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It seems to me that the best way for Uber to implement surge pricing without the public relations fallout would be to combine it with UberPool: Instead of "surg
by cperciva 12y ago
It seems to me that the best way for Uber to implement surge pricing without the public relations fallout would be to combine it with UberPool: Instead of "surge pricing hours" have "car pool hours". Tell Uber customers that because there's so many people trying to go places right now, they'll have to share... and if they really don't want to share a ride, well, they'll have to pay extra for that privilege. Suddenly the story ceases to be "Uber is an evil company which hikes their rates during peak periods" and turns into "Some Uber customers are selfish and don't want to share".
- krasin 12y agoAs it's noted in the article, surge prices may be up to 8x higher, and it's unlikely that car pool means 8 people in a car.
- dnautics 12y agoUber typically locks surge down to 3x and only lets it go higher if there is a specific reason to think that demand will be unusually high. My understanding is that the surge can only tick up if there has been a accepted request at the lower level in the timeframe, e.g., you can't get to 3x unless someone requested a ride a 2.75x. I've heard that surge once went to 11x. But that means that someone wanted a ride a 3.25x, 3.5x, 3.75x, etc. and so on including 10.5x, 10.75x, etc.
- Vik1ng 12y agoI don't think that will work well, when one of the main surge hours are like 2-3AM on the weekend.
- dpweb 12y agoThis outrage about the surge pricing is really just some more first-world complaining. Prices have to float freely. It goes badly when artificial influences come into play, in short, when we muck with it. When they stop the surge pricing, the same people will be complaining when its busy there's no Ubers around to pick them up.