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Uber Driver Tip-Hustling Schemes

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Re: Uber Driver Tip-Hustling Schemes

#161

Post by ezzaf »

nopassrecover wrote: post #154

In Australia we've tried tipping Uber drivers (e.g. because we've inconvenienced them with a stop to pickup food on the way home) and so far after 5 occasions no driver has accepted the tip (taxi drivers accept a tip without question, and usually won't accommodate short trips, despite the law, yet alone special requests).

I've had the same experience in Poland. Tried to tip a driver who'd gone above and beyond in helping me out, and the driver refused to accept the tip.

The whole thing seems to illustrate just how far out of whack tipping expectations are in the US compared to the rest of the world.

Re: Uber Driver Tip-Hustling Schemes

#162

Post by bogomipz »

bobbles wrote: post #79
bogomipz wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is indeed weird if not uncomfortable. There's been an interesting move by Danny Meyer and Tom Colochio two well-known and very successful restaurateurs in New York City to abolish tips in favor of a flat service charge to be shared amongst everyone in the restaurant. Danny Meyer talks about the history of tipping in the US in which he claims is rooted in post-Civil War racism and the old Pullman cars. http://www.b…

Why even keep it as a service charge.. just put it into the price

I agree, why not just reflect the true price of eating a meal in a restaurant which includes paying servers.

My guess is that it is more transparent to both the customer and the staff who may view this development with some suspicion at first.

Re: Uber Driver Tip-Hustling Schemes

#163

Post by arebop »

jforman wrote: post #51
acheron wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But tipping sucks. That was one of the reasons Uber was better than Lyft in the first place. Then some assholes sued and now Uber drivers are allowed to ask for tips. Nice job breaking it, hero.

You seem to want to kill the messenger here. If Uber's practice was unlawful, it would've been stopped eventually. And why was Uber's practice unlawful? The "free market" of contractors Uber relies on to drive down costs also allows drivers freedom of speech to ask for tips. Uber can either have an open driver market or they can limit their drivers' speech — they can't do both.

Does it make the farmers' market unfree when it declares a rule that vendors may not purchase their wares (but must grow the produce/animals on a farm)? Does that make the farmers employees of the farmers' market? Without getting into the finer points of law about contractor independence & discretion, it's a bit silly to hold the position that Uber can't regulate the service in any way. In particular, standardizing the terms of the contract to be traded in a given market is a practice even the staunchest of free market proponents accept.

Re: Uber Driver Tip-Hustling Schemes

#164

Post by inimino »

blhack wrote: post #89

I'd love if an economist of somebody with a better financial background could comment on this: When you're giving a tip, you're effectively giving money to the people who own the company (or participate in profit sharing). Tips allow employers to pay their employees under market rate. By paying enough tip to bring the employee's wage up to the market rate, you are subsidizing the company's profit, not the employees p…

There are cases where the employer is obligated to make up the difference if the minimum wage isn't reached by tipping. In that case, the alternative to you tipping the waiter $5 is that the restaurant charges you $5 more for your meal and passes that on to the waiter to meet the minimum wage requirement. If the restaurant eats the loss and doesn't raise prices, then you would be right, but restaurants already have thin margins and high competition so they would have to raise prices to raise wages and stay competitive. If tipping went away, menu prices would go up. However tipping is a form of price discrimination and an incentive for good service, which are both arguably good things.

Obviously the much more common case is where the tip would not be replaced by the employer. So in that case if you don't tip the $5, the waiter is just $5 poorer. The restaurant's profit isn't affected one cent.

Re: Uber Driver Tip-Hustling Schemes

#165

Post by blhack »

SilasX wrote: post #153
ryandrake wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yea, I don't get where this idea came from that tipping is either good for the employee or good for the customer. The employee is getting paid a crappy wage and the customer is being guilt-tripped into making up for it. The only winner is the employer.

Don't forget that you're implicitly paying a premium to compensate for the unpredictability/lumpiness/[1] of the tips! [1] as well as "the presence of people who deliberately flout the expectations" and whose non-payment must be made up, in expectation, by more honest customers.

So essentially subsidizing the profit of the employer and subsidizing the cost of the goods that people who aren't adhering to the implied price structure are paying (non-tippers)!

I wonder how this came about? Like was this something a clever businessperson invented at some point? It sounds like the US is the only place with a tipping culture like ours.

Re: Uber Driver Tip-Hustling Schemes

#166

Post by jdormit »

cortesoft wrote: post #109
dawnerd wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I deleted my Uber account over all the bad press and a few bad rides last couple months. There's definitely a trend for the drivers to be either really really bad at driving, or super aggressive with tips. Do drivers really expect people using a cashless system to... carry cash? I actually had one driver accepts tips using stripe.

I wonder if this varies by region? I ride with uber quite a bit here in Los Angeles, and I have never once been asked for a tip. I wonder what makes it different?

Here in Salt Lake I have never been asked for a tip.

In general though, I've found Uber experiences to vary significantly by region. In Salt Lake, I usually sit in the front seat, drivers are chatty, and the whole thing feels like "someone giving you a ride". In NYC, by contrast, I mostly sit in the back (a lot of the time the driver will block off the front passenger seat), drivers don't tend to talk, and the whole thing feels like a cab ride.

In fact, I would guess that many Uber drivers in NYC are/were taxi drivers.

Re: Uber Driver Tip-Hustling Schemes

#167

Post by [deleted] »

snuxoll wrote: post #91
amgin3 wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Then you are just enabling that process to continue. You are subsidizing their wages and making it seem ok for their employer to pay them peanuts. I don't tip anyone and tipping is not a common practice where I live. In fact, most people would feel insulted if you gave them a tip here.

> You are subsidizing their wages and making it seem ok for their employer to pay them peanuts. You're going to end up paying for it either way. But yes, I agree - I'd rather get rid of the culture of tipping and just pay a reasonable price for a service. The thing that really sucks though, is per federal law an employer paying the 'tipping minimum wage' is required to make up the difference if an employee makes belo…

[deleted]

Re: Uber Driver Tip-Hustling Schemes

#168

Post by cortesoft »

paulddraper wrote: post #157
cortesoft wrote: post #135

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Uber charges the amount that they need to get enough drivers to drive the number of customers they have. When there aren't enough drivers willing to drive at the given rate, they go into 'surge' pricing to intice more drivers to drive. You know what would happen if they raised the rates and paid more to the drivers? Two things - fewer riders would ride, and more drivers would drive. You would end up with a lot of dri…

Correct. Drivers should also be driving less for Uber. Or, alternatively, everyone is making the correct decision and there isn't an imbalance anyway.

You are probably right about there not being an 'imbalance', but I would like to add that just because there is an efficient market in place doesn't mean there can't also be structural problems in the society. The value of labor continues to fall as automation and machinery improves, which is why uber drivers are so cheap to entice to drive. For most people, the only thing they have to sell is their labor, and as we continue to find alternatives to labor through automation, that downward pressure on the cost of labor is only going to increase.

We really, really, need to address this as a society soon.

Re: Uber Driver Tip-Hustling Schemes

#169

Post by dorfsmay »

thesmallestcat wrote: post #160
ProfessorLayton wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's the implication here? The parent post paid more than they were required, if not then the business could charge more to cover their costs. This kind of thinking is precisely what's wrong with tipping in the first place.

The implication is that 20% the widely accepted minimum "good tip" rate, and consistently tipping 15% is consistently being cheap. Especially when you're a tech worker FFS. Let's break out of our echo chamber a bit. In the US, tipping isn't "paying more than required," it's basic manners. You can argue until you're blue in the face about how businesses are to blame, but the vast majority of society, who have no big b…

I'm in Canada whre 15% is considered "normal". I did not know 20% was the normal in the U.S.

Re: Uber Driver Tip-Hustling Schemes

#170

Post by ziikutv »

I remembered getting hustled to buy my driver McDonalds then coming home to realize I got billed $36 dollars for his time; a trip that usually costs $9. He guilt me into thinking he does not get paid the more he waits. Alcohol...
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