
Uber users with low phone batteries more likely to accept surge pricing - dgudkov
http://www.cbc.ca/news/technology/uber-surge-pricing-1.3593940
======
embro
Right now, even with surge, they seem to be a bit cheaper than the normal city
taxi but I would bet that as soon as there will be no more competition they
will raise the price AND still do price surge. In the end, we will pay more
than we used to.

Uber seem to be always on the edge between aggressive profit and shady
business.

EDIT: Don't think by my comment that I meant the taxis are better. I was just
saying that right now, this is a great deal in most cities where Uber does
offer their services but seeing how hungry they are for max profit, I doubt
this will last and eventually we will realize that a broken system was
replaced by another broken one.

~~~
sillysaurus3
For what it's worth, here are the prices of my last few uber rides:

    
    
      $4
      $4
      $2
      $2
      $2.50
      $1.75
      $2
      $2
      $3.75
    

These prices are so low that it would be more expensive to take public
transit, let alone a taxi. The trips were pretty far, too.

It's obvious that this can't last, but it's pretty great for the moment.

EDIT: A few clarifications: These were in Chicago, and I haven't omitted any
rides from this sample. Those really are the last 9 UberPool rides.

The reason it's so cheap is because Uber keeps carpet bombing my phone with
50% and 75% off promo deals. I don't know why. The two types of deals are
"Your next 5 rides are 50% off" and "All rides between 4pm and 7pm are 75%
off."

~~~
spike021
Plus the $5 base fee, right?

So that's not nearly cheaper than taking public transit.

For example if I get an uber ride between my apartment and the train station,
it's close to $2-3, but that's on top of the $5 base fee. So I could either
pay $7-8, or I could pay $2 for the bus.

~~~
CaptSpify
Where do you live that theres a base fee?

I've never heard of that

~~~
Nullabillity
In Stockholm there's a 40kr (~$5) base fee for UberX:
[https://www.uber.com/cities/stockholm](https://www.uber.com/cities/stockholm)

For UberBLACK that's 50kr (~$6), and UberLUX starts out at 100kr (~$12).

------
punnerud
In the article: "..the company can track your smartphone battery life.."

They ARE tracking my battery, all the time!

I looked into the HTTPS-trafic from the Uber-app (with MITMproxy) and it is
one of the few that send my battery and charging status on a regular basis:

    
    
              "battery_status": "unplugged",
              "battery_level": 0.73,

~~~
punnerud
It would be interesting to run a script that changed the battery status data
in the HTTPS-trafic to make it look like it is dropping fast.

Just to see if there is a correlation with the price, waiting time and
available drivers I am getting back.

~~~
hfjiepwlldmfm
And if so, get lower rates by running a script which lies to Uber and says the
battery is plugged in and at 100%.

~~~
punnerud
Then I would set up a proxy through my home server to change the battery-
status based on my need

~~~
dexterdog
But isn't your need to always pay the minimum amount?

------
whack
I wonder how much of this is also due to poor impulse control. People with
stronger impulse control are more likely to charge their phones fully
beforehand, and/or minimize their usage of it, so as to keep their charge at a
healthy level. Such people are also less likely to accept higher surge prices,
and choose alternatives that are cheaper but less convenient.

~~~
namenotrequired
Or people have worse impulse control when they're already annoyed at their low
battery.

~~~
SapphireSun
Or people need to get home and if their phone dies they'll be stranded....
been there.

------
WalterBright
I wouldn't be in the least surprised if companies will use your previous
buying behavior to give you a custom price.

It's not all that different from a store/car salesman sizing you up based on
clues like your clothing and quoting a price based on that. Home repair
contractors will also size up the value of your home and give you a quote
based on that for the same work.

I know I've been treated differently by bankers and car salesman based on my
dress.

~~~
jsmthrowaway
> I know I've been treated differently by bankers [...] based on my dress.

This is very true. At one point I managed a bit of money in a Wells Fargo PMA.
It was fun to dress and groom similarly to The Dude, wander into branches like
I was lost, and get treated like crap until they looked at the screen.
Invariably they quickly summoned a manager to whisk me away to an office and
asked if I wanted coffee, and their demeanor immediately changed. It became a
personal hobby of mine for a while because they _very_ obviously treat the
"normals" differently than Premier accountholders. (Doesn't work at my new
bank, sadly.)

I'm sure a number of folks here retain balances that far exceed my own at the
time. Try this sometime. It's a fun psychological demonstration.

~~~
dave2000
It's not psychological, it's just business. There's a relationship between
wealth and how you dress, and banks couldn't give a shit about poor people.

~~~
jsmthrowaway
> There's a relationship between wealth and how you dress

There most certainly is not, full stop, and this is the psychological aspect
to which I am referring and colorfully exploiting in my anecdote. Someone who
hangs out on Hacker News should realize this, since our profession in
particular has minted a large number of people who are exorbitantly wealthy
and still wear Old Navy flip flops and hoodies. Poor people also inherit
Prada, and quite a few hucksters within multiple industries dress in a
particular way to exploit this psychological conditioning while having no
money at all.

This is the _entire point_ of my comment, and assuming that relationship
exists says more about your subscription to certain expectations and
conditioning about people than your remarks on "business." It's actually a
disservice to yourself to assume there is a relationship between wealth and
style based on customs that are increasingly becoming dated.

~~~
angli
There most certainly is. You've pointed out some exceptions but do you really
think that on the whole they're not correlated? Having more money means people
can afford to dress better and are more likely to travel in circles in which
dressing well is important.

This may be a bad thing, but it's a reality that people are attuned to - it's
a useful heuristic even though it's imperfect. Should you treat people badly
because of it? No, but you shouldn't treat them badly even if you were 100%
sure they weren't wealthy. That's a separate problem.

~~~
jsmthrowaway
Okay, but ask yourself if that's an actual correlation or an imagined one
based on customs and psychological factors. (Which is my point.)

The assertion was that "there is a relationship," without any sort of
qualification. I'm saying that relationship only exists because of the belief
itself and if we all stopped believing it tomorrow, there would be no
relationship any longer. So it's not really a correlation at all and only an
imaginary one that has largely built itself up on conditioning, upbringing,
and so on.

I'm not saying you're wrong nor denying a tenuous correlation, I'm saying it's
faulty to assume a correlation where one only exists due to external factors,
and that leads to the problems that both you and I point out with the
correlation.

~~~
polarix
> if we all stopped believing it tomorrow

Similarly, money provides no power in society to the person controlling it.
Because if we all stopped believing that it would continue to work in the
future, it wouldn't.

... This is an obviously incorrect argument! There are things that occur only
because of widespread belief. Nevertheless, those things do occur!

------
MBlume
They say they're not going to use this data to set fares, but honestly, if my
battery's dying, I actually do want to pay more if it means a driver's more
likely to agree to pick me up before my battery dies. In general, I wish I
could turn on surge pricing for myself.

~~~
sksksk
A local taxi app here in Bogotá has this feature, you can say your ride is a
"VIP" ride and choose an pay some extra money to ensure you get your taxi
faster.

~~~
JBReefer
Uber has that in New York if you ride enough

------
yakult
>Chen said it's just "an interesting kind of psychological fact of human
behaviour." He stressed the company is not going to act on the information to
set fares.

...but battery optimization of the Uber app is now a lower priority, amirite?

takeaway: giving your battery status information to apps that do not
explicitly need it for core functionality is a bad idea.

------
apetresc
From the article:

> Chen also said people are getting used to the surge and Uber has seen demand
> during peak periods drop by a much smaller amount than when it introduced
> the system.

Doesn't that mean that surge pricing is starting to fail? Isn't the whole
point of surge pricing precisely to spread demand out so it's not all
concentrated at peak times?

~~~
WalterBright
Wouldn't surge pricing also increase the supply of available Uber drivers?

~~~
niccaluim
That was one of the stated goals but in practice it doesn't, according to some
folks at Northeastern.* Uber says they're wrong, and Uber is certainly in a
position to know, but I personally don't trust PR people farther than I can
throw them, so who knows.

*[https://www.propublica.org/article/uber-surge-pricing-may-no...](https://www.propublica.org/article/uber-surge-pricing-may-not-lead-to-a-surge-in-drivers)

------
DoggettCK
I'd be curious to see if certain locations trigger surge pricing, too. My wife
and I got sideswiped about a month ago, had to go to the ER in Austin.

Got out, had no way to get back to our truck, nor to our house an hour outside
Austin. Called Uber, figuring we'd at least get a ride back to the truck to
get our stuff, and see if any friends could take us the rest of the way home.

Despite nothing going on in town that night, and only being about 8:30pm, the
app warned me of surge pricing, saying it would be 1.5x the usual fare. Didn't
have many other options, and had been happy with Uber in the past, so went
ahead.

Driver was cool, and not only took us back to the truck, but drove us all the
way home, complete with a flat tire we helped him change on the side of a
busy, dark toll road, and running out of gas.

Wound up being $98, and that guy really earned his tip. I still wonder if the
fact that we called from the exit of the ER triggered surge pricing, though.
Not a great time to experiment, but I could've probably walked a few blocks
and tried again, if my wife wasn't in the shape she was in at the time.

~~~
maxerickson
I have to ask for clarification. Did you run out of gas, or did you only run
low on gas?

Running out of gas seems like a real unfortunate thing to have happen during a
paid ride and falls pretty squarely on the shoulders of the driver.

~~~
DoggettCK
Thankfully, it wasn't sputtering on the side of the road out of gas, just the
dashboard light coming on indicating that that was 10-30 minutes away.

------
drdaeman
The real question is why Uber has access to battery status information.

~~~
cicero
Apps are told when a phone's battery is low so that they can change into a
battery conserving state.

~~~
awqrre
I'd rather uninstall battery-hogging apps

~~~
corin_
It rather depends on why they are hogging the battery.

Example #1, since it's an "app" you can't remove but that many (I'd guess not
far away from most?) people use, is Mail. I wish my email servers would send
push notifications, but they don't, so Mail is constantly checking for
updates. That uses battery, but it's something I want it using battery for.
And then in battery saver mode, it stops automatically checking, so you won't
notice any new emails until you either turn off the mode, or go into Mail and
manually have it sync.

------
kristopolous
Maybe people who run their phone all the way down are just the type who are
less careful with their pocketbook

~~~
Navarr
You don't use your phone once it's below 60%?

You are an edge case, my friend.

~~~
kristopolous
I took it out to make it less about me. When my phone gets below about 60 I
turn it off and use it only when needed. I don't want to be in a situation
where I need it and don't have it.

I'm also the kind that carries around emergency money in his wallet and has a
first aid kit and spare headlight in his car. In fact, I keep a spare credit
card in my desk drawer with my passport so that if I lose my wallet I won't be
without money for a few days. Thanks dad, you taught me well

~~~
a_small_island
under 60%, really? That seems like overkill...

~~~
kristopolous
It's probably mostly lifestyle driven. If someone takes public transit (say,
living the bay or ny) as opposed to their own car (say living in houston or
la), there's one less charging opportunity.

Then if someone has a job where there's lots of meetings or lots of walking
... etc ...

For whatever reason, in my life at least, it's almost always north of 80%. And
I don't have some special smartphone (in fact, I don't even know the model
offhand). This has been a consistent story since I started carrying mobiles 15
years ago

~~~
corin_
I really don't follow your logic, if you hardly ever use more than the first
20% of the battery, why do you need to leave three times that amount as your
safety cushion by turning off when you get down to 60%?

I don't drive, but do carry a small USB charger with me anytime I either go
out for most of the day, especially if for work, and sometimes on nights out.
I still can get to the end of a long day having used all of both my phone's
and my charger's batteries. But I don't turn my phone off before it gets to
9%, because 9% is more than enough to do whatever emergency thing I might need
my phone for at the end of the day. I'd be able to turn it back on and... make
a few phone calls. Or order and wait for an Uber. Or look up transport options
on Google Maps. Or open my bus/train ticket app to get on-board.

(I do, however, often think ahead and would sometimes put battery saver mode
on even when I'm as high as 80% charged, if I know it's a long time until my
next charge, it means people can still contact me but there might be a slight
delay, it means I can still use it soon as I pull it out of my pocket, and it
means I'm much less likely to need to turn it off at all.)

~~~
kristopolous
I understand that. The reality is that it almost never gets below the top
quintile ... so if I see it getting near 50, then it's very likely going to
get to be a zero condition.

------
msoad
This came out of an interesting interview in this episode of The Hidden Brain:

[https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/hidden-
brain/id102890875...](https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/hidden-
brain/id1028908750?mt=2#episodeGuid=606d1336-b47b-4508-8c7f-feceb13df764)

~~~
jessriedel
Here's the link to the write up by NPR Hidden Brain:

[http://www.npr.org/2016/05/17/478266839/this-is-your-
brain-o...](http://www.npr.org/2016/05/17/478266839/this-is-your-brain-on-
uber)

------
Retric
I expect Uber to eventually show prices based on how likely someone is going
to accept 'surge' prices and how large a surge someone is willing to pay.

~~~
r00fus
Could also mean that those surge accepters will find faster rides. Since
they're not marked cars, you (as someone who may not accept surges) will never
know that an Uber driver is passing you by for a juicier passenger.

~~~
jaredsohn
That's how it already works; a nice aspect of surge pricing is that if you are
willing to pay, you don't have to wait longer than you otherwise would.

I view the GP as suggesting that Uber has an incentive to show some people a
larger surge price than what the market would suggest since those people will
pay it anyway. (And people don't have enough information to know if Uber is
charging them more because they can get away with it or if that is the price
that anyone who wants a ride would pay.)

------
r00fus
Surge pricing = new name for Value Based Pricing
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Value-
based_pricing](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Value-based_pricing)

~~~
cloudjacker
Web 2.0, when the marketing team doesn't let retarded technical names make it
to production.

------
erac1e
> Company researcher says Uber won't be acting on the information to set fares

I don't believe that.

------
paulus_magnus2
(on the risk of being downvoted)

People with Appendix attack, stroke, stab wounds would be likely to accept
100x surge. If only Uber was able to detect them.

------
nnd
The company has determined that customers are more willing to accept surge
pricing if they have a medical emergency and need to get to the hospital. Oh,
your battery is low too? Well, now you are really screwed. Dynamic pricing!

------
oneloop
I thought that HN loved the "price for vague, not for cost" mantra. That's
what they're doing when they charge you more on low battery.

------
wkingfly
Yeah, it's will could be

------
unlimit
Its still way cheaper than regular taxis here in Kolkata and thank you power
banks.

