I think I know the answer to this, but has anyone used Uber?
We got an Uber last night about 6.30. It was the first time I’d used it & put in the full address instead of just postcode, but no fare came up, just said something about there being a ‘surge ‘. When we got in the car I told the driver & he changed the address on my phone (we were going to Crayford) still no fare came up.
About an hour later I got an e-mail saying our fare was £32.26, a surge 1.5 charge had been added! So we paid just over £10 extra! My daughter & others have highly recommended Uber & I must say if I’m out with friends there is always someone who orders one home & we split the fare. Has this happened to anyone else? I have e-mailed them & complained, just waiting for a reply. We didn’t get one back, went the traditional mini cab service & found out how much it would be beforehand.
Uber
I have used Uber loads of times and never had an issue - even splitting journeys between three destinations hasn’t been a problem them and the fare has always been obvious. However their model is directly responsive to demand and prices do go up if there is access demand.
I guess the mark of a good company is how they respond when things go wrong so let us know how get on…
Thanks Nick, yes I will.
Hi Nick,
They replied & said exactly what you have said! I understand what they are saying, but even my daughter didn’t know what I was talking about. I e-mailed them back & said it’s not put clearly on the app when downloading, so in a rush & confusion & being a 1st time user on our own, I still didn’t see the price or take it in properly!
Anyway they have refunded the £10 this time as a goodwill gesture. If & when I use them again I will take my time & scrutinise the payment before accepting 
So was the price displayed but you didn’t see it or understand how surge pricing works? If that’s the case, I think it’s pretty decent of them to compensate you. I had an issue this week with an Uber ride that wasn’t their fault and there wasn’t much they could directly do for me as I wasn’t the person who booked the ride, but they did their best with limited information and were very helpful in getting a difficult situation resolved.
Yes it’s exactly that! If I had been made aware of the ‘surge ‘ that happens sometimes I would have looked out for it & could have made a informed decision there & then. Still a lesson learnt & I will be able to make an informed decision in the future
I recall once that surge pricing notifications were displayed in large numbers and you were prompted to confirmm you were aware by accepting.
That said, since the app upgrade I dont recall that level of warning. When kast I used Uber there was a surge of 1.3x but I think only noted in smaller print on the screen before I ordered the car.
Am I right? Has how Uber notifies of surge pricing changed?
I wish it had been in big letters, then after I found out the meaning (ie how much etc) I would be able to read it better!
For a while they removed it’s visibility from the fare estimation info altogether. I think it was still present when you attempted to hail tho. I think they reversed this though, and now it’s visible again.
It’s got to be visible hasn’t it? Transparency & all that!
If you’re getting transparency it’s only because they think that is better for them.
Oh yes I know that! 
Just a shame they didn’t make a transparent explanation about surging prices for customers to read when we download the app!
So this is what you used to get.
But it appears from 2016 this disappeared. Now I’ve only seen a small notice above the quotes given for the various Uber services. While Uber may suggest this simplifies the app, I’m not convinced that is the objective. When I’ve been informed of a surge price even of 1.5x that’s when I tend to consider alternate services.
Personally I think the bigger sign is better, but with so many people now using uber customers are used to it & I will know better next time. My whole argument was that nothing was put in writing explaining this or an alert for first time customers so you know then & for the future. With so much health & safety & PC I would have thought it was a natural thing to do in our ‘suing ‘ world not that I was going to do anything like that , but it happens doesn’t it?
I used an Uber the other night and had to confirm acceptance of the 1.2 surge price. Is this back?
I’m becoming more impatient with Uber and the quality of their services. I like their prices but reliability is even more important.
I and the OH have been besieged by cancellations of late. Coming home from the National last Thursday we had three cars accept the fare only then to cancel. Probably at least one in four cars now cancel their journey… and I have a rider rating of 4.91!
Tempting in-app maps also show at least three cars within a few streets and a car only a couple of minutes away. Yet when I confirm the request more frequently there’s a few minutes while the app finds a car. Apparently driver’s now see the estimated travel time and if over 45 minutes they can refuse. Given the often lon
And one you get the car you can watch the time to pick up stall or increase as they make wrong turns or miss them altogether and then sometimes cancel.
Uber has its place. Prices are great, but more frequently I have to accept that getting an Uber may be the hard bit.
That is what happened with us. I suppose if you are in a hurry or no other means of getting a cab home, then I suppose you have no choice but to accept, unless you wait till the surge is over? But if as you say they are getting unreliable… Black cabs have in the past refused to take a fare if it has been out of their way late at night, so I maybe Uber drivers are starting to do the same if it doesn’t suit? Maybe contact Uber direct & ask them, they may not be aware drivers are doing it?
If Uber becomes unreliable and there is a risk they will leave me waiting, they will lose their USP for me and I’ll go back to Addison Lee. Expensive but completely reliable.
Black cabs who did so were acting outside their licensing terms. I’ve on more than one occasion reported cabs to the Public Carriage Office. The ability to decline 45+ minute journeys is part of a number of changes Uber have been quietly making over the last few months. The other is the reduction of the free cancellation time from 5 minutes to 2 minutes and the introduction of an algorithm to determine the cancellation charge when it is applied. The customer has no recourse though.
In fairness Rachael I find them best to originate a journey TO the Centre of London from my house rather than the return. I also find them pretty good for local journeys except for pick-ups at Bell Green Sainsburys. They just cannot seem to figure out how to get into the area.
Yeah, I think they brought it back after making it less explicit.
They can see your rating before they accept, but not your destination. I suspect at this time they just wanted to buzz around zone 1. I try to always complain when this happens because it undermines the system.
For me it’s always been like this… strange and annoying, but ultimately not very important so long as the estimated time is accurate.
Which give some credence to my concern. Driver accepts the fare. Sees the travel time as 45+. Then cancels hoping for something better. Repeat three times and then use Gett London. We complained. There were sorry.
Actually - thinking about this again I think perhaps something has changed here. It used to be that they could not see your destination until they had physically picked you up - hence why a couple of times I have had them phone me and ask my destination and then cancel. Last time I refused to give my destination and he cancelled anyway. But to your point about how annoying it is - agreed, but I am still using it.
After reading all the comments above including yours of course, I’m getting more & more reluctant to use them again, especially if they have reduced the tone to cancel to 2 mins! Maybe getting too big for their boots comes to mind 
think I’ll stick to good old Forest Hill cars, at least I know where I am with them & can complain on the phone if necessary.
What does help is that uber has changed the playing field a bit so there are many more services available online and with apps. I mainly use uber from central London out as have no idea which would be local cab company and have had black cabs quote ridiculously high numbers (I know should be metered but having that discussion at past midnight as lone female…). Getting to or from Gatwick or similar prefer to take local company as they actually know the roads. Some uber drivers end up on ridiculously tiny roads with tons of speed bumps as supposedly quickest route which invariably it isn’t.
Yes I agree, getting home from London it would be good to use Uber, but as @starman said some drivers are now refusing fares, so I think what you are saying about having a choice is a good idea, so it makes things more competitive, so long as they are safe. It’s a mind field isn’t it
I was told by a driver that some of them have 2 jobs- one working for Uber, the other for one of the conventional minicab companies. If they have accepted a Uber job and then get a better job offer from their other Company they’ll cancel the Uber job.
I have stopped using Uber - too many cancellations, no office to speak to except by email, drivers from other parts of London who don’t know the area and follow satnave blindly, often going miles out of their way.
We recently had a nightmare getting back a phone left in the back of an Uber because the only way to contact the driver is via the person who booked the ride, and that person was uncooperative (teenagers, don’t ask). Uber themselves were polite and as helpful as they could be, but the system is locked tight.
Sounds reasonable to me - and at least with Uber you have an app that tracks your rides and allows these matters to be resolved. If you’d caught a black cab, how would you get back in touch with the driver?
I agree it’s perfectly reasonable, but it’s a situation worth being aware of. I don’t know about black cabs, but with a minicab this particular situation would have been easier to resolve. If my son had been the one that booked the Uber, then it certainly would have been resolved easily and quickly.
Uber provide a safe and convenient service for my teenager and his friends, but if other minicab services start to provide better access via apps and are more reliable, Uber will have to up their game and iron out these perhaps unanticipated problems with drivers increasing cancellations.
The only thing is that if they are via apps it’s stoll going to be a case of getting in touch with them via e-mail if we have a problem. I know today’s world consists of e-mail, text, twitter etc…but sometimes having someone you can talk to on the phone is preferable so you can converse straight away & not bat answers backwards & forwards while waiting for each other’s reply’s, or am I just being ‘old-fashioned ‘? 
Not the case - traditional minicab companies are now beginning to use booking apps. But there is still an office and a phone number for when you want to speak to a person, or get immediate information.
Oh yes now I think about it…That’s good then, Uber take note
I had an issue with an Uber in Miami - driver left his meter going and we were overcharged. I used the support chat feature in the app, took 30 secs. Of course, all the records and the GPS track were already in the hands of Uber support so I didn’t need to prove anything, or make any effort to identify the driver.
I got on with my holiday and within half an hour the cost of the whole trip had been refunded back to my card and I received an apology.
I’m really glad I didn’t have to call some minicab office to negotiate a refund, where it would have been my word against the driver’s.
Rarely had bad experiences with Uber, and found it to be cheaper and more convenient than black cabs and minicabs. I don’t take consumer choice for granted, and I abhor efforts by TfL / Sadiq Khan to remove my choice of Uber from the marketplace
As I said, Chris, if my son had been the person who booked the ride the situation would have been very easily resolved, More so than with either a black cab or minicab.
What this thread is quite rightly highlighting is that Uber need to keep on top of their already good game if they want to retain their USP.
I seldom hail a black cab from the road. The My Taxi and Gett Taxi apps work in a similar way to the other apps like Uber. Unlike Uber though you can speak directly to the driver and with Gett you have the option of fixibg the fare before you order the car. Neither disclose the destination to the driver and of course black cabs operate ubder Hackney Carriage rules. are generally quicker.
Yes. Black cabs are generally more expensive though I find them compatible with Uber when they are surge pricing. These apps along with other competitors also send out lots of discount vouchers. I’ve usually got a few £5 ones hanging around.
Oh. That’s new. Thanks.
No it’s not, it’s been there for many years.
You can also call the driver after the ride using the app - you make the request, Uber calls your phone (or the number of your choice) and then connects you to a call with the driver’s mobile phone.
Yes I did speak to the driver of Uber before he arrived, as the wrong destination (my fault) had been put in & he was very pleasant & helpful, but I still agree with @RachaelDunlop with her comments about Uber. Also I wouldn’t get a black cab unless absolutely essential as I know what their prices are like & agree that they have not been regulated properly as well. If we have choice, then we can choose what we use, you obviously are in great favour of Uber which is fine.