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

Waymo rides cost more than Uber or Lyft and people are paying anyway

techcrunch.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

501–510 of 916 posts

Re: Waymo rides cost more than Uber or Lyft and people are paying anyway

#501

Post by internetter »

applecrazy wrote: post #364
khazhoux wrote: post #228

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> $3 isn't this kind of a small problem? You're right -- it's surprising Lyft wouldn't just give back $3 (such a small amount!) to keep a customer.

this is so rampant but they know they have a captive market (in many places, only uber or lyft are an option) so they abuse their position

I've had good experiences with Uber. I know others don't, but I have. I used to use Lyft but they treated me like shit so now I don't. If Uber starts treating me like shit I'm going back to taxis. If taxis treat me like shit I'll take the bus, walk, buy a car, or any of the dozens of other ways to get around, even if impractical. The market is only captive because people are lazy and weak willed.

Re: Waymo rides cost more than Uber or Lyft and people are paying anyway

#502

Post by bravoetch »

dataflow wrote: post #478
paulgb wrote: post #336

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Their determination? I wasn't entitled to a $3 refund. Frustratingly, Lyft’s position on this is that if you don’t like the car that arrives you should reject it when it arrives, otherwise you’re not entitled to a (even partial) refund, even when they know on their end that the car they sent doesn’t match what you paid extra for.

This seems... interesting, legally speaking. I imagine the idea is that you're implicitly accepting alterations to the previous contract by opting to take the car? Would that argument hold water, legally?

I ran into a similar arbitration with a condo I rented for a long weekend. There was a significant issue and they weren't able to provide another place. We stayed there and had contractors in and out for the next couple of days. They refused to refund me, so I tried through my credit card to get a refund and they said "well you should have just left, then we would refund you. But since you stayed, the contract is fulfilled."

Re: Waymo rides cost more than Uber or Lyft and people are paying anyway

#503

Post by oefrha »

StableAlkyne wrote: post #390
chipsrafferty wrote: post #315

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You don't have to tip an Uber or Lyft, either.

[Caveat: there aren't many Lyft drivers in my town, so I have only used Uber] The problem is their system extorts you into tipping. If you don't tip, the driver will give you a 1/5 rating. If your rating averages low enough, nobody will pick you up. It's more of a bribe you pay for a good passenger rating than an actual tip. As a result, you're forced to tip if you want to use it long term. Personally, I'm hoping Way…

That’s straight up false. I don’t tip and my Uber passenger rating was ~4.95 last I checked.

Re: Waymo rides cost more than Uber or Lyft and people are paying anyway

#504

Post by ghushn3 »

kulahan wrote: post #468
ghushn3 wrote: post #446

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If I was that driver, you bet I'd be contacting Uber to try and get your friend banned for life. Threatening a driver is never ok, even less so when it's not his fault.

Threatening someone for being a complete asshole is always okay, and even cool. I really do not care how uncomfortable it makes the driver to move a family a few extra blocks to somewhere vaguely safe. I’d similarly threaten him if he tried to drop my family off in a forest, or on the side of a highway, even if that’s what the GPS, God’s Position System, tells them to do. If your job ends in a way that someone who wa…

> Threatening someone for being a complete asshole is always okay, and even cool.

"Being an asshole" is in the eye of the beholder. Plenty of people thing CEOs are assholes, you are saying that it is "always ok, and even cool" to threaten them? Some people think that religious folks are assholes. Some people think blue haired lefty folks are assholes.

I think you need better criteria for violence than "I think this person is an asshole". Even if you had a standard definition for asshole, threatening violence is an escalation. Someone flips you the bird, sure, they are an asshole, doesn't mean you can move to threatening to punch them.

The driver doesn't know these people, doesn't have any protection against them should they do something unpredictable or make a mess of his car outside of the Uber ride. The driver is also making a threat assessment here -- "why did they have me drive to this place and then insist I drive somewhere else? Is this a scam somehow? Is this a precursor to a violent crime?"

Re: Waymo rides cost more than Uber or Lyft and people are paying anyway

#505

Post by mystifyingpoi »

xnx wrote: post #12
femiagbabiaka wrote: post #10

Electronic vehicles have made riding in Uber's an almost uniformly nauseating experience (literally). In order of preference I will walk/bike -> public transit -> Waymo -> drive myself -> consider staying at home -> Uber/Lyft

> Electronic vehicles have made riding in Uber's an almost uniformly nauseating experience I've heard this a lot. Are drivers heavily accelerating and decelerating?

In my limited experience, all taxi drivers just do it all the time for time efficiency. They are paid by km most of the time, makes sense.

Re: Waymo rides cost more than Uber or Lyft and people are paying anyway

#506

Post by fortran77 »

dataflow wrote: post #478
paulgb wrote: post #336

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Their determination? I wasn't entitled to a $3 refund. Frustratingly, Lyft’s position on this is that if you don’t like the car that arrives you should reject it when it arrives, otherwise you’re not entitled to a (even partial) refund, even when they know on their end that the car they sent doesn’t match what you paid extra for.

This seems... interesting, legally speaking. I imagine the idea is that you're implicitly accepting alterations to the previous contract by opting to take the car? Would that argument hold water, legally?

Especially since you may have no time to wait for another car. There’s an element of “duress” here

Re: Waymo rides cost more than Uber or Lyft and people are paying anyway

#507

Post by Dylan16807 »

ghushn3 wrote: post #448
happyopossum wrote: post #445

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So tear down every city in the country and rebuild them all from scratch, then force the ~45% of people that don’t live in those cities to move there. And that’s better than mandating a small percentage of the population use FSD cars? Not sure I like the autocratic tone of that plan

This is a pretty uncharitable read of the parent poster. Many cities are upzoning, which means that corridors are being torn down and built more densely. During those times, we're seeing a lot more mixed use, walkable and bikeable spaces introduced. In Seattle we're seeing streets being closed and lanes being removed to support biking and walking. You can make walkable enclaves neighborhood by neighborhood. And those…

> This is a pretty uncharitable read of the parent poster.

Which is pretty fair because the parent poster was using a very uncharitable read of what they were replying to. 10000% the wrong approach, really?

Re: Waymo rides cost more than Uber or Lyft and people are paying anyway

#508

Post by hidelooktropic »

harmmonica wrote: post #137

As a Waymo-booster on HN for a while now, here's my latest anecdote. I tried to figure out how to take Waymo to LAX even though it's not actually in their territory yet just because I value the experience so much. I was borderline going to take it within walking distance (about half a mile), but got lazy at the last minute. I took Lyft instead, and, as if the universe cursed my laziness, I booked a "comfort" car for…

The Uber comfort designation frustratingly has nothing to do with the condition of the vehicle. I believe the parameters are age, seats, and model.

From the driver's point of view, it just means that you are allowed to accept comfort rides but most of the time you're probably going to be picking up UberX passengers which are more plentiful. That means you're only slightly more likely to get one of the good comfort vehicles if you actually select the comfort tier.

Re: Waymo rides cost more than Uber or Lyft and people are paying anyway

#509

Post by gblargg »

ribosometronome wrote: post #355
usehand wrote: post #350

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Charges for goods not delivered as agreed falls under the protection of the Fair Credit Billing Act. If you made a good faith attempt to resolve with the merchant (which you did) you should use your credit card to charge back the amount (some let you request a partial charge back, but if not you can request a full one and explain in the extra info that you want a partial one). This might not seem worth it for $3, but…

And then you're forever barred from using the service.

I once did a chargeback of almost $5k to PayPal when someone scammed me (and PayPal sided with scammer). I still have my account, though I don't use it for anything I'd actually need protection on now.

On the other hand I did get banned from an online local selling site (rhymes with Canary) for charging back a small purchase where the wrong thing was delivered and their system for reporting it was broken and they refused to refund. I even tried having a roommate create an account (same address) and they banned that when they made a purchase.

Re: Waymo rides cost more than Uber or Lyft and people are paying anyway

#510

Post by Freedom2 »

dannyw wrote: post #498
iwontberude wrote: post #413

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We are talking about Lyft in this example ("I took Lyft instead") so your point is somewhat moot but a good reason to never charge back Google!

I took Google to a tribunal (think Australian equivalent of small claims) a few years ago, over a defective Pixel they refused to repair 2 years and 1 month after purchase. Under Australian Consumer Law, I wanted to make the case that a premium phone should last more than 2 years. Google’s representatives initially sent letters arguing that the license agreement forces me to arbitrate, to which I responded by adding…

That's a fantastic outcome, and honestly, a bit of a unicorn from my perspective here in the US. Your story about the Australian Consumer Law having actual teeth is a breath of fresh air. Here in the US, it feels like we're playing a whole different ball game, and the house (of Google) always wins.

A buddy of mine, let's call him "Dave," had a strikingly similar issue with a Pixel phone a couple of years back. His device started bootlooping out of the blue about 18 months after he bought it. Not exactly what you'd call a "premium" experience. He went through the standard support rigmarole, which I'm sure you're familiar with – the endless chat bots, the canned email responses, the escalations to senior support agents who just read from the same script. The final word from on high was, "Sorry, you're out of the one-year warranty. We can't help you."

Dave, being the stubborn engineer type, decided he wasn't going to take that lying down. He'd read about people having success in small claims court and thought, "How hard can it be?" He did his homework, found the correct legal entity for Google in his state, and filed the paperwork. The filing fee wasn't outrageous, something like $75. He wasn't asking for the moon, just the cost of a replacement phone and the filing fee.

This is where the story takes a decidedly American turn. A few weeks after filing, he didn't get a settlement offer. Instead, he got a thick envelope from a fancy law firm. It was a motion to compel arbitration. Buried deep in the terms of service that we all click "agree" to without reading, there was, of course, a binding arbitration clause. And not just any arbitration, but one that would be conducted by an arbitrator of Google's choosing, in a location convenient for them (Northern California, naturally), and he'd have to split the cost of the arbitrator, which can run into thousands of dollars.

So, his $75 gamble to get a new phone suddenly had the potential to turn into a multi-thousand-dollar boondoggle. The letter from the lawyers was polite, but the message was clear: "drop this, or we'll bury you in legal fees." They weren't just trying to avoid paying for a faulty phone; they were making an example of him.

Dave folded. He couldn't afford to take the risk. So, not only did he not get his phone replaced, but he was also out the filing fee and a good chunk of his time and energy. He ended up just buying an iPhone out of spite.

Post reply on HN