# TNC vs Taxi driving experiment: quick initial summary



## hanging in there (Oct 1, 2014)

For those of you who don't know, I've been a taxi driver for about 8 years now in OC. I own my own taxi vehicle so the comparisons to TNC driving have many less variables in my case. For that reason, and the fact that I have no agenda whatsoever, I thought it would be interesting for me to post my experiences comparing the 2 options.

I took some vacation time and applied with the TNC's. Two weekends ago I worked Lyft Friday evening through early Monday morning (my usual work pattern with taxi driving... ie, more of a night driver.)

Gross billable ride totals including some tips and no-shows came to just about $20/hr after Lyft's commission. Since I had hit Lyft's first tier for their "Power Driver Bonus" for that week I only had to pay a 10% vs 20% commission. If I would have put in another 17 hours to bring it to 50 hours I could have would up with around $22/hour gross because I would have paid no commission at all.

The whole discussion of what we actually are "making" is a whole different issue as most of us know, but it's not really an issue in my case because once you take out the TNC commission or by contrast, the taxi weekly "lease" amount, then I can safely compare gross amounts without getting bogged down in the question of how much I'm really making after taking into account my gas, depreciation/wear and tear, and maintenance costs. Those costs are going to be about the same with either TNC driving or with owner/operator taxi driving. 

Having said that, I have to backtrack. The difference would be how far you have to go to "chase a call", and how many miles you are putting in for the given dollar amount of the ride. If, for example, I am putting on 2 times as many miles on my car for the same gross ride amount (fare amount minus commission or lease), then it becomes a pretty big issue for my bottom line. Logically it would make sense that if the rides are billing out at 1/3 to 1/2 of what I would be billing in my taxi, then to arrive at the same gross my car expenses would be double of what they would be with taxi driving. 

However, what I have found so far is that with Uber, at least, and to a smaller extent with Lyft, there is a higher efficiency in logged miles because once I dropped someone off somewhere it was pretty likely I could get another call in the area without having to wait too long, as opposed to having to "dead-head" it back. With the taxi, if I drop someone off in the LA area, I can not legally pick up there and even if I wanted to break the law I would be limited to street hails, since there would be no dispatched calls available to me in that area.

So, to keep things simple for now, let's just assume that miles driven per gross dollar is a wash. I'm not coming to that as final conclusion but for now, I'm not going to make an issue of it.

So what was my "first weekend bottom line"?

It was less than I am used to making, especially for the weekend, but it wasn't as bad as I thought it could have been especially since I made many first-time mistakes in my learning curve.

With taxi driving, "before Uber" I averaged about $33/hr in gross fares and about $28/hr gross after lease. After Uber and Lyft came on strong those numbers shrank to about $28/hr and $24/hr gross after lease. I have noticed that in the past year it seems to have reached more of an equilibrium with the TNC's, it does not seem to be continuing to erode. My initial reaction was that of wanting to jump off of a sinking ship but it's now more like, "well it took on a little water but we somehow managed to stop the leak so as long as we are happy wading in a few inches of water, we will be ok for awhile". I have my theories as to why that is the cse but I'll save them for later.

So if I can still make an average of $2 more per hour gross with taxi driving vs Lyft, would I? Well, maybe not, it was certainly easier and less stressful driving Lyft and it was nice knowing I didn't have the fixed weekly lease cost looming over my head at all times. However, keep in mind that I haven't tried the non-weekend times, and I am comparing my average for all days full time taxi driving to weekend only numbers for Lyft. 

So on to my second weekend of TNC driving, last weekend, from Friday night about 8pm to early Monday morning about 4am.

The first day I put in my 14 hours of Lyft driving before they cut me off for their manditory "rest break". I did about the same gross amount per hour as the last week, however, I had to pay the 20% commission because I did not hit any bonuses due to next trying Uber for the rest of the weekend. (I got approved for Uber on Saturday.)

My gross fare amounts per hour before commission is taken out came to a little over $30/hour with Uber, and after the commission and the $1 safe ride fees for 73 trips it comes to about the same $22/hour gross.

The big difference between Uber and Lyft, in my experience so far, has been how spread out the call offers are with Lyft vs Uber. During the slower times I had both apps on and not only was it the Uber phone that was almost always the first one to give me a ping, but also the ETA's were in general CONSIDERABLY shorter. When I did chase the longer ETA Lyft calls I was cancelled or no-showed on much more frequently than with the Uber calls, which, in the case of the longer chase, was much more frustrating. I got to the point, even in this short experiment, to thinking that basically it was a waste of time concentrating on Lyft calls even to try and get the 0% commission, and it was better to just use it as a filler. However, I was surprised that during the first weekend of doing Lyft exclusively, I was able to still stay relatively busy at all times. So I'm not saying it is not a viable option, only that for me, Uber was the better option.

Now, back to the original question, was it better for me than taxi driving, bottom line? First, money wise, I feel that the $2/hr higher average gross with taxi vs Uber or Lyft can probably be closed in upon once I become better at TNC driving since there was, believe me, plenty of room for improvement in my strategies. Most of my Uber calls were either at no surge or in just a handful of cases, only about a 1.5 surge, regardless of the fact that I was more often than not smack in the middle of a supposedly high surge area. Most of my calls were "X" calls even though I am driving an "XL" minivan. And I was having some mechanical issues with my van Friday night which put me out of business for about an hour and a half right at one of the busiest times. There were some calls I should have cancelled instead of wasting time on. There were lots of mistakes. Comparing to taxi is almost unfair in that regard because with taxi I feel I am pretty much on top of my game. I'm definitely not trying to brag, that's not my point. I'm just trying to compare apples-to-apples as best I can.

The best guess I have at this point is that once I become better at the TNC game I could raise the $22/hr (gross after commission, but before expenses) to about perhaps $25/hr and barely beat my taxi bottom line, all else being equal.

But we all know that all else is not, and never will be equal in the world of Uber. Policy changes, pricing changes, worrying about ratings, a higher influx of drivers, who knows. Taxi driving is a more stable option for me, a "safer" option. I've never been the one to choose the "safe" option, so my mind is still open. If it came down to a wash with bottom line/stability/ease of job/stress I think I would choose Uber only because it's nice to not feel committed to put in a more than full time work week to justify the fixed weekly taxi lease, which in my case is $460/wk. And when I go on vacation with my taxi I have to pay $100/wk just to keep the commercial insurance active, so this 8 week "vacation" has already cost me $800 even before I hit the door on my way out.

Tomorrow I'm going on an actual vacation to Kauai for 2 weeks with my daughter, but when I come back I will still have 2 more weeks in which to try more TNC driving before going back, perhaps reluctantly, to my taxi driving.

There is no question that I will not answer, if any of you are curious as to the TNC vs taxi driving experience. Ask away, or comment. Thanks.


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## Huberis (Mar 15, 2015)

With respect to metered versus un-metered miles, you own your own taxi....... Is all the taxi work you run calls you personally generated or are you connected to someone's central dispatching system? 

I drive taxi in a small town with a big university. We have a reasonable number of cars and a reasonable system for getting them from A to B. If there is a call in the hinterland, or a poor call in the hinterland, they will make a real effort to pay your way to that call. If the call is a good one, they may send a driver straight to the call. Sometimes, it's a good call, but it's going in the wrong direction, increasing number of unpaid miles....... So be it.

From my perspective, and I've been doing this for over 15 years: If the rate/mile is reasonable, you can relax a bit on the ratio a bit. If you have a smart dispatcher who is paying attention, you should be ok over the long run. A good dispatcher knows who has had the bad run of luck and has been run all over the county........

That is where the scale of the taxi company comes into play and having real people making enough decisions helps. Uber's model I would expect to be more inefficient in the long run with respect to miles driven. That might vary depending on how a particular place is laid out.

I know Uber is experimenting with stacking calls out west. Drivers seem very wary. It does seem to be something they will try to use to their advantage to keep drivers logged online more. It will make it tougher to also drive Lyft too...... 

Whatever the ratio of paid to unpaid, there has got to be many times drivers are dropping on pax who have empty cars en route following them in for the person waiting at their destination. That should never happen.


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## hanging in there (Oct 1, 2014)

Huberis said:


> With respect to metered versus un-metered miles, you own your own taxi....... Is all the taxi work you run calls you personally generated or are you connected to someone's central dispatching system?
> 
> I drive taxi in a small town with a big university. We have a reasonable number of cars and a reasonable system for getting them from A to B. If there is a call in the hinterland, or a poor call in the hinterland, they will make a real effort to pay your way to that call. If the call is a good one, they may send a driver straight to the call. Sometimes, it's a good call, but it's going in the wrong direction, increasing number of unpaid miles....... So be it.
> 
> ...


I didn't understand your last sentence:
"Whatever the ratio of paid to unpaid, there has got to be many times drivers are dropping on pax who have empty cars en route following them in for the person waiting at their destination. That should never happen."

The taxi company I work for allows you, in some cases once you prove yourself etc, to own your own vehicle, with a correspondingly lower "lease" rate. Otherwise the lease would be $710/wk in my case (considering the permits I have). The calls come through dispatch, through another special dispatch we have an exclusive contract with the county for (providing rides to disabled people), through flags or through waiting in line at the exclusive property contracts we have.


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## Huberis (Mar 15, 2015)

I'm kind of tired..... not much sleep. Say you are en route with pax to a Sprawlmart. If you are driving for Uber, you are off the radar screen. A request could come in for a pcik up at that point while you personally are en route to that very spot. Under Uber's current system, you will not get that call. The nearest idle car will be sent there to get that pax. Sometimes, that idle car may get there first, from an efficiency standpoint, it may make sense. But often, the car en route with pax should be slotted to pick up those people waiting at the drop spot....... to dispatch otherwise is to cross cars

To cross cars means you send cars which are dropping on opposite sides of town, each of them across town (passing each other) to get to their calls. That would be an extreme example. that should be minimized. Ubers current protocol, from my understanding is going to run drivers around more than needed. 

Gotchya..... I understand your setup, you even do paratransit for the county.


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## hanging in there (Oct 1, 2014)

Huberis said:


> I'm kind of tired..... not much sleep. Say you are en route with pax to a Sprawlmart. If you are driving for Uber, you are off the radar screen. A request could come in for a pcik up at that point while you personally are en route to that very spot. Under Uber's current system, you will not get that call. The nearest idle car will be sent there to get that pax. Sometimes, that idle car may get there first, from an efficiency standpoint, it may make sense. But often, the car en route with pax should be slotted to pick up those people waiting at the drop spot....... to dispatch otherwise is to cross cars
> 
> To cross cars means you send cars which are dropping on opposite sides of town, each of them across town (passing each other) to get to their calls. That would be an extreme example. that should be minimized. Ubers current protocol, from my understanding is going to run drivers around more than needed.
> 
> Gotchya..... I understand your setup, you even do paratransit for the county.


There is a recent thread here that was talking about Uber's recently added feature that apparently is doing just that. I haven't seen it yet in my short driving experiment but they will give you a call close to where you are dropping off, so you can "stack" calls.

Good taxi drivers have always known tricks to work their way around the dispatching system and stack calls. Say for example you know that you are going to be getting lots of calls from regulars in a certain bar area at a certain time, and there are very few cabs around. Instead of just letting calls sit there on the computer and get old, a taxi driver will accept a call, "short meter" it, to clear it off their computer, then accept another call, then short meter it, then accept another call, then call all 3 pax, for example, and give them all ETA's based on the route you work up considering where the other rides are going. Often times you can set up your own pool and just come up with flat rates per head. Most pax will be happy as long as they know you are on the way, as opposed to the frustration of their request going un-accepted. In the meantime the driver makes 3 times the money in that area before moving on.


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## Huberis (Mar 15, 2015)

hanging in there said:


> There is a recent thread here that was talking about Uber's recently added feature that apparently is doing just that. I haven't seen it yet in my short driving experiment but they will give you a call close to where you are dropping off, so you can "stack" calls.
> 
> Good taxi drivers have always known tricks to work their way around the dispatching system and stack calls. Say for example you know that you are going to be getting lots of calls from regulars in a certain bar area at a certain time, and there are very few cabs around. Instead of just letting calls sit there on the computer and get old, a taxi driver will accept a call, "short meter" it, to clear it off their computer, then accept another call, then short meter it, then accept another call, then call all 3 pax, for example, and give them all ETA's based on the route you work up considering where the other rides are going. Often times you can set up your own pool and just come up with flat rates per head. Most pax will be happy as long as they know you are on the way, as opposed to the frustration of their request going un-accepted. In the meantime the driver makes 3 times the money in that area before moving on.


I have read the thread already. Drivers seem suspicious of Uber's motives. It seems, as I mentioned earlier, partly an attempt to keep drivers on app longer.

As for the short meter trick, calling pax and self dispatching/routing your lineups...... I'm in a small/medium sized college town, that isn't something I need to do or worry about thankfully. We are never that far from any given call when the town is busy. Our dispatchers create lineups for us, it is al pretty transparent and everyone has a reasonable idea of what is going on.

Under that system, we are able to reshuffle and divert a car away from one call to another, if another car becomes available sooner than expected.

What Uber currently does well is remove doubt and mystery. The car being hired is idle, with the exception of a couple cities in California. If a market is properly flooded with cars, wait time will be short and accurate..... Uber isn't paying for the cars after all.

In the state of PA, we aren't allowed to set a flat fare. The meter needs to be run. Personally, I see no reason not to run the meter, it invites trouble.


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## RockinEZ (Apr 29, 2015)

hanging in there said:


> For those of you who don't know, I've been a taxi driver for about 8 years now in OC. I own my own taxi vehicle so the comparisons to TNC driving have many less variables in my case. For that reason, and the fact that I have no agenda whatsoever, I thought it would be interesting for me to post my experiences comparing the 2 options.
> 
> I took some vacation time and applied with the TNC's. Two weekends ago I worked Lyft Friday evening through early Monday morning (my usual work pattern with taxi driving... ie, more of a night driver.)
> 
> ...


OUTSTANDING POST!
Thank you for being the first taxi driver to do an honest comparison to TCN vs. Taxi.


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## Eat.Sleep.Drive (Jul 16, 2015)

Great post! I ve a few questions. What kind of insurance are you using for the TnC work? Unless it's TCP level insurance, you are always going to be swinging it, risk wise, and not an equal comparison. 
I didn't know you could own your taxi car without the seal and get discounts on the lease; can't you own your taxi flat out? I was gonna point out your weekly dues for an owner were kinda high compared to the cab owners in LA, which is the low $300s.
How is the rating system always hovering over your head affect your performance so far? Are you finding yourself, in any noticeable way, appeasing pax that you wouldn't otherwise done a cab? Like when choosing a route, and such? I think I ve more, but for now, that's all I got.


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## hanging in there (Oct 1, 2014)

Eat.Sleep.Drive said:


> Great post! I ve a few questions. What kind of insurance are you using for the TnC work? Unless it's TCP level insurance, you are always going to be swinging it, risk wise, and not an equal comparison.
> I didn't know you could own your taxi car without the seal and get discounts on the lease; can't you own your taxi flat out? I was gonna point out your weekly dues for an owner were kinda high compared to the cab owners in LA, which is the low $300s.
> How is the rating system always hovering over your head affect your performance so far? Are you finding yourself, in any noticeable way, appeasing pax that you wouldn't otherwise done a cab? Like when choosing a route, and such? I think I ve more, but for now, that's all I got.


The reason I felt this was the time to try TNC driving was the due to the timing of AB2293 kicking in and the fact that Metromile now has a TNC, specifically an Uber, insurance product for CA. I signed up for Metromile.

Metromile would prove to be an expensive option if I only did Lyft and not Uber, since Metromile only deducts the Uber miles from the per-mile charges, not the Lyft miles. But at least I know with Metromile I don't have to worry about a livery exclusion in the case of TNC driving.

The combined coverages between Metromile's coverages and the TNC coverages at this point puts me on similar footing compared to commercial insurance with my taxi, IMO. The weakest point of that exposure is the scenario where I would get into an at-fault accident with Lyft driving, in which case the Lyft deductible is $2500 as opposed to the Uber deductible of $1000 or the Metromile policy deductible that I chose of $1000 for personal driving. Since I believe that Uber driving would be the majority of my TNC calls, then the above 2 insurance caviats are not that significant.

As far as taxi "lease" amounts, in Orange County there are about 40 taxi companies, some quite small, there are even a few of taxi companies that have only 1 or 2 cabs in their "fleet". Several have less than a dozen cabs. Then there are medium sized ones and the "big 3", which all have 200 or more cabs. The company that I currently drive for has almost 500 cabs, it is the biggest one in OC. The owner-operator lease rates vary in OC from $200/wk to $460, in my case. The reason I chose to pay top dollar for my lease with the biggest company was that I get more calls and the company has more accounts and permits available. It's just a matter of maximizing my business potential. The $200/wk leases require you to basically generate 100% of your own business via building up your own client base and cruising or waiting for flags without the benefit of any established company accounts or exclusives.

Another benefit of this particular company lease structure is that they absorb, do not pass on, the credit card fees. Most taxi companies will charge the driver 5% or even 10% for every credit card transaction. I used to drive for the second largest taxi company in OC and paid $375/wk lease, but then when I added in the 5% credit card fees, it was almost the same as the higher priced lease I have now but with less calls and less business. Plus part of that $460 includes optional permits that I choose to have in order to increase business.

The current taxi lease I have makes it easier to compare to TNC driving since the credit card fees are covered in both cases, respectively by the taxi lease and by the TNC commission rates.

I have heard that some of the LA taxi companies have lowered the weekly lease rates by $100/wk in order to try and compete for drivers vs TNC's, but even if I could get an owner-operator lease in LA with a top company in the $300's range they probably still charge credit card fees. I haven't seriously looked into being an LA cab driver but I guess having LAX one day a week gives it an advantage. Not so much compared to TNC's now if they are now going to open it up to TNC's 7 days a week.


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## hanging in there (Oct 1, 2014)

hanging in there said:


> The reason I felt this was the time to try TNC driving was the due to the timing of AB2293 kicking in and the fact that Metromile now has a TNC, specifically an Uber, insurance product for CA. I signed up for Metromile.
> 
> Metromile would prove to be an expensive option if I only did Lyft and not Uber, since Metromile only deducts the Uber miles from the per-mile charges, not the Lyft miles. But at least I know with Metromile I don't have to worry about a livery exclusion in the case of TNC driving.
> 
> ...


Forgot to answer your question about ratings, yes, it does honestly affect me, but I suppose more in a good way. So far I have a 4.88 with Lyft and a 4.85 with Uber so it's not a big concern, but the "job stability factor" compared with taxi driving is definitely an issue. I have always felt that I was one of the "good guys" in the taxi world, maintaining a friendly professional image, keeping a nice well-maintained vehicle and being honest with pax, but yes. With TNC driving I wash and tidy up my car just a little more often, I open doors more often, I make it more of a point to get feedback on routes, choice of music, etc..


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## Eat.Sleep.Drive (Jul 16, 2015)

hanging in there said:


> since Metromile only deducts the Uber miles from the per-mile charges, not the Lyft miles


Could you go in-depth how Metromile works, please? Did you switch from another insurance? If so, what's the difference in cost? 
Also, if you compare Metromile cost vs commercial insurance, it would be nice. I think uber lets you keep the $1 SRF if you ve commercial insurance. If you do this full time, would you entertain getting one eventually?

Back to your taxi, how come you can't lease your taxi to other drivers and have your dues paid as well as, maybe, make small profit?? That's what an owner would do where I'm at. I assume they would make an average of $200 profit with a low lease rate compared to your coming out of pocket a $100 while on a vacation. Isn't that an option in your case? Thank you for your answers!


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## berserk42 (Apr 24, 2015)

Thanks for the insight, appreciate reading your experience. Enjoy Hawaii!


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## MiddleClassedOut (Jun 11, 2015)

That's really interesting you found Lyft to be essentially equal to Uber in terms of profit. I think that has a lot to do with your area though - LA is spread out and rides are often longer than here in Philadelphia.

What invariably happens in Philly is you may start in the suburbs and will end up downtown and work there, unless you want to deadhead back to the suburbs. Now with Lyft, as long as I can get pings, my hourly is $4-5 higher on Lyft once I get downtown. Driving Uber in downtown Philly, assuming an average of 3 rides an hour crosstown (1 mile), you can only really do $9.80, which is basically minimum wage after gas. Tips help a ton here. The guarantees also increase my profit since I'm quite happy to sit around and wait for a ping and not burn fuel for a $20/hr guarantee ($25 on Saturdays - those are before their commission though). It's been pretty easy for me to hit the 10% bonus too.

By my calculations it's not worth it to drive back to the burbs - rides from the near burbs will net $12-14. If you deadhead back 15-20 minutes you'll likely only get another $12-14 ride and factor in another 5-10 minutes to get to the pickup and that's only about $15/hr before gas. Doing Lyft downtown and letting the trade winds take me out is netting better.

This combined with only doing Uber if I get stuck in the boondocks and during weekend surges means I'm pulling in around $500-550 a week with about 25 hours of work. Since I live in the burbs I just leave Lyft on to hit the bonus, as my chances of a ping are very small and often 2 hours will pass without a ping, and I may even ignore pings if my acceptance rate for the week can take a few hits. So close to your $22/hr but not quite.


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## Fuzzyelvis (Dec 7, 2014)

hanging in there said:


> With the taxi, if I drop someone off in the LA area, I can not legally pick up there.
> 
> However, keep in mind that I haven't tried the non-weekend times, and I am comparing my average for all days full time taxi driving to weekend only numbers for Lyft.


I think taking these specific issues into account you truly are comparing apples to oranges. Not being able to pick up with the taxi favors uber/lyft and only working weekends also MAY favor them. That sort of confirms the "not viable as a full time job" issue for uber/lyft.

Can't you do an only weekend vs only weekdays experiment working the exact same hours and trying to be smarter with TNC?

I think it's very interesting what you did but as a lab rat it seems like a very uncontrolled experiment. Can you try breaking down different time spans from the data you already have perhaps?


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## hanging in there (Oct 1, 2014)

Eat.Sleep.Drive said:


> Could you go in-depth how Metromile works, please? Did you switch from another insurance? If so, what's the difference in cost?
> Also, if you compare Metromile cost vs commercial insurance, it would be nice. I think uber lets you keep the $1 SRF if you ve commercial insurance. If you do this full time, would you entertain getting one eventually?
> 
> Back to your taxi, how come you can't lease your taxi to other drivers and have your dues paid as well as, maybe, make small profit?? That's what an owner would do where I'm at. I assume they would make an average of $200 profit with a low lease rate compared to your coming out of pocket a $100 while on a vacation. Isn't that an option in your case? Thank you for your answers!


I switched my insurance on my personal minivan from a personal insurance policy to Metromile so that I could register the policy as an Uber policy once I was approved by Uber. Switching the policy from personal to Uber does not change the rate or anything, it just allows you to drive Uber in period 2 and period 3 without having to pay per mile. Still, if you consider worst case cost scenarios, where there are lots of dead-head miles and lots of Lyft rides (which are still charged per mile in all periods), then Metromile will charge a maximum of 150 miles per day. Based on the rate I am paying it would work out to roughly $2400/year worst case if I were to work full time TNC 6 days/wk. That is still about half or less of what a traditional 24/7 commercial policy would cost me. Your point is very valid about perhaps considering commercial insurance if I can save the safe ride fees, that might pencil out. In order to do that I would also have to pay $1000 for a TCP permit, with a $100 renewal every 3 years, and pay more yearly for commercial registration.

In comparison to my regular insurance policy, yes, either option is much more but that is simply not an option for me, I'm not going to take the risk of doing livery with a policy that excludes it. There is less risk now with AB2293 but there is still a risk and there are coverage gaps. Specifically, in Period 1, a non-livery personal policy can deny coverage for collision and comp, and all Uber or Lyft is going to cover is the liability in that period. And the way insurance companies like to look for any excuse to not cover claims, even if they are not TCN related, I don't want them to give them that excuse and have to fight them.

Your are right, i could have possibly subleased my taxi when I was away but for me, that is just a personal decision. I simply do not want anyone else ever driving my "baby" for whatever reason, a few hundred bucks notwithstanding. I bought it brand new and I am very careful to have it serviced properly by people I trust and don't want any surprises down the road due to what happens with the car when I am not in it and in control of it.


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## hanging in there (Oct 1, 2014)

Fuzzyelvis said:


> I think taking these specific issues into account you truly are comparing apples to oranges. Not being able to pick up with the taxi favors uber/lyft and only working weekends also MAY favor them. That sort of confirms the "not viable as a full time job" issue for uber/lyft.
> 
> Can't you do an only weekend vs only weekdays experiment working the exact same hours and trying to be smarter with TNC?
> 
> I think it's very interesting what you did but as a lab rat it seems like a very uncontrolled experiment. Can you try breaking down different time spans from the data you already have perhaps?


You are absolutely right. I am definitely going to try weekdays with TNC when I come back from vacation. I just haven't had a chance to do that yet due to unforeseen circumstances.

If it turns out that full time, including weekdays, is not viable, then TNC is simply not viable for me because I need something full time. Mixing taxi and TNC doesn't work because I'd still have to pay the full weekly fixed taxi lease amount whether I work 1 day per week as a taxi driver or 7.

As far as breaking down the data I already have, TNC, especially Uber, has been pretty consistent so far across the days and hours that I have worked so far. It has been much more steady and consistent than taxi work. Taxi driving can often be feast or famine for long stretches of time. I can only give an average taxi gross amount because I've been at it so long, I know that eventually all the peaks and valleys tend to average out.

So, yes,it will be very very interesting to see if I can still be consistently busy with Uber at, say, 3:00 or 3:30 am on a Tue or Wed morning.


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## hanging in there (Oct 1, 2014)

hanging in there said:


> You are absolutely right. I am definitely going to try weekdays with TNC when I come back from vacation. I just haven't had a chance to do that yet due to unforeseen circumstances.
> 
> If it turns out that full time, including weekdays, is not viable, then TNC is simply not viable for me because I need something full time. Mixing taxi and TNC doesn't work because I'd still have to pay the full weekly fixed taxi lease amount whether I work 1 day per week as a taxi driver or 7.
> 
> ...


Well, weekend #3 results were interesting, I spent most of the time exploring LA County. I'm a double-newbie there since I'm mostly familiar with OC.

Out of the total 82 completed rides (77 Uber, 5 Lyft, Friday night through early Monday morning):

I did 15 pool rides. Only two attempted matches, one cancelled the other one fell through due to a "404 network error". So no matches, the riders got a better price yet still got a private ride. I was paid the same as a regular X ride including any applicable surges, in contradiction to what I've read in other threads here. So I've learned not to fear the almighty pool request. I might sing a different tune if I start getting matched and that becomes a hassle.

I did only 8 XL trips, about 10%. Burned $225 in gas traveling a total of 960 miles in my gas-guzzling minivan. Big question is, would I have been better off with a Prius? I would have spent maybe $75 in gas, saving $150 last weekend in gas, ASSUMING that with a Prius or similar fuel-efficient "X" car I would have still grossed the same. The XL trips grossed an extra $177. For similar distance trips, the "X" rate for those fares would have been $102, assuming I would have gotten similar trips as opposed to sitting waiting for trips along with the larger herd of "X" drivers competing for the same "X" fares. After Uber takes dthe larger 28% commission from my XL fares that left me with $128 as opposed to the 20% taken out of the "X" fares leaving $82. So on paper I netted an extra $46 gross profit by burning an extra $150 in gas, resulting in a gross loss of $104. That's one way to look at it. The other way is that maybe that extra $128 after Uber's cut was money I would otherwise not gotten with "X" so I'm only down $22 in extra gas, and have the luxury of driving a bigger vehicle that has more options to meet the needs of more people such as with pool rides, luggage, and potentially more XL trips. Who knows, I don't have a clue which path is better.

I am learning to love Uber driving in terms of just how easy and seamless it usually is compared to taxi driving.

It seems pretty obvious to me at this point that in order to basically gross the same amount or less with UberLyft, I have to put many more miles on my car and work practically non-stop. I have shown that it is possible but it is unsustainable IMO, for me. My gross not including the SRF, but before Uber's commission is taken out, and not including tips, was $1248. Adding about $80 or so in tips it was about $1328. After Uber's/Lyfts commission of $260 it came to $1068.

For that, I actually drove for 48 hours, so that comes to about $22/hour, the same as I came to last time I worked a weekend. Then subtracting 35 cents/mile for car expenses (.25/mi just for gas alone!) of $336, my "net" before taxes comes to $732, or $15/hr net.

If it was $15 hour full time, not just on weekends, it might be worth it but from what little weekday driving I've done so far, it doesn't seem to be anywhere near that. I will test that more when I have a chance...


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## Eat.Sleep.Drive (Jul 16, 2015)

^ Thanks for following up earnestly. I truly understand your dilemma on 'minivan vs hybrid' route. I 've driven vans, and even with similar rates in taxi, it seemed to always make up the gas difference and some more. That was before rideshare takeover though. But I still believe you would gross a lot more in a minivan taxi as opposed to a hybrid. Here, though, I think the most efficient vehicle wins, considering the higher commission as well as the constant excess expense for gas, and probably maintenance, too.
When it comes to uber, I'm thinking uberPlus might be the closest class to compare to a taxi fare. The gross miles driven compared to the gross earned, as posted here, doesn't look good at all.
Btw, do you guys get any airport action similar to LAX in OC or is it not a major factor there?


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## hanging in there (Oct 1, 2014)

Eat.Sleep.Drive said:


> ^ Thanks for following up earnestly. I truly understand your dilemma on 'minivan vs hybrid' route. I 've driven vans, and even with similar rates in taxi, it seemed to always make up the gas difference and some more. That was before rideshare takeover though. But I still believe you would gross a lot more in a minivan taxi as opposed to a hybrid. Here, though, I think the most efficient vehicle wins, considering the higher commission as well as the constant excess expense for gas, and probably maintenance, too.
> When it comes to uber, I'm thinking uberPlus might be the closest class to compare to a taxi fare. The gross miles driven compared to the gross earned, as posted here, doesn't look good at all.
> Btw, do you guys get any airport action similar to LAX in OC or is it not a major factor there?


If you are asking from a taxi driver's perspective, JWA is a closed shop. There are only 2 permitted taxi companies for pickups out of the 40 in OC. They are 1) California Yellow Cab and 2)Yellow Cab of Greater Orange County. Even though I drive for the second one, I still can't do pickups because you have to be an "airport cab". I can drop only. In my company there are, I believe, about 75 permitted airport cabs out of a fleet approaching 500. The other company is allowed to have 75 cabs there as well. To be an airport cab you have to pay a higher weekly lease, about $100 more per week, and you have to drive their vehicles, no owner-operator vehicles allowed, so you are talking about a $800/wk lease.

From an Uber/Lyft drivers perspective, I haven't had much chance to try it out. The few times I tried it was mostly a waiting game but I did get one Lyft pickup there after only waiting maybe 10 minutes, maybe it was just luck. I do know some of the JWA airport cab drivers have been quitting lately as a result of lowered business due to the TNC pickups. Cab drivers there would previously typically wait maybe an hour for a pickup and now it's becoming much longer, so the drivers are deciding that maybe they can make more money on the streets or switching to Uber. I personally feel at this time that there is still more money in the taxi business but I would not want to be an airport taxi at this time. Looks like it's going to be a repeat of the same story for LAX when the TCN pickups are approved there. All I can say is, maybe you should start making some LAX taxi driver friends so that when they want to switch to Uber you can bank some of that referral money. ;-)


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## hanging in there (Oct 1, 2014)

Quote: "The gross miles driven compared to the gross earned, as posted here, doesn't look good at all."

BTW, I was thinking about that as well. The thing that struck me big time while Ubering was just how immeasurably valuable my taxi driving experience turned out to be. I am not trying to toot my own horn I'm just saying that in countless instances my taxi experiences saved my butt big time and allowed me to move along much more quickly, find pickups and drop-offs quicker, and generally be able to navigate the shark-infested waters of commercial transport much more smoothly. There are so many things I could point out that I'd have to write a book, and you know me, how wordy I can get, that's a book you would not want to read. But I kept having this vision in my head of how many times I would have gotten so tripped up on stuff if I was a typical newbie with no taxi or commercial driving experience. Believe me, lots of stuff I read on this forum falls into that category. You don't hear me complaining about this and that detail because I was able to push through stuff in most cases and get over it, or avoid it in the first place. So, as silly as it seemed to me to be "busting my balls and wearing out my car" for a net $15/hr, it would have been even much less than that if I didn't have prior experience, trust me.

I am not saying I'm any kind of Uber pro, I am sure that some of the veterans would have and could have run circles around me. Just saying that it was easier being an experienced newbie as opposed to a "wet-behind-the-ears bright eyed and bushy-tailed" newbie that I see around me all the time and hear all kinds of stories about from pax.


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## Eat.Sleep.Drive (Jul 16, 2015)

hanging in there said:


> If you are asking from a taxi driver's perspective, JWA is a closed shop. There are only 2 permitted taxi companies for pickups out of the 40 in OC. They are 1) California Yellow Cab and 2)Yellow Cab of Greater Orange County. Even though I drive for the second one, I still can't do pickups because you have to be an "airport cab". I can drop only. In my company there are, I believe, about 75 permitted airport cabs out of a fleet approaching 500. The other company is allowed to have 75 cabs there as well. To be an airport cab you have to pay a higher weekly lease, about $100 more per week, and you have to drive their vehicles, no owner-operator vehicles allowed, so you are talking about a $800/wk lease.
> 
> From an Uber/Lyft drivers perspective, I haven't had much chance to try it out. The few times I tried it was mostly a waiting game but I did get one Lyft pickup there after only waiting maybe 10 minutes, maybe it was just luck. I do know some of the JWA airport cab drivers have been quitting lately as a result of lowered business due to the TNC pickups. Cab drivers there would previously typically wait maybe an hour for a pickup and now it's becoming much longer, so the drivers are deciding that maybe they can make more money on the streets or switching to Uber. I personally feel at this time that there is still more money in the taxi business but I would not want to be an airport taxi at this time. Looks like it's going to be a repeat of the same story for LAX when the TCN pickups are approved there. All I can say is, maybe you should start making some LAX taxi driver friends so that when they want to switch to Uber you can bank some of that referral money. ;-)


The lease rates are still high in OC, it seems, at least by $100 compared to LA. Probably those drivers get the airport to themselves every day of the week, hence the higher rate. LAX is a two or three times a week deal, one or two of those days being as a back-up when it gets busy. I was a backup yesterday, even though I started very late, and only got three rides, one of em being to Irvine, believe me, that's all the fares I needed and didn't even bother to hassle outside. With TnCs arrival, those busy days as a back up might dwindle fast, forcing drivers to work the city, although that's a depressing prospect these days, as well.

As far as referring drivers to uber, how much is that currently? I know Lyft currently pays $250 to both parties according to a driver who wanted to refer me. The thing is I probably know as many drivers who ve returned to taxi after trying TNC for any amount of time. As far as those guys are concerned, if the taxi is toasted with this LAX deal, it's time for another line of work, and not TNC. In fact one of my closest friend was a top rated and top earner (as much as $1600+/wk when rates were $1.10/mi, if i remember correctly) uberX driver for about a year before he gave up and came back to taxi. He also drove Lyft. As a full time driver with a fair lease, he could net something close to that in taxi now, with the added benefit of driving someone else's car. The only difference was the mileage he was putting on his car, and on himself, too, as he worked hard and drove really long hours to make it on the TNC platform. When he first returned to taxi, he told me how grateful he felt even when he landed minimum $20 fares at LAX. That's saying a lot for an LA taxi driver.

I ve started the signing process with uber a while ago, yet still not fully convinced. I downloaded the rider app for the first time yesterday (without adding CC  just to get a feel for what it's like surge wise and so. I dropped the pin on my home and checked the app through out the day, and was surprised to see it surged all day, except on a few stretches, anywhere from 1.3-2.2x. On the other hand, an X/Xl car I was tracking - it was positioned a block away - rarely disappeared especially when the surge went above 1.8x. So, it seems like even though the area surges, fare isn't guaranteed at that rate.

What's your strategy, surge wise? Have you tried deploying "skipping" as demonstrated by a member here? That may be the trick to driving less and earning more.


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## hanging in there (Oct 1, 2014)

Eat.Sleep.Drive said:


> The lease rates are still high in OC, it seems, at least by $100 compared to LA. Probably those drivers get the airport to themselves every day of the week, hence the higher rate. LAX is a two or three times a week deal, one or two of those days being as a back-up when it gets busy. I was a backup yesterday, even though I started very late, and only got three rides, one of em being to Irvine, believe me, that's all the fares I needed and didn't even bother to hassle outside. With TnCs arrival, those busy days as a back up might dwindle fast, forcing drivers to work the city, although that's a depressing prospect these days, as well.
> 
> As far as referring drivers to uber, how much is that currently? I know Lyft currently pays $250 to both parties according to a driver who wanted to refer me. The thing is I probably know as many drivers who ve returned to taxi after trying TNC for any amount of time. As far as those guys are concerned, if the taxi is toasted with this LAX deal, it's time for another line of work, and not TNC. In fact one of my closest friend was a top rated and top earner (as much as $1600+/wk when rates were $1.10/mi, if i remember correctly) uberX driver for about a year before he gave up and came back to taxi. He also drove Lyft. As a full time driver with a fair lease, he could net something close to that in taxi now, with the added benefit of driving someone else's car. The only difference was the mileage he was putting on his car, and on himself, too, as he worked hard and drove really long hours to make it on the TNC platform. When he first returned to taxi, he told me how grateful he felt even when he landed minimum $20 fares at LAX. That's saying a lot for an LA taxi driver.
> 
> ...


I've done my share of "skipping" but so far only used it as a way to, I guess you could say, do a "soft reject" as opposed to letting it time out if the fare pickup ETA is too far away or I don't want it for some other reason like the area it would be taking me to for the pickup. I haven't personally had enough experience to say, but so far for me I have not had much luck picking up surge fares even when I do a fair amount of skipping. It seems that oftentimes when I am smack in the middle of a long-lasting surge zone I don't get calls unless I'm willing to take a non-surge call, and most likely "chase" it as well.

There have been many fellow cab drivers I have seen that have followed the same path as your friend did and came back to taxi after awhile after reaching pretty much the same conclusion.

There are currently 4 of them that I know of from my taxi company that have stayed with TNC so far:
1) one because he got booted by the taxi company for too many accidents and is currently not that happy with UberX and is thinking XL might be better for him (I doubt it)
2) one because he got suspended for awhile for disciplinary action, went to UberXL and then didn't want to come back when the taxi company invited him back
3) one that is doing Uber Black TCP and mostly has his other TCP gigs and rarely gets/does any Uber work, but is doing ok due to having the other good contracts
4) and a fourth one that is really struggling with Uber SUV that is desperately trying to find someone to take over his Santander lease on his Suburban so that he can go back to taxi.

Personally at this time I'm thinking that the real pivot point comes down to scheduling and priorities. The hardest test of UberX is the "full time plus" replacement gig. The flexibility that Uber offers to go out when you feel like it during busy times and grab some quick, hopefully surging bucks is it's greatest strength driver-wise, IMO, but that advantage is lost when you need to make it a serious all-the-time gig. So the people who get into TCP cars thinking that is a more serious worthwhile full-time commitment strategy are often finding that all the UberX's are buzzing around them eating their lunch while they sit. The Black and SUV drivers probably hate the X cars even more so than the taxi drivers do. Maybe Plus is the answer, I don't know, all I know is that from what I've heard most of the Black and SUV drivers mostly try to stay busy with Plus calls, or X and XL calls, so they don't just sit.


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## Huberis (Mar 15, 2015)

hanging in there, nice job you are doing. Keep it up.


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