# Bait+switch fare quotes/long routes



## thelawnet (Sep 15, 2015)

Try this for London:

North Terminal Approach, Gatwick to Fenns Way, Woking

Uber quote is £44-£59, using the M23 and M25

Waze suggests, at 1am (quickest time):

M23/M25 (this is the route any normal driver would take) - 35.25 miles, 38 minutes

The cost would be:

£2.50 base + 35.25 * £1.25/mile + 38 * £0.15/minute = £52.26. Plus £4 airport surcharge = £56.26

You could alter the route by using the A217 (Reigate), instead of the M23, and the A3 and then via Ripley, which saves 6.08 miles (-£7.60), but adds 4 minutes (£0.60) in the best case, so the fare comes out £7 cheaper, but it's still more than Uber's quote, and it's not a route that Uber or Google Maps suggests

You can shave a further 1.15 (-£1.44) miles off the journey avoiding the M25 entirely, but it makes the journey 9 minutes longer (+£1.35)

Any way you slice it, this journey cannot be done for £44, and to get even close requires a weird route.

Also, because the time element of the fare is cheap, it makes sense for the customer to take the shorter route. E.g., now at 2:45pm, the A217 versus the M23 is going to take 5 minutes longer, that is £0.75, but it saves £5.43 in mileage, so that's a saving of £4.68, or £56.16/hour for the passenger, which for most people is worthwhile. This money comes out of the driver's pocket of course, because he gets paid £3.74 less for working longer, and his fuel saving is maybe only around 40p.

If you compare this to a normal car driver, if he takes the longer, faster route, he burns somewhere in the region of 40p-80p in extra fuel depending on his car, but he saves five minutes, which comes out at £4.80-£9.60/hour, which is much more rational.

In other words the Uber passenger is incentivised by the charging structure to take shorter, slower routes, that wouldn't normally be rational.


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## Bart McCoy (Nov 4, 2014)

you lost us with the London and £ symbol


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## thelawnet (Sep 15, 2015)

Two things : time charge should be a bigger percentage of distance charge, and Uber giving fare quotes that aren't possible

In London Uber pays, net (based on £0.15/minute, £1.25/mile), per hour on the clock

£7.20 + £1/mile for every mile covered in the hour.

An hour spent in traffic at 10mph earns you just £17.20, which at 20p/mile marginal cost to drive is £15.20 net, but in reality is unlikely to amount to minimum wage (£6.70) if you consider the need to meet overheads which will amount to thousands per year.

OTOH if you do a longer journey of 50 miles in an hour then you earn £57.20. That's £47.20 net, at 20p/mile. If you return empty, then you have driven 100 miles in 2 hours, costing you £20, leaving £37.20 net for two hours work. This is £18.60/hour.

So in the first case you earn £15.20 for an hour in traffic, but in the second case you get £47.20. In the second case you might not find a new fare for a while, or at all, but even driving back empty, is better than driving around central London at 10mph for rates that will amount to sub minimum wage.

It's obvious that the base hourly rate, £7.20/hour is too low, given that minimum wage is £6.70/hour, and you need to cover down-time and overheads. It's irrational to drive in high traffic in this scenario.

Change the rates to something like £0.25/minute and £1/mile, and you get a base rate of £12/hour + £0.80/mile and it becomes viable to sit in traffic. But £7.20/hour is insane.


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## Bart McCoy (Nov 4, 2014)

hmm, so Uber has low rates in other countries too


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## Uber-Doober (Dec 16, 2014)

thelawnet said:


> Try this for London:
> 
> North Terminal Approach, Gatwick to Fenns Way, Woking
> 
> ...


^^^
Jeremy Clarkson is posting here now? 
Sheesh...


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## Uber-Doober (Dec 16, 2014)

Bart McCoy said:


> hmm, so Uber has low rates in other countries too


^^^
Yeah, makes me wanna walk outside and Pound my Pence in Publick.


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## thelawnet (Sep 15, 2015)

It's not that the rates are low, they are lower than metered taxis but higher than private hire vehicles, but more that the way Uber fares are structured makes it uneconomic for the driver to sit in traffic. Regular metered taxis are structured so that you pay a 'time' charge if the taxi is moving at 10mph or less, or a distance charge at 10mph+. With Uber in the UK, 'time' is very cheap, in relation to miles.

And London has actually got one of the higher time charges. Some UK cities only pay the driver £4.80/hour. Making a driver wait for sixty minutes for £4.80 is not funny.


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## Uber-Doober (Dec 16, 2014)

thelawnet said:


> It's not that the rates are low, they are lower than metered taxis but higher than private hire vehicles, but more that the way Uber fares are structured makes it uneconomic for the driver to sit in traffic. Regular metered taxis are structured so that you pay a 'time' charge if the taxi is moving at 10mph or less, or a distance charge at 10mph+. With Uber in the UK, 'time' is very cheap, in relation to miles.
> 
> And London has actually got one of the higher time charges. Some UK cities only pay the driver £4.80/hour. Making a driver wait for sixty minutes for £4.80 is not funny.


^^^
Driving in London is sheer murder. 
During the Olympics, an hour on Piccadilly to drive a a mile in a 500 Hp supercharged Holden UTE in the rain... to go to Albemarle St. to my hotel.... and all the while on the wrong side of the street. 
Oy!


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