Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Uber is experimenting with letting riders wait longer for a cheaper fare

qz.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

61–70 of 198 posts

Re: Uber is experimenting with letting riders wait longer for a cheaper fare

#61

Post by chrisabrams »

koolba wrote: post #44
chrisabrams wrote: post #7

Based on my rides recently I have seen the quality of drivers plummet on both Uber and Lyft. I'd be much more willing to wait (and maybe even pay) for a higher quality driver. Having a driver who cannot follow a GPS and takes you in a circle 3-4 times around the airport or does not speak English well enough to understand your request to stop on the right instead of the left like the GPS shows can be quite frustrating…

I’ll settle for waiting 5 min extra for a driver that doesn’t have to stop for gas.

Do they stop the fare when this happens, and/or do you get out and end the ride?

Re: Uber is experimenting with letting riders wait longer for a cheaper fare

#62

Post by chrisabrams »

chimeracoder wrote: post #17
chrisabrams wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're in a suburb that should never happen. If you are in the NYC area for example, the GPS just really struggles between all the buildings. What's more frustrating is when you are on the other side of a busy street, you wave to the driver or even call them to let them know you're on the other side of the street, and they just sit there...

> If you are in the NYC area for example, the GPS just really struggles between all the buildings. What phone are you using? In a decade of living in Manhattan, I've never had any issue like this. The location services on my phone (Pixel 2 XL) and every Android phone I've ever used have been spot on.

iPhones, model hasn't mattered. Flat Iron + GPS = location lottery for me anytime of the day.

Re: Uber is experimenting with letting riders wait longer for a cheaper fare

#63

Post by rrix2 »

dannyw wrote: post #52
tvanantwerp wrote: post #28

I've frequently used Uber Pool, and have noticed that it's started forcing a waiting period of a minute to "find the best match". I've also noticed that I'm getting matched with drivers further and further away from me, frequently waiting up to ten minutes. The matching algorithms sure don't seem improved, so maybe they're just covering up a decreasing number of drivers in my area.

Uber most likely thinks you're a habitual user, so it gives priority for newer riders. Uber dynamically prices rides based on the person and your ride history[1], as well as factors like your battery percentage. [1]: https://therideshareguy.com/uber-is-ripping-off-frequent-rid... [2]: https://www.theverge.com/2016/5/20/11721890/uber-surge-prici... - while it was only a study in 2016, in 2018 this is definitely true.…

> Your upfront fares are hiked if your battery say 5%.

Do you have a source for this?

Re: Uber is experimenting with letting riders wait longer for a cheaper fare

#64

Post by vinay427 »

dvtrn wrote: post #57
chrisabrams wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're in a suburb that should never happen. If you are in the NYC area for example, the GPS just really struggles between all the buildings. What's more frustrating is when you are on the other side of a busy street, you wave to the driver or even call them to let them know you're on the other side of the street, and they just sit there...

For the first time in 11 years I'm thinking of switching off T-Mobile after relocating to Chicago. Much of my day is spent in the loop and despite their best claims buildings are a bane. Can anyone recommend a carrier with better QOS here or is this just inherent to my new life in a giant city? I'll get over it and adapt, just keeping my options open.

The GP was referring to a problem with GPS, not their cellular connection. In any case, I haven't noticed any issues with T-mobile in San Francisco, so maybe T-mobile has some weaknesses unique to the Chicago area.

Re: Uber is experimenting with letting riders wait longer for a cheaper fare

#65

Post by maerF0x0 »

anon84598 wrote: post #23
maerF0x0 wrote: post #16

I just wanted to drop a note to say I think Uber is doing a good job, all things considered. Many public transit companies have been around for decades and haven't figured out how to scale up to the kind of service Uber is providing. 4B rides in 2017 is pretty amazing. If I understand the math correctly, BART claims about 126 million rides (2015) and cost $906M (~$7 a ride, comparable to some uber pool fares)

Just to totally nitpick your last point, it's worth noting that the BART cost probably includes the entire infrastructure maintenance cost whereas Uber essentially has infrastructure subsidized (i.e., they don't need to pay for maintenance of the roads their cars drive on etc.) so a true comparison of efficiency would result in Uber "costing" more than that.

The cost of the infrastructure is in capital and operating costs of the drivers. ie the capital in the cars and the taxes in the fuel (and income tax?).

So these costs are passed along in the cost of an uber ride.

You did point at something I missed though. Technically every ride is being subsidized by investors (because uber operates at a loss afaik). To whatever extent they're losing money on every ride is a sort of disadvantage to uber ...

Re: Uber is experimenting with letting riders wait longer for a cheaper fare

#66

Post by koolba »

chrisabrams wrote: post #61
koolba wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ll settle for waiting 5 min extra for a driver that doesn’t have to stop for gas.

Do they stop the fare when this happens, and/or do you get out and end the ride?

No and no.

Re: Uber is experimenting with letting riders wait longer for a cheaper fare

#67

Post by chimeracoder »

chrisabrams wrote: post #62
chimeracoder wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you are in the NYC area for example, the GPS just really struggles between all the buildings. What phone are you using? In a decade of living in Manhattan, I've never had any issue like this. The location services on my phone (Pixel 2 XL) and every Android phone I've ever used have been spot on.

iPhones, model hasn't mattered. Flat Iron + GPS = location lottery for me anytime of the day.

> iPhones, model hasn't mattered. Flat Iron + GPS = location lottery for me anytime of the day.

That's unfortunate. As I said, every Android phone I had has been spot on everywhere in the city.

Re: Uber is experimenting with letting riders wait longer for a cheaper fare

#68

Post by zaroth »

jessriedel wrote: post #15
dm8 wrote: post #2

Lyft used to do something similar couple of years ago (at least in Bay Area) in Lyft Line. I believe they had 10 min wait option wherein when you request and wait for 10 mins you'll get cheaper fare. I remember getting 10-20% cheaper fares consistently using that option. I'd regularly take 10 min wait option especially going to east bay or peninsula from SF. Uber also has "express pool" option (again in bay area), wh…

The longer the rider is willing to wait, the more the service can optimize the allocation of drivers. (Less distance driven without a passenger, more distance driven with multiple passengers in a car pool, more direct carpools.) This is a real elimination of waste whose value can be split between the service and the passenger, although it's not clear whether the size of that value is really at the 10-20% level.

If they can pair you up with a drop-off already on the way to your exact location by having you wait a couple minutes, I would estimate this is easily worth 20% to the driver, assuming average trip time is on the order of 10-20 minutes.

Re: Uber is experimenting with letting riders wait longer for a cheaper fare

#69

Post by mlthoughts2018 »

code_duck wrote: post #49
kemitche wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the same breath you complain that they don't pay their drivers enough and that their service is too expensive. Drivers aren't going to get more than a few percentage points increase without increasing the price to the end user.

"In the same breath you complain that they don't pay their drivers enough and that their service is too expensive." You seem to present that as a contradiction, but the obvious conclusion is that the GP believes Uber keeps an unfair share of the ride fees. Based on my vague internet research, it appears Uber keeps 20-25% plus various fees, like how credit card settlement charges work, which can add up to 40%+ for som…

And the amount Uber keeps has to go way up too, if Uber is to cease operating at multi-billon dollar per year losses to become profitable. Currently they only take 20-25% and the rest of the required income to meet operating expenses is subsidized by VC funding.

And the losses are so large that it likely means both raising prices to riders and reducing the net payout to drivers at the same time.

Re: Uber is experimenting with letting riders wait longer for a cheaper fare

#70

Post by selectodude »

dvtrn wrote: post #57
chrisabrams wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're in a suburb that should never happen. If you are in the NYC area for example, the GPS just really struggles between all the buildings. What's more frustrating is when you are on the other side of a busy street, you wave to the driver or even call them to let them know you're on the other side of the street, and they just sit there...

For the first time in 11 years I'm thinking of switching off T-Mobile after relocating to Chicago. Much of my day is spent in the loop and despite their best claims buildings are a bane. Can anyone recommend a carrier with better QOS here or is this just inherent to my new life in a giant city? I'll get over it and adapt, just keeping my options open.

Verizon, unfortunately. Though a lot of the issue isn't signal but bandwidth. There are just too many people. You'll have five bars and nothing will load. That's what caused me to leave T-Mobile.
Post reply on HN