NEW: Earn Avios with your Uber rides (and get 250 Avios just for registering)

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• S says:

  7 Nov7 November 13:25

  I find this interesting for a couple of reasons. Firstly, Uber has been having profitability problems for quite a while now. They are waiting for the unicorn of autonomous cars to come and save them by removing their major expense (driver
  payments) but have burned through huge quantities of VC funding in the process and aren’t really any closer to that. Meanwhile they’ve fallen foul of regulators in several major cities including London with their “we’re not an employer of taxi drivers” line that sought to minimise their costs. Ultimately their disruptive innovation (an app) was easy to replicate – see Gett, etc. and they’re in a bit of a hole.

  So this strikes me as a clear attempt to drive more traffic to the platform – especially if you’re going to be able to claim miles on train travel too. They’re significantly diversifying away from the “taxi” side of things.

  But as others have said, the few times I’ve tried to request an Uber in the last year or two – I’ve very often simply had no driver accept the journey (or accept it then cancel). This is in several major cities in the north of England, at times (early to mid evening) where it shouldn’t be impossible.

  • Rob says:

    7 Nov7 November 13:52

    It seems to vary a lot. We’ve done four Heathrow runs in the last month between my wife and I and always got a car within 3-4 minutes to the house, even at 5am.

    However, every Saturday I try to get home from my son’s basketball training in Wandsworth around 1pm and it is carnage. Bolt is no better. More often than not we end up in a black cab from the rank outside Southside for £25.

    • Alex Sm says:

      8 Nov8 November 19:24

      There are also buses…

      • Rob says:

        8 Nov8 November 21:21

        We go on the bus but the return is impractical due to timing – my family aren’t prepared to wait that long for lunch!

  • SP says:

    7 Nov7 November 15:21

    I have this issue in London all the time, I actually find Bolt a bit more reliable, and cheaper. I’ve had real issues at LHR trying to get anyone on either app to accept a ride in the last few months, it might take half an hour or so before someone is willing to accept (and generally only when they’ve pushed the price up) and on occasion I’ve given up and got the train, even though it takes a lot longer to where I live. There’s no way I wouldn’t pre-book a taxi if arriving late at night now. Uber should take note that if they can’t be relied on, people won’t use them.

  • Alex Sm says:

    8 Nov8 November 19:23

    One driver explained to me that they now can see the route of the ride in advance and it’s a game changer for them as they can reject the shortest and the longest rides which are less profitable for them and not go to places they don’t like. But it makes life difficult for passengers

• Spaghetti Town says:

  7 Nov7 November 14:22

  One uber driver told me last week he makes £4k per month for a 50 hour week. drives a hybrid to minimise fuel costs, not bad going that.

  • Aston100 says:

    7 Nov7 November 14:51

    The maths doesn’t seem to add up.

    • Spaghetti Town says:

      7 Nov7 November 15:16

      possibly not. no idea how it works if im honest, he did say his hybrid only cost him £100 a week in fuel, that will bump your bottom line up a bit.

      • TGLoyalty says:

        7 Nov7 November 20:49

        Wear and tear isn’t free either. Easily forgotten.

  • Colin MacKinnon says:

    7 Nov7 November 16:44

    Turnover is vanity, profit is sanity!

    So he may get £20 an hour in income, but what is left after expenses to pay him?

• Max says:

  7 Nov7 November 15:05

  Bolt and Free Now are often cheaper.

  • Lady London says:

    7 Nov7 November 21:16

    I haven’t found Uber to be any cheaper than black cab around Zones 1-2. Based on very limited no. of journeys though

• Comrade says:

  7 Nov7 November 15:13

  Rob, I remember you mentioned that you have sent a set of questions to Barclays regarding the 100k offer and an article answering those was due. Is that still the case?

  • Rob says:

    7 Nov7 November 15:50

    No feedback received.

• Stu_N says:

  7 Nov7 November 15:14

  Uber has been totally unreliable recently, I have virtually given up on them. Used (or tried to!) in several UK cities – either you can’t get a car or your 4-5 minute wait turns out to be 10, the driver sits on the booking for a few mins then cancels. One driver I spoke to says they basically all run 2 or more apps – they will bag the Uber trip and then wait a few mins and see if something more lucrative comes along before setting off. If it does, they bin Uber.

  There’s no penalty to them of doing so from Uber and doesn’t affect their driver rating as the trip never completes but it is really infuriating for a customer.

  • Londonsteve says:

    14 Nov14 November 13:11

    That squares with my recent experience. Uber suggested a 5 minute wait for a car from a north London suburb into central London. The app churned for a good 90 seconds before the job was accepted, then I see the car is stationary a good 10 minutes drive from me and it took over 5 minutes before he started to head towards me. From order to car arrival it was nearly 20 minutes, not the 5 mins promised at the outset. I guess based on other people’s experiences here I was lucky to even get a car. My average score is 4.9.

• Tim P says:

  7 Nov7 November 16:05

  Another one who has experienced poor availability (east London). Of my last two attempts, the first was given as 4 mins but cancelled after 15 mins. The second was 15 minutes wait after the app steadily increased the waiting time. That driver took two wrong turnings further delaying me.

• Can says:

  7 Nov7 November 17:10

  That is good, especially the A Lee drama with Plat.

• Can says:

  7 Nov7 November 17:10

  That is good, especially *after* the A Lee drama with Plat.

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