Comment by hattmall
1 day ago
Cheap and easy were the big factors, in roughly equal proportions, with a nod towards cheap. I did a lot of things I didn't need to do and just wouldn't have done at all if I would have had to pay taxi prices for several years while Ubers were cheap. Taxi's were also only easily available in very limited circumstances.
Taxi's here worked one of two ways. You either negotiated a price before leaving, or they ran a meter and went some crazy route then when you got to the destination clicked a bunch of buttons and the total went up by $15-$20.
When negotiating a price, it was usually $10 per person, for about a 3-4 mile ride, and they wouldn't take you right away if less than 4 people. They would encourage you to load like 8 or 10 people in (All Taxi's were vans) and would try to pick up other people along the way. Tipping was all but mandatory. So add another $2-3 per person.
Uber/Lyft on the other hand was $5-6 or $2-3 for the shared one. An SUV was like $12-$20 that could seat 7, and the whole booking on the phone and tracking was excellent. Uber was so cheap that I would frequently book them because it was easier than going down into the parking garage since I could just meet the Uber on the street.
A cheap ride in 5-10 minutes was available pretty much 24 hours a day. Now surge pricing was a whole different beast, but I never got caught in that.
Not only that, the first 2 years it was completely free. Because I got a $25 credit for signing up and then $25 for ever referral. I had a prepaid phone from some spring MVNO that let you change your number by just texting a shortcode. I would just make a new account every night before I went out and have $50 in free rides.
Now Lfyt and Uber are expensive, there's practically none available unless it's the middle of the day. Taxi's are down to pretty much $5 per person to go most places, but they are just completely destroyed unsafe cars. The last one I took was a longer ride $10 or $20 and it had no seat belts and the driver was so large I have no idea how he got in and out of the car.
I don't disagree. As a business traveler, it was probably about ease. When I'd go down to one of our other company locations semi-regularly, I'd usually grab a cab at the airport because it was easy. Going the other way, I'd usually grab a Lyft. The Lyft was a bit cheaper but eh.
I admit I'm usually taking public transit while traveling if it's reasonably convenient but cheaper ride-share (or taxi) options can tilt the balance when public transit is complicated/awkward. Rent a car for long distance and rural. (I did start using Uber/Lyft in some situations in areas like Silicon Valley where I would previously have reflexively rented a car.) Around where I live, driving my car is the only real alternative except in special cases. And I essentially always take a pre-booked private car back and forth to the airport.
So, for me, more about ease but if I tended to rely on taxi-type services in cities more, it would probably be more about cost which is probably the case with many people commenting here.