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Marketing is all they are. The driver aren't employees. The cars in the fleet aren't their assets. The insurance is handled by someone else and there is no lic
by themagician 7y ago
Marketing is all they are.
The driver aren't employees. The cars in the fleet aren't their assets. The insurance is handled by someone else and there is no licensing.
Uber, itself, is just an app with a giant marketing department. The app itself isn't even that different than it was in 2011. 99% of the functionality that people actually use is exactly the same as it was when they started.
- QuixoticQuibit 7y agoDoesn’t Uber also lease cars to drivers? I was surprised to see in the Bay Area that so many drivers had fairly new cars. I asked one about it and he said that Uber leased it out. Presumably a portion of the driver’s income goes directly towards the car.
- themagician 7y agoUber doesn’t directly. They just find partners who do.
- selectodude 7y ago100 percent of their income goes to the car until its paid off for that month, and the interest rate they charge to lease the car is downright usury. $200/wk to rent a Hyundai Elantra that Hyundai leases out at under $200/mo.
- UncleEntity 7y agoThe difference being that $200/wk covers everything but gas, lease a car direct from Hyundai and you have a lot more overhead to deal with -- maintenance, insurance, going over the "average miles" in a few months, &etc.
- sjg007 7y agoMost lease agreements now include maintenance. Why? Because they don't want you to run the car into the ground since then you'll just return it. Modern cars need oil changes at 10k miles. With a 30k lease you are talking 3 oil changes which is like $50 in wholesale cost. Brakes and tires should last the whole 30k.
- williamDafoe 7y agoNot exactly true. If you drive full-time for Lyft or Uber you MUST change the oil of your car EVERY MONTH. Leased Hyundai's don't see that kind of stress until a year goes by so the Lyft/Uber car is getting destroyed at least 4x more quickly.
- selectodude 7y agoDepreciation curves aren’t linear. At $20,000 which is the list price of the car (which is almost certainly overstating it) you’re depreciating the car to zero after two years. Even a beat to shit two year old car isn’t worth zero.
- freewilly1040 7y agoThe "just an app" critique is often repeated and makes no sense. The app is just the interface.
- themagician 7y agoThe interface is all their is. The drivers aren’t employees, and the cars aren’t theirs.