# Upfront Pricing..hmmm



## justaGoober (Mar 12, 2019)

We recently started doing upfront pricing in my market (DC/Baltimore). I absolutely love being able control the length of my trips and knowing where I am going. It just gives me so much more control……

But it seems to me we are paying a price for this control. I haven’t taken the time to price out the rides, but my gut tells me, on average, we are being paid less. It has been relatively slow in my market lately, but yesterday was somewhat busy with some surges. However, because Uber arbitrarily prices rides, it seems as though surges don’t really mean what they used to. When there are surges, it seems as though they simply lower the base price, then try to get us excited with a “surge”, but at then end of the day, it really doesn’t add much to the ride.

Also, it seems they are sending me all kinds of rides with long pickups so I am declining tons of rides, not to mention the radar crap that keeps popping up. With all this stuff happening, I am constantly getting logged out and having to go through the process of entering my phone number and pin. Because rides are being sent so quickly, I sometimes am not able to go offline/online after the 2nd decline. Bottom line is that this has become dangerous, as I’m spending way too much time looking at my phone to sort out all the stuff being sent my way and logging back in while I’m driving.

in my mind the jury is still out on this major change. If the Quests continue to be meager, I think I would prefer the old way. Or maybe I’ll adapt and learn how to better sort out the rides that are sent my way.

As a P/T driver, it. doesn’t matter much to me. But I feel for the F/T drivers that have to deal with this apparent pay cut.


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## bobby747 (Dec 29, 2015)

Pa. Full time drivers got big pay cut imho.


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## Soldiering (Jan 21, 2019)

As a FT driver in PHX I can verify your post. This new system is garbage so far. Ive got 25k rides under my belt an it is making driving more dangerous no doubt because of the distra




















































































ction of all the requests that come in that I reject. I can only imagine new drivers getting discombobulated. But really what they want is for them too accept everything. Heres a sampling of the garbage this evening.


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## Cerebral (5 mo ago)

Welcome to the club! It’s pathetic to witness this upfront fee garbage.


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## Daisey77 (Jan 13, 2016)

Its trash


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## Nats121 (Jul 19, 2017)

What's up with all the long pickups? 

Are we supposed to believe that no one orders Ubers unless they're at least 12 miles from the nearest driver?


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## painfreepc (Jul 17, 2014)

Nats121 said:


> What's up with all the long pickups?
> 
> Are we supposed to believe that no one orders Ubers unless they're at least 12 miles from the nearest driver?


uber feels they need to put a driver and car in passangers app right away, they don't what passanger thinking ubers needs time to find a driver,
passanger sees a car and driver in app coming for them so passanger feels good,

if passanger sees looking for driver, passanger feels bad and thats bad for uber business.

uber wants a real live time ETA to passanger
NOT a ETA of lets say 7 to 15 minutes for pick-up with no driver and car showing in app,
until a close driver is found, this to a passanger would feel more like the taxi system,

so we as driver get long azz pick-up times, uber says fu*k the unhappy driver,
passanger see a car and driver is coming no matter the eta, passanger is happy,

uber is all about keeping passangers happy, NOT the drivers.


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## justaGoober (Mar 12, 2019)

Soldiering said:


> As a FT driver in PHX I can verify your post. This new system is garbage so far. Ive got 25k rides under my belt an it is making driving more dangerous no doubt because of the distra
> View attachment 675699
> View attachment 675698
> View attachment 675697
> ...


Wow…those examples are horrible. Good point re: new drivers. I wonder how long until all these distractions cause a few accidents and Uber is forced to change this. IMHO, the alert screen is very poorly designed - font is too small and essentially monochrome, not too mention the very short period of time you have to process all the info. My cancel rate has gone up as I’ve accidentally accepted rides by brushing over or trying to dismiss an offer that I don’t want. Maybe I’ll get better at processing the offers, but either way, it seems that my AR will plummet. 

It also seems that rides on the “radar” become actual offers, so essentially you have to decline the same ride multiple times. Again, more distractions.


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## painfreepc (Jul 17, 2014)

justaGoober said:


> Wow…those examples are horrible. Good point re: new drivers. I wonder how long until all these distractions cause a few accidents and Uber is forced to change this. IMHO, the alert screen is very poorly designed - font is too small and essentially monochrome, not too mention the very short period of time you have to process all the info. My cancel rate has gone up as I’ve accidentally accepted rides by brushing over or trying to dismiss an offer that I don’t want. Maybe I’ll get better at processing the offers, but either way, it seems that my AR will plummet.
> 
> It also seems that rides on the “radar” become actual offers, so essentially you have to decline the same ride multiple times. Again, more distractions.


I've seen trips come up as a normal trip first and then immediately come up in the radar and then a minute or two later come back up as a normal trip


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## justaGoober (Mar 12, 2019)

painfreepc said:


> I've seen trips come up as a normal trip first and then immediately come up in the radar and then a minute or two later come back up as a normal trip


so you have to decline the same trip 3x….smh.


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## Heisenburger (Sep 19, 2016)

justaGoober said:


> But I feel for the F/T drivers that have to deal with this apparent pay cut.


Same.



Heisenburger said:


> UberX count: 68
> UberEATS count: 2
> Quest incentive achieved: $210
> Total miles: 680
> ...


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## Beninmankato (Apr 26, 2017)

It's only a distraction if you allow it to be. The app can be turned off while driving or ignored. The new system is a real help to any market that has it.


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## Soldiering (Jan 21, 2019)

Beninmankato said:


> It's only a distraction if you allow it to be. The app can be turned off while driving or ignored. The new system is a real help to any market that has it.


Not if you want too make money (revenue). Go back too Dara's house an reporr, you troll.


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## justaGoober (Mar 12, 2019)

Beninmankato said:


> It's only a distraction if you allow it to be. The app can be turned off while driving or ignored. The new system is a real help to any market that has it.


So you only accept rides while parked? Or do you accept all offers? That doesn’t sound very profitable. Please explain.


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## Daisey77 (Jan 13, 2016)

Beninmankato said:


> It's only a distraction if you allow it to be. The app can be turned off while driving or ignored. The new system is a real help to any market that has it.


The only people it's helping are the people who did not have the direction and distance of the trip before The Upfront fares. Otherwise it's trash. My monthly numbers support this. Before The Upfront fares came, I was averaging the $1.55 per mile. Upfront fares came, and I'm now averaging $1.18 a mile


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## Cerebral (5 mo ago)

Soldiering said:


> Not if you want too make money (revenue). Go back too Dara's house an reporr, you troll.


I despise these trolls. Maybe 1-2% drivers at major metropolitan areas are doing better, but for majority of fellow drivers, weekly incomes are plummeting quicker than meteorites. It’s freaking insult to humanity to offer these garbage prices. Minimum wages go up in every state, but twisted minds in Uber boards had a chutzpah to cut the pay instead. ‘Business ethics’ has run amok .


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## Beninmankato (Apr 26, 2017)

justaGoober said:


> So you only accept rides while parked? Or do you accept all offers? That doesn’t sound very profitable. Please explain.


I don't allow my phone to take precedence over traffic conditions.


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## bobby747 (Dec 29, 2015)

Its total eats bad fares. Want drivers to drive total of 30 minutes ++for $8 and that's with gas surge charge.and gas
Notice a few going 10 minutes total @$13 and looked ubers numbers custom was paying $22. So that's the only way we see surge


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## Beninmankato (Apr 26, 2017)

Daisey77 said:


> The only people it's helping are the people who did not have the direction and distance of the trip before The Upfront fares. Otherwise it's trash. My monthly numbers support this. Before The Upfront fares came, I was averaging the $1.55 per mile. Upfront fares came, and I'm now averaging $.118 a mile


Most of the Country did not have this info before the update so it is helping many drivers.

You know how much the offer is before you accept it. If you don't like the offer price than don't do the trip.


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## Mad_Jack_Flint (Nov 19, 2020)

I never knew the difference between Upfront and Hidden pricing until I started to work College Station and discovered the difference.

In Houston upfront was there when I started to pick up Pax’s in April of this year so I didn’t know that Uber had cut the pay that badly.

In college Station if I do twenty rides I know I will clear two bills easily but in Houston that could be just one bill.

Also long distance rides pay far less in Upfront Pricing and how I discovered this was on the two Airport rides I did on Sunday and Monday that both paid a combined two hundred-fifty dollars, so yeah you get a big pay cut with upfront pricing because those two rides would have been a hundred dollars less under the new system.

Upfront Pricing does help weed out the bad rides to bad locations but it also defeats Uber wish to have higher Acceptance ratings and even less cancellation rating.

In the end Uber isn’t making things faster and in fact they are screwing the Pax with Upfront Pricing and causing longer wait times because the driver will never accept those wages for that distance.


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## bobby747 (Dec 29, 2015)

Beninmankato said:


> Most of the Country did not have this info before the update so it is helping many drivers.
> 
> You know how much the offer is before you accept it. If you don't like the offer price than don't do the trip.


What if 10 in a row are low. Your screwed..
I was a 80%. Driver. I got a pay cut first day. I got 5% more for longer years of service on miles and minutes.


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## Heisenburger (Sep 19, 2016)

Beninmankato said:


> It's only a distraction if you allow it to be. The app can be turned off while driving or ignored.


 QFT



Beninmankato said:


> I don't allow my phone to take precedence over traffic conditions.


 QFT



Beninmankato said:


> You know how much the offer is before you accept it. If you don't like the offer price than don't do the trip.


 QFT 

It's indeed amusing to see just how many whiners have bleated in response to your spittin truth.


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## Cerebral (5 mo ago)

An eminently good explainer.


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## Cerebral (5 mo ago)

Mad_Jack_Flint said:


> I never knew the difference between Upfront and Hidden pricing until I started to work College Station and discovered the difference.
> 
> In Houston upfront was there when I started to pick up Pax’s in April of this year so I didn’t know that Uber had cut the pay that badly.
> 
> ...


An eminently good explainer.


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## bobby747 (Dec 29, 2015)

In my city all got put in the shitter...I been over coming all objections for over 8 years this is very hard to overcome...imho. plus them giving Tesla better more rides is a major insult. 99% did not buy a tesla. I invested in a wav van. My second. Costs close to a Tesla. 
At least I can do more of another platform and xl. And now if I want a normal big surge event. That I never work. I have option to wait for big price as per only $20 surge.
If I was uber x fulltime. I would rent a taxi .
Thank god I have alot of private. Without my 5 plus years of my platform. You cannot rely on rides only from uber and lyft..


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## Heisenburger (Sep 19, 2016)

hoyota said:


> View attachment 675867


Why complain into the void? Just drive.


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## Heisenburger (Sep 19, 2016)

hoyota said:


> View attachment 675869


And are you present here just to moan?


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## Heisenburger (Sep 19, 2016)

hoyota said:


> takes you 68+ trips + "bonuses" to make 1000
> takes me 11-15 trips
> work smarter not harder


Unsupported assertion.


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## Tnasty (Mar 23, 2016)

justaGoober said:


> so you have to decline the same trip 3x….smh.


I have also noticed the price goes down each time I've ignored a few!


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## bobby747 (Dec 29, 2015)

Yota.. I agree screw that trip. What happens if you take that slop out of desperation. And go 4 miles and the ******** cancels. This other guy posts alot. But can he sustain 2k everyweek. I can in 5 days still gross...


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## Beninmankato (Apr 26, 2017)

hoyota said:


> View attachment 675867


$40 in a half an hour would make a lot of drivers happy. Even if you had to drive a few miles to get back into ride territory it wouldn't be that bad.


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## ObeyTheNumbers (8 mo ago)

Soldiering said:


> As a FT driver in PHX I can verify your post. This new system is garbage so far. Ive got 25k rides under my belt an it is making driving more dangerous no doubt because of the distra
> View attachment 675699
> View attachment 675698
> View attachment 675697
> ...



Wow, that's a load of crappy trips


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## ObeyTheNumbers (8 mo ago)

hoyota said:


> View attachment 675867


Buubuuuttt it was FORTY DOLLARS MAN! 🤣

5.0 doesn't know where the cancel button is, you might have made it to their front door! 😁


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## Soldiering (Jan 21, 2019)

ObeyTheNumbers said:


> Wow, that's a load of crappy trips


Yup an they came in consecutively. In facr they logged me off 3 times during that time. Uber has sunk too a NEW LOW.


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## ObeyTheNumbers (8 mo ago)

Soldiering said:


> Yup an they came in consecutively. In facr they logged me off 3 times during that time. Uber has sunk too a NEW LOW.


It's what it always was, but now everyone gets to cherry pick when before they didn't think.

What the driver app needs is a driver adjustable filter preference with presets.


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## Bnerdy (Jul 11, 2015)

There has almost never been a major update, that Uber has done, that actually benefit the driver. Shocking that people are still surprised by Uber’s shady business practices and greed. Upfront pricing is a ripoff. Now I don’t even know how I’m being paid, Uber just makes up a price and see if I’m desperate enough to take it. I even had a trip where Uber got a bigger cut of the fare than me


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## justaGoober (Mar 12, 2019)

Bnerdy said:


> There has almost never been a major update, that Uber has done, that actually benefit the driver. Shocking that people are still surprised by Uber’s shady business practices and greed. Upfront pricing is a ripoff. Now I don’t even know how I’m being paid, Uber just makes up a price and see if I’m desperate enough to take it. I even had a trip where Uber got a bigger cut of the fare than me


They are squeezing the supply/demand principle as far as they can. As long as they have enough drivers, they will squeeze even more. Without a rate card, they don’t even have to announce/publish lower rates. They just arbitrarily change fares whenever/however they want, based on driver supply at any given time. Genius.


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## Heisenburger (Sep 19, 2016)

justaGoober said:


> They just arbitrarily change fares whenever/however they want, based on driver supply at any given time. Genius.


IKR!



Heisenburger said:


> This is the highest amount that I've seen a customer pay for similar distance and time where no surge is in play.
> 
> It's also the single most profitable trip for distance and duration that I've accepted in at least a couple years.
> 
> ...


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## Heisenburger (Sep 19, 2016)

Nats121 said:


> What's up with all the long pickups?
> 
> Are we supposed to believe that no one orders Ubers unless they're at least 12 miles from the nearest driver?











'Batch Matching': Uber rider Algorithm article


"Here's why you don't get paired with that Uber you see on the map" Friend sent me this article earlier. Interesting... https://mashable.com/article/uber-batch-matching-ride-hailing-request/




www.uberpeople.net












Batched matching


What do you know about batched matching? How does Uber match riders with drivers? Here's why you don't get paired with that Uber car you see on the map Uber’s Marketplace Matching: Case Study




www.uberpeople.net












Closest Driver/Pax? Nope...


..."Batch Matching". https://mashable.com/article/uber-batch-matching-ride-hailing-request/




www.uberpeople.net












Here’s why you don’t get paired with that Uber car you...


https://mashable.com/article/uber-batch-matching-ride-hailing-request/ You're searching for an Uber or Lyft on the respective ride-hailing app and you see a car icon crawling nearby ... but even though it's temptingly close, that doesn't mean you'll be matched with that car. Uber uses "batch...




www.uberpeople.net


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## justaGoober (Mar 12, 2019)

It’s been a few weeks with the new upfront pricing, and I have to say, as a pt driver, I think I’m a fan. While I’ve certainly seen plenty of rides getting lower pay than they used to, there definitely seem to be some rides that are paying higher. It’s hard for me to assess the actual net change, but I do think it’s not too different. 

But the ability to totally control where I go is huge to me. I can completely avoid the crappy areas. It’s like having unlimited, PERFECT destination filters at your disposal. However, as mentioned above, on busy nights, the constant bombardment of offers and radar, can create a lot of distractions and be dangerous. 

I realize that the new upfront pricing may work out differently in different markets, but so far, my market is busy enough to allow me to cherry pick my rides. 

Without some big promotions from Lyft, I will probably avoid Lyft now that I can completely control my destinations. I used to multi app quite a bit, but not so much now.


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## Daisey77 (Jan 13, 2016)

Beninmankato said:


> Most of the Country did not have this info before the update so it is helping many drivers.
> 
> You know how much the offer is before you accept it. If you don't like the offer price than don't do the trip.


No all it did was reward bad behavior. If you didn't have this info it was because your numbers sucked. 



justaGoober said:


> It’s been a few weeks with the new upfront pricing, and I have to say, as a pt driver, I think I’m a fan. While I’ve certainly seen plenty of rides getting lower pay than they used to, there definitely seem to be some rides that are paying higher. It’s hard for me to assess the actual net change, but I do think it’s not too different.
> 
> But the ability to totally control where I go is huge to me. I can completely avoid the crappy areas. It’s like having unlimited, PERFECT destination filters at your disposal. However, as mentioned above, on busy nights, the constant bombardment of offers and radar, can create a lot of distractions and be dangerous.
> 
> ...


And this is exactly the problem. Part-time drivers who are doing this for extra money don't seem to care about the net change. Which is absolutely absurd to me. That type of ignorance is exactly what feeds Uber and allows them to keep making these BS changes. They only care about the superficial aspects such as we don't want to drive in the hood, even though they will be profiting. Yet they'll accept a ride to soccermomville at a loss but claim they're winning because they can see they avoided the hood. 🙄

The only real way to determine if upfront pricing is a good thing or a bad thing is your dollar per mile. Its not hard at all to assess the net change. All of the information needed to assess the net change is information you already have or should have if you're doing your taxes correctly. _sigh_


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## justaGoober (Mar 12, 2019)

Daisey77 said:


> No all it did was reward bad behavior. If you didn't have this info it was because your numbers sucked.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


Sorry to be a “problem” for you. So I should take crappy rides for the “community”?

So you say I’m a “problem”, then you say I take losing rides….if I take the losing rides aren’t I helping you, the professional ft guy? You really make no sense. 

I guess you have a general resentment to pt drivers for reasons other then what you’re contradictory post is trying to say. And, honestly, I understand that sentiment. If this were my ft job, I would probably feel the same.


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## Daisey77 (Jan 13, 2016)

justaGoober said:


> Sorry to be a “problem” for you. So I should take crappy rides for the “community”?


Define "crappy". What do you use to determine if a ride is crappy or not? The Final Destination address? You're obviously not using the dollar per mile Factor because you yourself said, it's hard for you to assess the net change. That should be the main factor any driver should use to determine if a ride is crappy or not. There can be other influencing factors but nothing should supersede the dollar per mile


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## Heisenburger (Sep 19, 2016)

Daisey77 said:


> No all it did was reward bad behavior.


Cherry picking is bad behavior?


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## justaGoober (Mar 12, 2019)

Heisenburger said:


> Cherry picking is bad behavior?


Apparently…


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## AGKkansascity (Jun 27, 2020)

Same here. My rating went down so dramatically because of these requests coming constantly and can’t accept all of them. You’re right it sometimes could be dangerous. I keep looking down on my phone to see which rides to accept.


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## justaGoober (Mar 12, 2019)

Daisey77 said:


> Define "crappy". What do you use to determine if a ride is crappy or not? The Final Destination address? You're obviously not using the dollar per mile Factor because you yourself said, it's hard for you to assess the net change. That should be the main factor any driver should use to determine if a ride is crappy or not. There can be other influencing factors but nothing should supersede the dollar per mile


True, I don’t spend a lot of time analyzing my productivity, but I have a pretty good idea of how I’m doing. 

While I agree dollar/mile is very important, I also look at dollar/minute, which actually has a much higher weight for me. I can’t stand the 25 minute, 5 mile trip from one side of Baltimore to the other. While the dollar/mile might pass your test, the dollar/minute fails miserably for me, not to mention the horrible streets that destroy your car. 

I also look at destination (bad area), as well as destination in terms of when do I need to be home. This last factor is awesome, which usually allows me to get 1 or 2 more rides in so I can work my way back home. Previously, I would simply turn off the app and dead head home because the DST filter was useless and you never knew where the next ride will take you. 

I’m sure we both look at many factors while determining which rides to accept, but it sounds like we weight things differently.


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## Beninmankato (Apr 26, 2017)

Daisey77 said:


> No all it did was reward bad behavior. If you didn't have this info it was because your numbers sucked.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


This is the way a 'Super-Moderator' responds to my posting. No wonder this site is full of angry, naysayers. 

Bad-behavior; like not accepting rides 10 miles away, or not wanting to give $4 rides; you meant that kind of bad behavior? Many drivers who have this information given to them are making more money than before the system took effect because they know which rides to give.


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