[WI_Hedgehog]

Upfront pricing came to help us realize that we don’t make any money. How can you make money if you do a trip of 84 minutes 31 mile and only getting paid $38.28. This is insane. Pricing should be based on traffic also. Come on Uber!

This really exposes that for the most part, driver time is worth nothing to them, drivers are worth nothing. Drivers are like Chinese ants: completely replaceable.

Uber/Lyft/Google/other are waiting for self-driving cars they can "make a killing off of." Wait until they have to do maintenance on vehicles they own...

"Rideshare is a hobby where most of your expenses are reimbursed." --Lyft driver
I firmly believe ^^this^^ applies to most (not all) drivers who are not using every hack/advantage/tip they can.

 

[WI_Hedgehog]

....Furthermore, part of upfront fares is how busy it is at drop off location. It ends in Anaheim, the biggest city in OC around 9am, a very busy time of the day. There are a plethora of trips to Disneyland, John Wayne Airport, Long Beach airport, LAX and downtown LA. Potentially with surge. So a good paying fare out of Anaheim is almost guaranteed....

That is a good point, if you're not dead-heading back or only given ant-it offers, and if the time estimate is accurate given heading into rush-hours traffic (and not getting 1-starred for not hitting the time estimate).

Your expenses estimate might be low, CA gas is $6+/gallon, and X is burning maybe 2 gallons, so that plus maint. costs and vehicle depreciation is...would you say $38.28 -$12 -($0.30 x 32 miles) = $17 / 90 minutes = $11.25 to $13 hour, roughly? In CA that's not a lot of $$$, IMHO. Maybe I'm wrong?

 

[WI_Hedgehog]

Getting a little desperate here aren’t we? One stars for not hitting a time estimate? That’s comical. I already mentioned 9am in Anaheim would be impossible to not get a ride to LA. Almost a ZERO percent chance of needing to deadhead.

You are very wrong. For starters, 32 miles is NOT two gallons unless the traffic was idling about 3 hours. Its one gallon for most and 2/3 of a gallon for Prius’s. So your gas estimate is exaggerated by at least $6.

THEN you double dipped by using the .30 figure WHICH ALREADY INCLUDES FUEL. So you now have added another $3ish that isn’t real.

Lastly you are committing the mistake of analyzing it and an individual ride rather than factoring any possibility that there may be a short high surges trip at the end of the rainbow in Anaheim.

So humbly speaking, you were wrong on just about every point……..

I can accept I'm wrong about it, no biggie, that's why I was asking.

I'm not driving a Prius so don't have the fuel economy you do, and my maintenance costs and depreciation ($0.30/mile) are in addition to fuel costs. In that respect a Prius is pretty affordable.

Maybe the time estimate is accurate too, and maybe getting 1-starred is unrealistic, I've just come to expect 75 minutes to morph into 90 minutes because of changing traffic volume at those hours, but I'm not in CA. Maybe you haven't heard, "the app said 74 minutes, why didn't you drive faster?"

You are right on the deadhead--I would just expect to get screwed on that, but maybe not in CA, maybe Uber & Lift blow unicorn dust up your app on a regular basis. (I'm joking, thank your for clearing things up)

 

[WI_Hedgehog]

I think driverless cars will not be cheaper than actual drivers, by reason in China they use workers instead of automation because it's cheaper. Rideshare is following the same path, drivers are paid less and less as prices of goods continues to quickly increase. If drivers basically cost nothing, why replace them with technology that costs something? If technology a company owns is in an accident the company that owns it is at fault (at least partially), if a driver is in an accident the tech company blames the driver, deplatforms them, and lets them deal with the ramifications (depending).

 

[WI_Hedgehog]

This thread makes me want to become a butter farmer.