But seeing this, it's neither sophisticated nor malicious. They changed their customer pricing model from time-and-miles to fixed-price. That doesn't defraud anyone. And of course Uber is going to balance their increased risk (i.e., that their estimate is too low) against better profitability and customer experience.
Like, duh.
Similarly, Uber didn't change their pricing model for drivers. It's still time-and-miles. You can certainly argue that drivers should get "more", but are drivers willing to shoulder the increased risk as well? I could see this story going the other way: Uber Slams Drivers With Increased Risk, Lower Pay with an example of some driver getting paid $10 for some crazy-long trip during a snowstorm.
I was also very confused about this -- I am a heavy Uber user and was under the impression that I was paying a flagfall plus minutes & kilometers rate.
There's a hint about my confusion in what I just said above: I'm from Australia, where drivers are considered contractors by the Australian Tax Office and must know the gross amount charged for the purposes of calculating their GST (a 10% VAT) burden.
I suspect that Uber aren't able to bring upfront pricing in here without a considerable fight.
https://qz.com/874224/this-year-you-wont-wake-up-to-a-shocki...
But seeing this, it's neither sophisticated nor malicious. They changed their customer pricing model from time-and-miles to fixed-price. That doesn't defraud anyone. And of course Uber is going to balance their increased risk (i.e., that their estimate is too low) against better profitability and customer experience.
Like, duh.
Similarly, Uber didn't change their pricing model for drivers. It's still time-and-miles. You can certainly argue that drivers should get "more", but are drivers willing to shoulder the increased risk as well? I could see this story going the other way: Uber Slams Drivers With Increased Risk, Lower Pay with an example of some driver getting paid $10 for some crazy-long trip during a snowstorm.