As Uber stands at the doorstep of its initial public offering (IPO), Uber drivers cry out: “They treat us like crap!” If the face of your company complains to your customers that they’re poor and mistreated, why should investors pour $90 billion into an business that has vigorous competition from Lyft and others, and virtually no barrier to entry, since it’s essentially just an app? And what does this say about capitalism itself?
Categories
Poor Mistreated Uber Drivers Cry Out on Eve of $90 Billion IPO
As Uber stands at the doorstep of its initial public offering (IPO), Uber drivers cry out: “They treat us like crap!” If the face of your company complains to your customers that they’re poor and mistreated, why should investors pour $90 billion into an business that has vigorous competition from Lyft and others, and virtually no barrier to entry, since it’s essentially just an app? And what does this say about capitalism itself?
16 replies on “Poor Mistreated Uber Drivers Cry Out on Eve of $90 Billion IPO”
There’s a Mexican restaurant in my town. Everything is very simple. The food is basic Tex-Mex. Even the silverware looks like it was bought from Army surplus. However, at lunchtime the owner shakes the hand of every arriving customer and treats them like his long lost family. The place is packed and if you don’t get there early, you’ll never get in. Uber should remember that short term thinking yields short term results.
Bill, I loved the story about how your Dad treated customers. I guess the adage “The customer is always right” is true. We all need to learn how to improve our serve.
Maybe I am lucky that Uber turned me down simply because my immaculate, but 16 year old car was 1 year too old.
Wow, didn’t know they had that requirement. We have three vehicles. Two are of the early aughts vintage, the other is also 5 plus, but a 2-door, ragtop. Not an uber type vehicle.
Bill, your anecdote about the doorman struck home with me. My cousin didn’t go to college. He started working as a doorman at a nice hotel, worked his way up to concierge. Now matre d at very nice NYC restaurant. He moved up precisely because of the skill set you mentioned. Treating everyone as returning family.
I wonder if there is a difference of opinion on driving for uber or lyft depending on where you live, small urban area vs large one. In my small SW VA town, my wife and I take uber anytime we go out. As you might gather, I did enjoy my whisky. So 2-3 times per month. All drivers have been very positive. They choose when to drive. Rates change on some supply and demand model. Concert downtown, lots of people looking for rides. But due to the relatively small size of the “city”, there are not that many drivers. So the ones there are make decent money. Also, cost of living is less so as a side hustle it can work. If it were LA, with longer distances and traffic issues, probably not nearly as enticing.
Bill, agree with you about customer service.
I use Zipcar for my car rental needs since I just do day trips.
My only bad experience with them was the previous driver walked away with the parking pass & the gas card. I notified them about this & they said they would reimburse me for my expenses.
When I got back home, my credit card company had sent me a notice that they rebated me two hours rental cost on the car. One hour would have covered my expenses.
I don’t know about Uber, but being retired, I looked into driving for Lyft to bring in some mad money. It just wasn’t a financially viable venture. Even though you indicated what zone you wanted to drive in, you were offered rides up to 60 miles away and they would only pay for your gas one way, not to mention wear-tear on your car, tires, etc. You could refuse the ride, but if you refused too many, then you wouldn’t even get offered local rides. In the end, you were paid so little that it simply was not worthwhile.
That said, if you don’t like working for someone, you don’t have to.
I travel by taxi a lot and most taxi drivers are in small networks using cellphones to allocate rides and coordinate around the centralised monopoly. We never have to deal with the central dispatch and its long wait or robot voice app that can’t understand half the street names. Dispatchers that can’t find cars. Lost cab drivers. The muslim driver that thinks it is funny to park across the driveway of a church blocking everyone arriving while rebooting the billing machine.
SMS messages to trusted cab drivers with all their mates on speed dial is ten times cheaper than Uber. You can say pick me up at work and they already know the address. Its like having a chauffeur. Uber and lyft will have a niche but trusted cabbies with cellphones will always beat them in a small city.
The idea of Uber was bouncing around libertarian forums for mouths before it was created. Some of the names were sillier.
The best thing about an IPO is that we’ll get to see their financials. My suspicion is that they used debt to grow too fast and they can’t afford to keep executives, bondholders, lenders and drivers reasonably happy all at the same time. Possibly they’ll raise enough in an IPO to be able to fix that assuming they see it as a priority. I don’t really think they do though given their past decision to pump cash into a self-driving car division.
Steve. I like your granddad.
If it was on purpose, that was a lovely and touching Vonnegut reference.
If not, it was still lovely and touching.
It was on purpose.
I only do things on purpose by accident.
IIRC Uber started out as quite literally a ride sharing app. As in…
Bob: Hey, I gotta p/u my wife at the airport tomorrow morn at 9. Anyone need a ride?
Nancy: Yeah. I got a 11a flight. I could use a ride.
And you, the passenger, could voluntary kick in gas monies.
It was quite literally an app to match people who were going places w/ people who want to go places and need rides.