My car is in the shop and if I could I was going to run somewhere across town, then my wife could pick me up after work. The place is about 10 minutes away.
I pop open Uber, and type in where I need to go. 10 minute ride, but it’s priced at $25 and up from there. I was like holy shit ok I don’t need to go that bad I can wait.
A few minutes later I get a push notification that said “Prices have dropped!” I click it and it opens up the exact same route but now the fare is 9 fucking dollars.
Even looking now, it’s $11-12. I’ve worked in a mobile app company before… That shit isn’t random. They appear to be testing some “fuck you pricing” and then if you don’t bite they cut it to the normal rate. Someone at the company is currently running numbers to see if they can get wealthy people to bite on the inflated pricing.
Fuck you Uber. Not like your company has a great history in the first place, so I guess I’m partially to blame.
It’s not Uber, it’s “drivers” using group chats to co-ordinate surges and move from area to area.
Basically, big groups designate a part of town to collectively ignore. This means not enough drivers are there to handle the requests, so the surge kicks in to attract more drivers into the area with bigger fares. When the surge is on, they all come in, grab the inflated fares, drop off, and co-ordinate again for another area.
So when jobs aren’t being backed up, your trip would likely be $9. But if a big group is blocking the area, there’s enough of them in the group chat to influence prices.
Because they all use three or four ride share services, switching won’t help. They won’t risk missing the Uber.surge.when everyone decides it’s time to start pickups.