sarcasm

We're here to help [you stop feeling discriminated by making your wife pay
$12.16 fee too]!

/endsarcasm

------
lhorie
This hasn't been my experience at all. I have been using express pool
basically every day to commute for months, and the price has always been
between $5 and $8 for a 30-45 min ride (depending on traffic and how many
people pool in the same car). Fare increases are pretty obviously correlated
with how close to the peak rush hour window I request and things like rain
(i.e. more demand)

What I did notice though is that prices can fluctuate plus or minus a dollar
in a matter of minutes, so sometimes I can get a cheaper fare by simply
waiting a couple of minutes (though that tends to only work if I'm not
approaching peak rush hour).

~~~
therideshareguy
We didn't test this with Express Pool but Pool in general is a different
animal since the prices are so cheap to begin with, there's not a lot of
variability that can come into play and affect the pricing.

Plus, Uber takes a huge loss on Pool and Express Pool especially when they
first launch since they want to offer low prices to riders but they don't know
the match % rates yet.

~~~
lhorie
Thanks for the insight!

Can you qualify what you mean by a frequent rider? How frequently are we
talking about?

I did experience lower prices when I first started using express pool (though
not to commute to/from work), and at one time I got a $2.50 ride to go from
downtown SF to Ocean beach (a 40-ish minute ride), which anyone with half a
brain would suspect to be VC subsidies at play.

Could it be that this is a similar case, where the original "cheap" price is
just subsidies for new rider/some desirable target audience and the "ripoff"
price is just the regular price if VC money/competitive race to the bottom
weren't in the equation?

Another theory I had was that congestion in pick up/drop-off areas would play
a role in pricing (given that cheaper-than-expected rides happened to be
nearer the freeway as opposed to, say, Market st)

------
saosebastiao
Here's what I do: I ride Uber for a while, then I ride Lyft. After a day or
two of riding Lyft, Uber sends me a discount on my next 10 rides. When those
run out, I go back to Lyft until Uber gives me some more. I never really end
up riding Lyft for more than a day or two before I get the next discount
email.

Im not sure if it's cause they're spying on Lyft like they've done in the
past, or just noticing that I've stopped riding Uber. Either way, thanks go
out to all the idiot VCs for making this happen.

~~~
ams6110
Competition among ride services should keep this kind of thing in check. If
you're in an area where Uber is the only option (don't know how likely that
is) you may be stuck.

~~~
martinald
London is Uber only. Would be great if Lyft started in the UK.

~~~
SyneRyder
I thought London had banned Uber? Did that end up getting repealed?

There are competitors to Uber in London [2], myTaxi seems to be the one that
lets you hail London Cabs via an app. And apparently they're offering 33%
discount over Easter [1]. (Never used them and I'm usually an Uber fan, but it
seems myTaxi could be an alternative to try.)

[1]
[https://uk.mytaxi.com/EasterDiscount](https://uk.mytaxi.com/EasterDiscount)

[2] [https://www.pocket-lint.com/apps/news/uber/142333-best-
taxi-...](https://www.pocket-lint.com/apps/news/uber/142333-best-taxi-apps-
uber-alternatives-to-get-you-a-cab-in-london)

~~~
martinald
No, it's still pending appeal but I would be very surprised if it actually
goes ahead; Uber has 2-3M users in London and I think it's more a scare tactic
to get them to play more ball with regulation here.

'Standard' taxis are really expensive, I would say 2-4x the price of Uber, so
a 33% discount doesn't really get you anywhere.

------
paulsutter
Now that I switch between Uber and Lyft I notice the prices are lower for the
same rides than when I used Iber exclusively. I noticed it by accident when I
would use Uber out of habit instead of Lyft.

Similar for reserving hotels on travel sites. I started always checking the
price on the hotel’s own site and it’s often cheaper. At first the gaps were
huge, but they came down after I became a frequent-abandoner on Kayak

~~~
dahdum
I’ve traveled a lot recently and was surprised by Lyft always being cheaper
than Uber until I had my colleague check Uber rates for the same destination
when together.

Uber has decided I’m a schmuck who must pay more for the same service. Not a
fan.

For accommodation, the rates are usually a bit cheaper direct (often a few
dollars), but unless you have/want hotel status, the rewards program at
Hotels.com gives a lower effective rate.

------
the_watcher
This is the opposite of false advertising - upfront pricing means you agreed
to the price by definition. Uber is under no obligation to detail the pricing
mechanism to the user.

~~~
chacham15
While I see what you're saying, without the details of how the pricing
structure works this is basically gambling from the consumers point of view
and theres a lot of harm in that.

~~~
the_watcher
Flight pricing works in similarly opaque fashion (I generally compare pricing
between different browsers and private sessions and sometimes even devices
before buying).

~~~
dahdum
Flight pricing is opaque, but there is no comparison possible with Uber since
that price is based on your individual profile. United doesn’t use my recent
travel history and detailed personal information gleaned from data brokers
before quoting me a fare class ticket.

------
tomcooks
Am I the only one seeing an "Earn up to 1500$/week" Lyft banner right above
the header of this article?

~~~
kalleboo
It's hosted on the domain and links to
[https://therideshareguy.com/NewLyft1](https://therideshareguy.com/NewLyft1)
so it appears the blog is an affiliate

------
memco
As a rider, I use Uber and Lyft interchangeably to get a roughly stable price
whenever I come to work. This price is about 40% more than what I would like
to pay based on my budget, but I don't have a choice but to pay it sometimes
because neither app is willing to give me a lower price (which I have paid in
the past). I know I'm being overcharged, but I still need to get home or to
work so I have to pay the higher price. Also, because I'm using a
transportation program through work, I can only use the carpool services,
which means I can't take advantage of the tactic in this article since you are
not allowed to change your destination after booking for pools. I was really
hoping Waze's carpool would help, but I can't get connected to someone else at
the times I need to leave and they are not recognized as a valid candidate for
our work program. Uber once had a monthly pass available, which was a huge
help for me financially, but it hasn't been available in over a year. Would
really love to get some more affordable options as I use these services almost
daily.

~~~
JumpCrisscross
> _I don 't have a choice but to pay it sometimes because neither app is
> willing to give me a lower price_

Depending on your market, you may have a choice. I use Juno in New York and
Scoop or Waze Carpool in the Bay Area as my primary choices.

------
swiley
Man I thought the point of all this shiny app crap is that you don't have to
know what's going on with it and everything "just works."

I'll stick with my non-mobile command line tools and keeping all my cash under
my bed.

------
specialist
Increasing the price? Or reducing the discount?

I ask, because Uber is operating at a loss, hemorrhaging money.

~~~
paxys
Their US business has been profitable for a while.

~~~
kn0where
Is it really? [https://www.reuters.com/article/us-uber-usa/uber-boss-
says-u...](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-uber-usa/uber-boss-says-u-s-
market-unprofitable-amid-tough-competition-from-lyft-idUSKBN1D9348)

~~~
paxys
From the same article

> For a brief period last year, Uber was profitable in the United States and
> Canada, the company said

Recent troubles have been due to negative press and Lyft's popularity, but
again in the same article (from November) they said they could be profitable
again in 6 months. So overall their business is pretty stable and not really
on the brink of death as people here usually make it out to be.

------
Spoom
Seems like an easy thing for Uber to fix; it's not running its price gouging
calculation on mid-trip changes.

------
viscanti
It says the algorithm is based on time and distance. Was there more traffic?
Is it possible that the up front pricing algorithm knew that the time portion
of the trip would be more than usual and charged more because of that?

~~~
therideshareguy
We tested all different times and traffic levels but in general, Uber's
algorithm is terrible at predicting traffic since they use their own internal
maps system (as opposed to gmaps or waze).

~~~
viscanti
> Uber's algorithm is terrible at predicting traffic

So how does that rule out that their algorithm is looking at estimated
traffic? I usually get an estimated arrival time right after booking and
that's generally correct on the few Uber trips I've taken. How different was
your estimated arrival time and your actual arrival time?

------
bogomipz
It seems like its time for consumer-driven AI to combat these shenanigans.
Like if there is an app I could open that would automatically do the Uber/Lyft
rate arbitrage for me, create false positives/negatives to thwart the business
traveller flags and then to automatically reset the destination mid-way to
ensure I get the honest price.

Is there some reason this wouldn't be viable? I would think such apps would
have applications beyond just fighting the latest discriminatory or dynamic
pricing exploitation by Uber.

------
nodesocket
Additionally as the article hints at, imagine they detect that you use Uber to
commute to work (destination is a business and Monday - Friday at near the
same time each morning and evening). Of course they can charge you more
because often times the companies are reimbursing, or it's a tax write-off.

------
neolefty
Yes, Uber's opacity is shady, but raising their rates is a business necessity.

If rides are still being subsidized by Uber (via losses) and its drivers (via
low wages), would it be more accurate to say that new riders are given a
promotional discount and frequent riders are charged a more sustainable rate?

~~~
ksk
>would it be more accurate to say that new riders are given a promotional
discount and frequent riders are charged a more sustainable rate?

The government had already regulated cab fares to where they couldn't just
gouge the customer and (hopefully) the prices were fair to both the cab driver
and the rider. Uber re-introduced risk into the equation, along with the
opportunity to capture the consumer surplus.

------
the_watcher
This doesn't seem any different than the known behavior of online merchants
(particularly airlines in my experience) of listing different prices based on
what they can infer about the user, or than a mechanic quoting an artificially
high price to someone who seems less knowledgable about what's actually
required (Seinfeld has an episode touching on this, blanking on which one).

That said, I have noticed that, the rare times I Uber to work (I work in a
pretty big corporate office space), if I enter a nearby Target as my location,
my price is often notably lower. This happens with Lyft as well. It's hard to
tell if this is just timing based (sometimes just re-requesting fares to the
same destination has a similar effect).

------
johnklos
The person who's hosting this article is a jerk. The ads are crazy and max out
all cores.

------
jellicle
Everyone, including Uber, said this would happen, so...

To all the people talking about giving up their car to use Uber, just realize
that once Uber realizes you don't have a car, your rates just doubled.

------
niksmac
This is very true, I used to get offers but right after I took some insane
surge of 3x no new offers were coming. Other than that, none of the usual
coupon codes were working for me.

------
misterbowfinger
I've definitely noticed that if use Uber infrequently, I consistently get
marketing promotions for "40% off" of your rides.

This might be specific to my market, but it happens really consistently.

Honestly, I just think about it like a marketing analyst. Who would you try to
entice back onto your platform? High value users, who show interest (i.e.
opening the app but not taking rides). It really becomes easy to game most
marketing promos this way, but Uber's is particularly gullible.

------
jsjohnst
Digging into ride data I have access too, I see this is definitely the case
for UberXL / UberBlack rides. Seems they are fairly consistently
"overcharging" for those types of rides by 20-25% with upfront pricing.
Unfortunately most of the data I have access to for other types of rides has
RidePass's associated with it, so the difference isn't as pronounced, but that
could potentially be the advantage of the Ride Pass.

------
im_down_w_otp
My semi-regular Lyft ride to work has increased steadily from ~$7 to ~$10 over
the last 3 months.

The only change is that the pattern of days and times has become much more
consistent.

I don't know if they're doing a similar thing or if they've just steadily
increased prices.

Now that the weather is getting better, I'll just be riding my bike more
often.

~~~
therideshareguy
Lyft has switched to an upfront pricing model too so it wouldn't surprise me
if they are doing something similar. But I haven't seen any examples that are
as bad as with Uber, where I'm constantly seeing big discrepancies like this.

------
dano
It takes just a few moments to bring up Lyft and Uber and compare prices to
your destination. The one you don't choose will likely see an abandoned cart
type of metric as feedback as you did not complete the transaction. This is
the only method I can think of for keeping prices competitive.

------
recursivelambda
Couldn't a higher upfront price also partly be because Uber tries to predict
the travel time and need to add some error margin due to uncertainty? That
would probably explain only a small part of it and certainly not why different
people seem to get different deals.

~~~
dx034
In that case they could let you choose. If you know the trip is always around
$60, you'd probably not hand over the risk to uber for a 25% higher fee.

------
jtmb
Uber seems very actively hostile to its employees, drivers, and riders.

It's kind of impressive in a bad way.

------
akhilcacharya
I basically used uber to commute (exclusively for a few weeks and as a second
option for the rest) during an internship. I noticed my pricing going up from
$16 to $22 at the same times during the same season. By the end I ended up
using Lyft.

------
jtokoph
I've noticed that Uber gives discounts when you don't use them for a while.
Uber will give 10 rides at 50% off. I'll do 10 rides with them and then go
back to Lyft...until Uber notifies me of the next round of discounts.

------
lewis500
This is how Comcast works too: introductory offer and then the price goes up.
So about every two years I call them acting like an over sharing man-child and
say my parents cut me off and I can’t afford Comcast anymore.

------
htormey
I’ve notified this a lot in San Francisco/Oakland coming and going from the
airport. I always comparison shop with lyft and sometimes their is a $10-$20
difference in price.

~~~
myrandomcomment
Agreed. Last week landed opened both applications and picked the cheapest.
Lyft this time by almost $20.

------
Etheryte
While it always weird to see just how much Uber plays both the local laws as
well as its customers, it’s also quite an interesting insight into what I
would call peak capitalism.

------
wemdyjreichert
Here's how to avoid it: use Lyft. Thanks, free market!

~~~
CloudYeller
I only use Lyft for personal reasons but FWIW Lyft almost certainly uses this
type of predatory regularly trip pricing. As I mentioned in another comment, I
take the same trip at roughly the same time 1-2x per week. After doing that
for awhile, I noticed the price went up 10-20%. When I adjust the locations
just a few hundred meters from my usual endpoints, the real time price drops
10-20%.

------
bradhe
I've had $5 Ubers for the past like 4 months. No idea why they keep giving me
$5 ubers, but I save a TON of money every month thanks to it.

------
jdlyga
Here's how to avoid it: Use Juno, Via, or Lyft. They are all better than Uber,
at least in NYC.

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reconbot
Easy to avoid. Use Lyft, Use Juno, Use anything else and compare prices.

~~~
CloudYeller
Lyft is definitely doing it too. I take the same trip at roughly the same time
1-2x per week. After doing that for awhile, i noticed the price went up like
10-20%. When I adjust the locations just a few hundred meters from my usual
endpoints, the real time price drops 10-20%.

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xchip
TL;DR: Uber charges more if it thinks you might be expensing the trip. When
going home from the airport try setting as destination a place close to your
house. That will fool the system and will give you a non inflated upfront
price. Then wait to be in the middle of the ride and ask driver to change
destination and take you home.

------
rhizome
Milking the whales, film at 11.

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LyalinDotCom
I avoid this by using Lyft.

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wlll
"Uber involved in $shady_business_practice, news at 10!"

Seriously, they're scum, this isn't surprising at all.

I deleted my account a while back and although _sometimes_ it's less
convenient, I've managed. I don't regret it. I hate the idea of supporting
such a bunch of thieves and liars.

------
bananatron
How to avoid it: use lyft?

------
jdp23
An even better way to avoid it: don't use Uber.

------
cryptoz
> Here's How to Avoid It

Stop using Uber.

------
alexmorse
Very simple way to avoid it. DON'T USE UBER

~~~
ilkan
Cabs can be next to impossible outside downtown core. Calling in advance had
minimum half hour wait in Hamilton, even an hour wait when when you're only 10
minutes outside the downtown. And street pickups have massive discrimination.
Everyone except cab drivers was happy for Uber.

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nukeop
Please don't call it "ride sharing" or "ride hailing", that's what they want
to be called despite being very clearly a taxi service.

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agumonkey
My first and only uber ride was a 80$ one. Enjoying the special 3x tarif,
according to them to help me having the fastest service. Felt like a very
hypocritical scam.

I don't know how they keep these sort of things.

~~~
icebraining
I don't see what's hypocritical about it.

~~~
agumonkey
Felt like a very weak excuse to benefit from hurried people at night to shell
out way to much.

~~~
icebraining
Why didn't you get a cab? Maybe then you'd see that it's not such a weak
excuse after all. At least, my experience is that it isn't.

~~~
agumonkey
Was let down in the middle of the night, angry and impatient, I thought I'd
try uber because f. it. Actually I think I installed the app because I thought
it would be cheaper than a traditional taxi, but a quick calculation the next
day showed that they would have asked for 50$ end to end.

------
paul7986
Oh look another negative article about Uber.

Also they are struggling to make money and they just killed an innocent woman.
I wonder if the lawsuit or lawsuits from their murder prompted by following
the startup adage move fast, break things and learn will cause them
irreparable harm?

Does anyone know if the victim has next of kins?

~~~
wlll
> Also they are struggling to make money

Isn't this largely their own choosing? They're deliberately undercutting the
competition to at best gain a foothold, or worst eliminate the competition
entirely so they can put prices up.

~~~
paul7986
Yet they are doing everything including 3rd degree murder to be the winner.
Can anyone name a previous modern company who succeeded via this type of
playbook?

Wonder why people downvote my loathe for Uber who stole 1k from me and then
laughed in my face and 1000s of other users who fell the same fate.

------
Ro93
This is fake news.

The media is purposefully generating outrage for ad clicks.

People need to think when they see a headline, "Is this title clickbait?", "Is
it purposefully angled in a way to increase likelihood of me sharing the
article?"

EDIT: This article should be flagged, since it's spreading misinformation.

~~~
Dylan16807
Are you going to say what the misinformation is, or just make a vague
nonproductive comment?

------
spodek
> I started regularly taking a Monday morning trip to the airport, then
> another ride home from the airport Tuesday evening.

My first thought from the headline: Walk, bike, or take public transit. But
the pollution I expected wasn't in the same league as his actual behavior.
He's a global warming machine.

~~~
criley2
Yes, walk or bike >30 miles between cities before getting on an airplane for
work. Your fellow passengers in coach will appreciate your odiferous devotion
to the environment.

Sometimes the comments in here are truly insane. How could you even suggest
walking or biking between two California cities?

Just to add to the hilarity of your "global warming machine", here's a Google
breakdown of the THIRTEEN HOUR WALK you suggested that this man take
[https://www.google.com/maps/dir/San+Diego+International+Airp...](https://www.google.com/maps/dir/San+Diego+International+Airport+\(SAN\),+3225+N+Harbor+Dr,+San+Diego,+CA+92101/33.2090363,-117.3496005/@32.9682962,-117.4064659,11z/data=!3m1!4b1!4m9!4m8!1m5!1m1!1s0x80deab3944f1e6ef:0xdc2e46f957550b6b!2m2!1d-117.1933038!2d32.7338006!1m0!3e2)

~~~
vanderZwan
> Walk, bike, _or take public transit._

Here is a tip: comments are a lot less insane if you actually read them.

~~~
criley2
"Here is a tip: comments are a lot less insane if you actually read them."

Oh, so when he said "walk, bike or take public transit" he actually meant
"walking and biking aren't options for you, only public transit is"

Wow, I'm so glad we have folks like you to literally rewrite posts.

And of course it's completely beyond the pale that I dared quote someone and
judge their words as they wrote them!

The reality here is that this person obviously did not read the post and wrote
a boilerplate "green shame" post, assuming that walking was valid, assuming
because they obviously did not read.

The "insanity" is people not reading and just running to the comments to
parrot their script even when the script is absurdism when applied to the
situation.

------
tom-_-
This is the Ride Share Guy's false assumption:

"It’s important to understand that traffic is rarely an issue when I’m going
to and from the airport, as I’m usually doing it in non-peak hours. So the
part of the cost having to do with time shouldn’t fluctuate by more than a few
dollars."

The time has a very large impact on the price, because morning is when demand
is commonly the least elastic (people need to get to work)

Uber is not "ripping off frequent riders", it's charging more for trips where
riders will accept higher prices. And now, the Ride Share Guy has ripped off
Uber (and it's drivers) by publicizing a flaw in pricing.

