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

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

#111
IMO, the worst thing about Uber's pricing 'experiments' are silently gouging frequent riders with higher upfront fares, hiking up return fares (since it knows you didn't drive to the location) as well as hidden surges (that aren't passed on to the driver) during night.

https://therideshareguy.com/uber-is-ripping-off-frequent-rid...

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

#112
post #63
post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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?

See the second source. I've only anecdotally confirmed that this actually happens, but when your battery is low and you're requesting an Uber, I encourage you to get an upfront fare and then compare that versus Lyft.

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

#113
post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm no Uber fanboy, but the app provides on-demand, door to door transportation service for (more or less) the entire BART market area.

The point the commenter is making is that Uber is just providing access to it. They aren't training all those drivers, buying and maintaining all those cars, building and maintaining all the roads, etc. BART does all those things for their rail system.

Hypothetically, if a company is able to provide the same service as BART without building and maintaining all that infrastructure, isn't that a huge point in favor of that company?

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

#114
post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Drivers aren't going to get more than a few percentage points increase without increasing the price to the end user. But they should. Perhaps the pay scale is too top heavy. Uber's operational expenses should be trivial (hell, they straight up stole the most expensive bits -- the self-driving car IP). Instead they squeeze the drivers (passing along rate cuts) and riders (surge pricing during shootings, etc) pretty…

Uber's driver and rider acquisition costs (marketing, promotions, ads, etc.) are astronomical. They can't easily scale these efforts back because the value of the service plummets for all parties if they lose their economy of scale.

"we lose money on each sale but we make up for it in volume"

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

#115
post #77
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…

Express Pool and Pool include an up to 2 minute wait to give other riders a chance to make a request in the same area or along the route. Express Pool often feels much faster than Pool because they ask the rider to walk towards main streets and I notice it helps the driver avoid having to drive around city blocks unnecessarily. I think Lyft Line is the same offering as Uber Pool and doesn’t require a 10 min wait (but…

I have to wait five minutes now

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

#116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Customers should pay a premium for the driver to not park a block and a half from them at pickup?

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...

Why use GPS, just walk to an intersection so you know where you are, and set the needle there.

If driver comes on the other side of street, maybe cross the street.

A tiny bit of effort goes a long way...

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

#117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Better than none, and using the public's resources.

It's actually not better than none, but feel free to believe whatever you want to.

Regardless of how good or bad BART PD is, running a police force is an operational cost Uber doesn't incur.

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

#118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's actually not better than none, but feel free to believe whatever you want to.

Regardless of how good or bad BART PD is, running a police force is an operational cost Uber doesn't incur.

Didn't object to that!

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

#119

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.

Unlike bart that infra is shared and taxes are paid by all users . If uber and its drivers are paying lesser than they should for their usage the govt which needs to fix that, however it cannot be said uber is not paying for the infra they use.

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

#120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point the commenter is making is that Uber is just providing access to it. They aren't training all those drivers, buying and maintaining all those cars, building and maintaining all the roads, etc. BART does all those things for their rail system.

Hypothetically, if a company is able to provide the same service as BART without building and maintaining all that infrastructure, isn't that a huge point in favor of that company?

Capitalize the gains, socialize the losses. The infrastructure has to be built, if the company doesn't do it, the state does, which means society pays. More individual rides mean more traffic congestion which means a worse experience for everybody.

I think that Uber from an investment perspective is looking good but from a social perspective it's looking bad.

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