# True Purpose of Flat Surge?



## Atom guy (Jul 27, 2016)

I know the primary purpose of flat surge seems to be to skim more of the surge from the drivers. But the other day as I sat waiting for a ping with a nice flat surge attached to my account, I wondered, is the real purpose to keep us from driving for the competition? Think about it, if you have a nice +$12 surge guaranteed for your next trip, are you going to dump it to take the next regular fare Lyft ride that comes along? Not likely.

I drive for Uber and Lyft, and what I've started doing when Uber surges is to get the high dollar surge amount, but then instead of waiting for Uber to send me a trip, I keep myself open to Lyft as well. i have been able to complete Lyft trips while waiting for Uber to send me something. And if Uber pings me while I am driving for Lyft, I accept, and make that Uber passenger wait. If they cancel, the surge will roll over to the next trip anyway.


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## Pax Collector (Feb 18, 2018)

That's actually quite a possibility. Same thing with quests and consecutive boosts. They use them to keep the drivers online as long as possible and avoid driving for the competition. 

It's good that you have Lyft as a back up.


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## BiggestScamInHistory (Jan 19, 2016)

Not a chance. When 1 app is surging, the other is too 90% of the time. Drivers choose whoever pays them better. Uber obviously thinks drivers are too stupid to realize it's not them, & they've got way more regular customers they can still do as they please. 

They haven't learned a thing from #DeleteUber. Both of these companies would have been toast with any real competition. But only those getting the big money from all the investors worldwide can play the game.


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## Trafficat (Dec 19, 2016)

I drove on a snow day and riders complained to me they tried to ping drivers and could not find any drivers at all until I "came online" and I didn't get surge or at best a few dollars bonus. . I saw like 10 passengers waiting at the airport, jealously gawking at the one guy I picked up.

Similar storm last week (before flat surge) and every ride was at 2x surge and I saw plenty of other drivers... did not see piles of pax waiting for their Uber in the rideshare pickup spots.

It seems to me that Uber is trying to get rid of surge, possibly for political cow-towing, but the fact is that surge is why anyone can get an Uber. No one wants to drive in 8 inches of snow for base rates and +$1.50 "surge" bonus. When all surge is dead, getting an Uber is going to be about as difficult as getting a taxi. Passengers pay more in snow with surge, but realistically, without surge, drivers make a lot less than normal due to reduced speeds and traffic congestion.

Two days a week apart with virtually identical storms but I made only a little over half as much money after flat surge even as it seemed like there was a lot of ride demand because for all intents and purposes surge was dead.

Even before flat surge I got the impression that surge got capped at 3x. Last weeks driver shortage left a lot of riders waiting excessively long times for a ride (while I only got 2x surge) but it did seem like they were getting picked up eventually.

If there was 4x, 5x, 13x surge like I saw in years past snow storms I highly doubt any pax would wait longer than 10-15 minutes for a ride.


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## New2This (Dec 27, 2015)

Atom guy said:


> I know the primary purpose of flat surge seems to be to skim more of the surge from the drivers. But the other day as I sat waiting for a ping with a nice flat surge attached to my account, I wondered, is the real purpose to keep us from driving for the competition? Think about it, if you have a nice +$12 surge guaranteed for your next trip, are you going to dump it to take the next regular fare Lyft ride that comes along? Not likely.
> 
> I drive for Uber and Lyft, and what I've started doing when Uber surges is to get the high dollar surge amount, but then instead of waiting for Uber to send me a trip, I keep myself open to Lyft as well. i have been able to complete Lyft trips while waiting for Uber to send me something. And if Uber pings me while I am driving for Lyft, I accept, and make that Uber passenger wait. If they cancel, the surge will roll over to the next trip anyway.


Until this week I was doing much more Lyft because they had PT multiplier and Uber was doing Surge Roulette (you'll get a dollar amount that MAY extend and may not). I'd take a 25% PT over a $3 Surge because I could Longhaul the shit out of the trip and make more than the minimum Uber was charging.

Sadly Lyft put their version of Charlotte Surge in place and Lyft is now pretty much dead to me.


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## Polecat69 (Dec 22, 2018)

I just have a question. I have over 2300 rides, with the flat surge in Dallas. This morning I showed no surge at all in the Dallas area. Other drivers in surrounding areas showed surge all over the place. They had only 200 rides. Does anyone have a clue why this happens?


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## Diamondraider (Mar 13, 2017)

Polecat69 said:


> I just have a question. I have over 2300 rides, with the flat surge in Dallas. This morning I showed no surge at all in the Dallas area. Other drivers in surrounding areas showed surge all over the place. They had only 200 rides. Does anyone have a clue why this happens?


Surge is now an incentive for newbies to get hooked driving. Veterans used to anticipate surge. Uber is changing "who gets what and when" based on your active platform status and behaviors that drive Uber initiatives.

This approach fully demonstrates how companies can exploit the 1099 status while avoiding federal labor laws.


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## touberornottouber (Aug 12, 2016)

Polecat69 said:


> I just have a question. I have over 2300 rides, with the flat surge in Dallas. This morning I showed no surge at all in the Dallas area. Other drivers in surrounding areas showed surge all over the place. They had only 200 rides. Does anyone have a clue why this happens?


Because it's a game Uber is playing on drivers. For whatever reason they want those other drivers to go to that area. For you they don't care. They wanted you where you were.

I know it sounds ridiculous but Uber over engineers everything. They have people getting paid $200,000+ to program this crap and those people come up with crap like this to try to justify their pay. It's idiocy. We all know it. But this is Uber we are talking about here.


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## Trafficat (Dec 19, 2016)

Polecat69 said:


> I just have a question. I have over 2300 rides, with the flat surge in Dallas. This morning I showed no surge at all in the Dallas area. Other drivers in surrounding areas showed surge all over the place. They had only 200 rides. Does anyone have a clue why this happens?


On busy nights when surge disappears, try doing a few Lyft rides in a row. Maybe it is all in my head, but it seems to work for me to cause surge to reappear on Uber.


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## mrpjfresh (Aug 16, 2016)

Polecat69 said:


> I just have a question. I have over 2300 rides, with the flat surge in Dallas. This morning I showed no surge at all in the Dallas area. Other drivers in surrounding areas showed surge all over the place. They had only 200 rides. Does anyone have a clue why this happens?


You, my friend, have just "won" this thread and found the true answer to the original question, in my opinion anyway. I was aware that Uber was basically pooling all this passenger paid surge money into essentially a "slush fund" of sorts and redistributing it to other drivers and obviously keeping a little extra for themselves to bump up their numbers. I was totally unaware they would be using this money to basically replace certain boosts and incentives for specific, typically newer, drivers.

Not exactly surprising considering many surges have always been manipulative but for sure taken to a new level. Good on you for stumbling on this and letting us know!


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## The Gift of Fish (Mar 17, 2017)

Trafficat said:


> cow-towing


_Never _tow a cow. It would be indescribably messy.


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## Nats121 (Jul 19, 2017)

Trafficat said:


> I drove on a snow day and riders complained to me they tried to ping drivers and could not find any drivers at all until I "came online" and I didn't get surge or at best a few dollars bonus. . I saw like 10 passengers waiting at the airport, jealously gawking at the one guy I picked up.
> 
> Similar storm last week (before flat surge) and every ride was at 2x surge and I saw plenty of other drivers... did not see piles of pax waiting for their Uber in the rideshare pickup spots.
> 
> ...


Uber's been lying to the public about surge for quite a while.

Uber's website STILL tells the pax that surge is used as an incentive to get more drivers on the road, which is a LIE.

For a while now (even before flat rate surge was created), uber has been phasing out surge pay for the drivers, but are charging pax surge prices.

The media and consumer advocates should be made aware that uber is guilty of false advertising.


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## mrpjfresh (Aug 16, 2016)

mrpjfresh said:


> You, my friend, have just "won" this thread and found the true answer to the original question, in my opinion anyway. I was aware that Uber was basically pooling all this passenger paid surge money into essentially a "slush fund" of sorts and redistributing it to other drivers and obviously keeping a little extra for themselves to bump up their numbers. I was totally unaware they would be using this money to basically replace certain boosts and incentives for specific, typically newer, drivers.
> 
> Not exactly surprising considering many surges have always been manipulative but for sure taken to a new level. Good on you for stumbling on this and letting us know!


Whoops... jumping to conclusions. New surge doesn't show if you are offline, does it? Apologies. Still in the first week of it.


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## Harepy (Jan 31, 2019)

Nats121 said:


> Uber's been lying to the public about surge for quite a while.
> 
> Uber's website STILL tells the pax that surge is used as an incentive to get more drivers on the road, which is a LIE.
> 
> ...


I'm literally telling every pax this now. Some of them seem legitimately pissed that Uber is charging them for the surge and giving little of it to the driver. I've had more than 10 rides the last 3 weeks where Uber is taking nearly 50% of the fare. Add to this that I've found fewer tips during a big surge as the pax figures you're already making surge rates. Except we're not anymore....


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## Nats121 (Jul 19, 2017)

Harepy said:


> I'm literally telling every pax this now. Some of them seem legitimately pissed that Uber is charging them for the surge and giving little of it to the driver. I've had more than 10 rides the last 3 weeks where Uber is taking nearly 50% of the fare. Add to this that I've found fewer tips during a big surge as the pax figures you're already making surge rates. Except we're not anymore....


If you look at the pax app during supposedly busy periods, uber alerts the pax that prices are higher due to "high demand" or "very high demand".

Meanwhile, during most of those "high demand" periods, drivers are being paid base rates or puny flat rate surges.

So much for uber's bullshit claim of charging higher rates during busy periods to ensure there will be enough drivers available.

The media should report on uber's false advertising.


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## dauction (Sep 26, 2017)

Atom guy said:


> I know the primary purpose of flat surge seems to be to skim more of the surge from the drivers. But the other day as I sat waiting for a ping with a nice flat surge attached to my account, I wondered, is the real purpose to keep us from driving for the competition? Think about it, if you have a nice +$12 surge guaranteed for your next trip, are you going to dump it to take the next regular fare Lyft ride that comes along? Not likely.
> 
> I drive for Uber and Lyft, and what I've started doing when Uber surges is to get the high dollar surge amount, but then instead of waiting for Uber to send me a trip, I keep myself open to Lyft as well. i have been able to complete Lyft trips while waiting for Uber to send me something. And if Uber pings me while I am driving for Lyft, I accept, and make that Uber passenger wait. If they cancel, the surge will roll over to the next trip anyway.


 I noticed that last few days....Yesterday was the first day I didn't take even 1 ride from Lyft because of Ubers flat surge... If that was the intent (to keep me from switching back and forth) then it worked .... I have to say I liked it ..Pay was fair ..


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## HazardousDescent (Jul 25, 2016)

I got a minimum surge (just $2.50) and it says I'm online, but no requests coming in. Checking the rider app, no ant, hmm


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## Jo3030 (Jan 2, 2016)

Trafficat said:


> I drove on a snow day and riders complained to me they tried to ping drivers and could not find any drivers at all until I "came online" and I didn't get surge or at best a few dollars bonus. . I saw like 10 passengers waiting at the airport, jealously gawking at the one guy I picked up.
> 
> Similar storm last week (before flat surge) and every ride was at 2x surge and I saw plenty of other drivers... did not see piles of pax waiting for their Uber in the rideshare pickup spots.
> 
> ...


This seems to be what I'm coming up with as well.
They are simply not going to allow surges or prime time to take place.
As the drivers realize that the whole game is rigged, they quit and go home.
I turned down basically 200 pings in DC today and not a lick of prime time on Lyft.
What do you think that does to someone's psyche or motivation?


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## IUberGR (Jan 2, 2016)

The Gift of Fish said:


> _Never _tow a cow. It would be indescribably messy.


If you're going to tow a cow, you have to put roller skates on it. All good.


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## jgiun1 (Oct 16, 2017)

Diamondraider said:


> Surge is now an incentive for newbies to get hooked driving. Veterans used to anticipate surge. Uber is changing "who gets what and when" based on your active platform status and behaviors that drive Uber initiatives.
> 
> This approach fully demonstrates how companies can exploit the 1099 status while avoiding federal labor laws.


I agree..nice post sir


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## Atlwarrior (Nov 2, 2014)

Diamondraider said:


> Surge is now an incentive for newbies to get hooked driving. Veterans used to anticipate surge. Uber is changing "who gets what and when" based on your active platform status and behaviors that drive Uber initiatives.
> 
> This approach fully demonstrates how companies can exploit the 1099 status while avoiding federal labor laws.


Veterans drivers don't call this a surge.


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## Bbonez (Aug 10, 2018)

Atom guy said:


> Think about it, if you have a nice +$12 surge guaranteed for your next trip, are you going to dump it to take the next regular fare Lyft ride that comes along? Not likely.


I agree 100% this is one of their reasons for doing this. Last night I had a $4 surge and turned Lyft off after a few minutes without a ping I turned Lyft back on and immediately got a Lyft ping. I took the ride and drunk got in my car and asked if I could stop at jack in the box on the way, I told the pax to make it quick or I'd leave. I was willing to wait as long as my uber surge ride didn't come. After about 5 minutes I got an uber ping and drove away.

Also if you have a large uber surge guarantee and a ping comes in while you have a Lyft Pax in the car just accept it, if the pax cancels you still get the guarantee on the next ping.


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