9 comments
Traveling via rideshares has become one of the easiest and cheapest modes of transportation over the past few years. However, the ridesharing world still hasn’t mastered how to conveniently cater to families with young children. Uber and Lyft, two of the biggest ridesharing companies, have recently started working towards making their vehicles more friendly for families with infants, toddlers, and young children. Take a look below for each company's guidelines on riding with kids.
Uber requires children who are of car seat age to be safely secured in an age appropriate seat for all rides. You are allowed to bring your own child seat into any Uber car service and secure the seat yourself. However, many riders would rather not lug their child’s car seat around after arriving at their destination.
Luckily, Uber does have some family friendly services in various cities around the world. Depending on the location, Uber’s family friendly service is either called Uber Car Seat or Uber Family. Both services will bring you a car already equipped with a forward facing car seat. Car seats accommodate children who are at least 1 years old and are between 22 and 48 pounds and 31 and 52 inches. If your child is younger than this than unfortunately you will need to bring your own carseat. Also a $10 surcharge is added to your ride cost when you choose one of these services.
Currently Uber Family/Car Seat is available in Philadelphia, NYC, Washington DC, Baltimore, Orlando, Istanbul Turkey, and Cluj and Bucharest Romania. To request a car simply open your Uber app while in one of these cities and choose the Family/Car Seat option.
Lyft, much like Uber, requires that young children are properly secured in a car seat whenever riding in one of their vehicles. You can bring your own car seat to secure into your Lyft rideshare vehicle if you would like.
Lyft also recently started offering car seat rides solely in NYC. Through Lyft Car Seat, you can request a car that has a forward-facing car seat. This will accommodate a child who is over 1 years old and weighs between 22 and 48 pounds and is 31 to 52 inches. The surcharge to use Lyft car seat is slightly less than Uber’s at $8.98, the rest of your ride will be charged at the standard Lyft rate. To request a Lyft car seat in NYC, open your Lyft app and choose the “car seat” option.
While we are covering popular rideshare services and their policies on taking young children, let’s take a look at how Taxis compare on this subject.
TaxiFareFinder has covered the rules regarding taking taxis with infants, toddlers, and young children thoroughly here but we will summarize their findings for you below!
The rules regarding taking young children in car seats vary widely from city to city. In some cities, such as NYC and Las Vegas, taxi cabs are exempt from the car seat law, and you are allowed to bring your little one in a taxi without a car seat if you wish. Other areas, such as the state of Massachusetts requires that all children are properly seated in a car seat while in a taxi and if you are found breaking this law you will be fined.
While the rules for car seats in taxis vary from region to region there is one constant, all taxi cabs will let you bring your own car seat to secure into their car and most taxi cabs will provide a car seat if you call ahead.
If you do wish to bring your own car seat along check out our top travel friendly car seats!
Have you traveled via Uber, Lyft, or Taxi with a young child? If so, share your pointers in the comments below!
RIDEGURU
Comments
sure, you can bring them but would you want a stranger driving your kids around?! I would rather just rent a car!
Why can't I just hold my child in my lap?
Maybe because it's illegal..?? Why would would want to do something so unsafe? If you get into a wreck your kid is dead.. come on.. great thinking.. 😒😒🖕
Haaa Haaa haaa.a. Too funny. However, I believe this practice is permitted in certain vehicles with certain licenses. For examples, taxis and car services with livery license. They have been exempt from carseat laws for along time. Now with UberX, that won't work, because they are real people cars.
I've been using Uber for about a year now on a weekly basis. I live in a smaller town in Eastern WA, so Uber hasn't been available too long. I have two kids and they both legally require a booster but I assumed Uber was exempt from this rule. There's absolutely nothing visible in the app regarding carseat rules or anything age related. Also, I've only had one driver ever bring up the carseat issue. Luckily, I found inflatable boosters that you can easily carry any where. I just find it incredibly strange that the app is completely silent regarding the rule. But I'm sure I could spend all day speculating why Uber doesn't put forth an effort to enforce guidelines that could alienate a potential customer base.
Right exactly. It's a conflict of interest. They'd rather not intentionally shrink their audience by excluding some people. Since many of the liability insurance falls on the drivers (as well as negligence), they really don't have a reason to advertise kids aren't allowed.
I will just bring a telephone book next time. Who says it has to be a specific booster.
Telephone book. LOL.
I think there are regulations for boosters. or maybe not. My kids are grown up. Then the drivers on the streets don't know anyways.
You know with taxis, those pesky carseat rules are exempt, right?
I'm really confused why you would think Uber would be an exception to the law requiring your kids be in a booster. It's not like the structure or safety of the vehicle is any different just because it's an uber. You can still get in an accident, and your kids can still be injured. I don't think it's weird that they don't have these laws posted. They vary by state and it's not their responsibility to know each state's carseat laws. It's your job. As the parent.