RIDEGURU
Any drivers able to pinpoint a trend of which type of rides hit drivers with lower ratings?
i suspect pool/shared rides generate more lower ratings as more can go wrong with added stops, extra wait times, etc.
any thoughts?
Do lower ratings for drivers come predominantly from Pool/Shared rides vs. regular or spread is about the same
LG-PA
810
Driver
Posted 6 years ago
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Leonard Girsh (LG-PA)
810
Driver
Ride Apprentice from Southampton, PA
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JPoland
179
Driver
Driver
Here is the news: Passengers rate the ride and not the driver.
Social dynamics of when people share a ride affect the ratings. If riders are matched up with others that are pleasant, they will rate higher and vice versa.
I don't necessarily blame them for doing this. One it's human nature. Two, they should somehow provide feedback to Uber that their experience wasn't great. No, the drivers shoudn't get dinged for this, something out of their control, but I see why customers would incorporate how their experience was.
I feel like I need to intervene to how people are reacting all the time. Say when a guy starts hitting on a girl and she is obviously a bit uncomfortable. No, we shouldn't have to be responsible for that, but I do take it on myself to make the experience a good for everyone.
Tough topic.
Comments
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Here is the news: Passengers rate the ride and not the driver.
Social dynamics of when people share a ride affect the ratings. If riders are matched up with others that are pleasant, they will rate higher and vice versa.
I don't necessarily blame them for doing this. One it's human nature. Two, they should somehow provide feedback to Uber that their experience wasn't great. No, the drivers shoudn't get dinged for this, something out of their control, but I see why customers would incorporate how their experience was.
I feel like I need to intervene to how people are reacting all the time. Say when a guy starts hitting on a girl and she is obviously a bit uncomfortable. No, we shouldn't have to be responsible for that, but I do take it on myself to make the experience a good for everyone.
Tough topic.
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This is very true. It is almost a systemic problem where Uber holds the drivers responsible for the user's experience. Sure, the driver have a huge impact on the experience of the customer, but there are things that are outside of their control. The carsharing of Uber Pool is definitely one of them.
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Let me start by saying that I don't have any problem with UberPool. I'm gladly accepting all the UberPool requests because I always get incentives and promotions and UberPool actually help me achieve them. Most drivers who complain about UberPool are the ones that don't get any incentives. I came to realization that Uber reward drivers who accept Pool requests with incentives (No uber didn't pay me to say that, its just an observation).
Well, the only problem I have with UberPool is bad ratings. Here are some of the reasons why Uber riders rate badly:
1. They think that they can outsmart the system by calling in UberPool and keep the trip to themselves. Maybe it worked for them several times and it became a norm for them to only request UberPool even when they are late for work. Guess what buddy, Uber will add a second request automatically and yes you will be late at work. Of course, it is so easy to take it on the driver.
2. Some UberPool riders think that they can social with others (…Let me start by saying that I don't have any problem with UberPool. I'm gladly accepting all the UberPool requests because I always get incentives and promotions and UberPool actually help me achieve them. Most drivers who complain about UberPool are the ones that don't get any incentives. I came to realization that Uber reward drivers who accept Pool requests with incentives (No uber didn't pay me to say that, its just an observation).
Well, the only problem I have with UberPool is bad ratings. Here are some of the reasons why Uber riders rate badly:
1. They think that they can outsmart the system by calling in UberPool and keep the trip to themselves. Maybe it worked for them several times and it became a norm for them to only request UberPool even when they are late for work. Guess what buddy, Uber will add a second request automatically and yes you will be late at work. Of course, it is so easy to take it on the driver.
2. Some UberPool riders think that they can social with others (Example a guy wants to talk to a girl). I noticed that some girls are not interested to talk. They just say hi and mind their own business. Well guess what, the guy will take their frustration on the driver with bad rating. So much for the UberPool social experiment.
3. UberPool requestors are cheap riders who are mad at the world. They want to save as much money as possible, even if it is few cents. Since they are mad at the world, they assume that you are taking their money. If the ride is not free, they are not happy. How do they express their anger? bad rating of the driver.
4. As a driver, I don't mind to talk to cool people. You can tell that if the person wants to talk or mind their business playing with their phone. With UberPool, you can get two parties, the ones that want to talk and the ones that would like to keep quite. It could be that if you talk, the quite party will rate you bad because you are annoying them. If you do not talk, the talkative party will rate you bad because they want to live the ultimate Uber Experience where you have to pamper them.
I know many people just would tell me, don't do UberPool. I will keep doing it because I'm a driver with incentives all the time. It is just I wish Uber would not allow UberPool riders to rate. Or you only take the higher rate from any trip that has multiple rides.Show Hide 1 Reply-
Thank you for the detailed response
I suspect you drive full time or a big chunk of time for good incentives. From what I can tell Uber will send incentives to all drivers but fine tune them to the match driver’s performance in terms of qty of rides given. I for example do not do many rides and my incentives that are sent out by Uber every Thursday are around $15 for completing 12 rides, and $5.50 for consecutive rides. That is what I get because I do not drive much and I do not do pools for all the reasons you outlined in such great detail. If I was indeed chasing incentives as I occasionally do, such as one I described above and all I need to get the $15 bone is one or two rides, I will take a pool and hope they get an add in passenger as every added passenger is consider a separate ride ;)
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I stay away from pool unless I am bored or nothing else coming in. I will not accept a pool request unless their rating is above a 4.9. I did a little study of my own. If pool rider is below a 4.9 its because they are a short ride and never tip (based on 20 pool trips over past 6 months). I had 1 out of 20 that had a 4.84 rating was short trip less than 3 miles but tipped 3.00 cash. Very nice girlI don't know why she had a lower rating. Ten pool rides 4.90 rating or better were 8/12 mile trips 4 out 10 tipped 1.00 to 3.00. If every driver in US declined pool trips maybe Uber would have to remove it. Although doubtful because dear old Dara wants Uber to be all pool trips one day as he stated in an article.
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Beginning to think that pool riders are the issue. Haven't been accepting pool lately. Past 2 weeks took 4 pool trips accidently while texting or going to log out for the day. One trip was 3 pool riders one of them was a nightmare that made all of us uncomfortable. Got 1 4 star rating dropped from 4.95 to 4.94. I am tired of the whole rating system. Its a bunch of BS. If you get a passenger from point a to point b safely, you drive safely, your car is neat, clean and smells good, you do not get lost, you are respectful and pleasant, only talk if rider wants to why the hell would you rate that driver less than 5 stars? People are nice to your face then hide behind their phone to rate you less than 5 stars. When a driver has 482 5 star trips and 17 people rate under 5 stars what does that tell.you? I'm sure 482 people dont lie or give you 5 stars for the hell of it.. If you consistently do the same thing and act same way for every rider it seems like the problem lies with th…
Beginning to think that pool riders are the issue. Haven't been accepting pool lately. Past 2 weeks took 4 pool trips accidently while texting or going to log out for the day. One trip was 3 pool riders one of them was a nightmare that made all of us uncomfortable. Got 1 4 star rating dropped from 4.95 to 4.94. I am tired of the whole rating system. Its a bunch of BS. If you get a passenger from point a to point b safely, you drive safely, your car is neat, clean and smells good, you do not get lost, you are respectful and pleasant, only talk if rider wants to why the hell would you rate that driver less than 5 stars? People are nice to your face then hide behind their phone to rate you less than 5 stars. When a driver has 482 5 star trips and 17 people rate under 5 stars what does that tell.you? I'm sure 482 people dont lie or give you 5 stars for the hell of it.. If you consistently do the same thing and act same way for every rider it seems like the problem lies with the 17 passengers. If rider rates driver under 5 stars we should be able to find out why. Cant fix something that we dont know about. Uber claims that riders dont know what we rate them. Suppose they take Uber once a week, once a month, etc... obviously when their rating drops they can figure out what driver rated them below 5. #ratingsystemsucks or #deleteratingsystem :) Would love to go to their job and be able to rate them. No more pool for me. I will be extra careful not to accept pool. As I am composing this comment a ride request came in for pool almost accepted it. Lol
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Yup, I am glad you too are starting to think that Pools are the culprit of lower ratings. I actually do not see a point for a part time driver to do pool rides at all unless part time consists of making 100's of rides per week where a driver actually is trying to hit a quest for a bonus. I could never hit any such quests because I do not drive anywhere close to hitting such numbers of rides. Or if a driver is starving for fares (but that just tells me the driver has no plan as to where to be and where to be to get rides). Many drivers still think acceptance rate is important - it is not! Why would a driver want to do more work for less pay (pools), why would a driver expose themselves to lower ratings? not sure.
Just for kicks I did 1 pool on Saturday night under destination filter., willingly accepted a 4.69 rated pool rider (wanted to prove my point) and it worked like a charm:)
This ride earned me 1 star, my guess is because many pool riders are so cheap that they will actually g…
Yup, I am glad you too are starting to think that Pools are the culprit of lower ratings. I actually do not see a point for a part time driver to do pool rides at all unless part time consists of making 100's of rides per week where a driver actually is trying to hit a quest for a bonus. I could never hit any such quests because I do not drive anywhere close to hitting such numbers of rides. Or if a driver is starving for fares (but that just tells me the driver has no plan as to where to be and where to be to get rides). Many drivers still think acceptance rate is important - it is not! Why would a driver want to do more work for less pay (pools), why would a driver expose themselves to lower ratings? not sure.
Just for kicks I did 1 pool on Saturday night under destination filter., willingly accepted a 4.69 rated pool rider (wanted to prove my point) and it worked like a charm:)
This ride earned me 1 star, my guess is because many pool riders are so cheap that they will actually give driver 1 star and report to Uber that driver was (pick one) just to get the $6.00 fare reimbursed - cheap asses
I called Uber to see when the 1 star came in (I did not want to know who left it, as I already know) but just wanted to see if they would at least say it came this week, or last month. Uber asked me to wait 2 minutes while their checking their resources (Let me get the manager used car trick), came back on the line and said they do not ahve this information - idiots - why hold me on the line for two minutes then :) lol.
Luckily my rating is still at 4.92 on Uber so one 1 star is not draggin me down too bad, but certainly will not do any pools any more.
So any drivers out there who are hovering around 4.7 in ratings, cut out the pools until your ratings get back up to 4.8+, or better cut them out completely.
Check out this link - a requst I got the other day, which I declined of course. I would hate to be a driver trying to hit 4 rides streak for $16.00 or whatever peanuts Lyft offers and my 4th ride to complete the streak be the one on the pic:) - are they really thinking a driver will drive 30 minutes to get to the passenger, wait for the passenger to come out for additional 5 minutes and then give the passenger a 2 mile ride in traffic which will take another 10-5 minutes to get paid $3.57 at the end - gas and maintenace cost will outweigh the fare :), No wonder I have an orange banner reminding me of my low (3%) acceptance rate
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1IRytIuX7fp9VoaMOUheCBCdEO-xUW8MJ/view?usp=sharing
I hope no driver out there would actually accept such a request (regardless of circumstances) :)
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I was a 4.96/4.98 driver before pool/shared. When I started taking those rides my ratings tanked to 4.90/4.91. (in only 3 weeks) Since refusing to take any sort of shared rides, my ratings have rebounded to 4.94 and 4.99.
Analyse that however you choose.
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Numbers speak for themselves
my retiree uncle just got canned by Uber for low ratings which I suspect were due to a combination of him being new and pool/shared rides which he undoubtedly screwed up a few times being new.
had to pay $49 to take useless online class to get reinstated. I told him no more pools or shared rides unless it is a 45+ min shared ride from uber or he is is in destination filter heading home at end of shift. Will see if that helps. He was at 4.23 when got sacked on Monday, slowly creeping up now at 4.29 ( nothing to brag about I know) lol.
hopefully by eliminating 95% pools and shared rides his ratings will go up
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Sorry to hear about your Uncle. I hate to say it but it also depends on the neighborhoods you drive in. I personally dont notice a difference. I started driving Uber XL approx. 2 months ago but not enough request. I also drive Uber X which includes pool. Since I started driving XL I have cut down ion the pool trips because of my gas mileage went from Ford Focus to Honda Pilot. My rating stays between 4.93 and 4.94. I will keep saying this even though it doesnt change anything. Why cant people tell you what the issue is on the ride? Its too hot, too cold, can you change the music, i would like some quiet time, or I am bored talk to me. I had a son order Uber for his mom. He texted me and said mom is going through menopause and is always hot can you put air on? Needs help with her bags can you please help? I thought that was great. I made sure car was cool and helped her with bags. I got 5 stars and 20.00 tip for helping with 5 light bags. Now lets say son didnt …
Sorry to hear about your Uncle. I hate to say it but it also depends on the neighborhoods you drive in. I personally dont notice a difference. I started driving Uber XL approx. 2 months ago but not enough request. I also drive Uber X which includes pool. Since I started driving XL I have cut down ion the pool trips because of my gas mileage went from Ford Focus to Honda Pilot. My rating stays between 4.93 and 4.94. I will keep saying this even though it doesnt change anything. Why cant people tell you what the issue is on the ride? Its too hot, too cold, can you change the music, i would like some quiet time, or I am bored talk to me. I had a son order Uber for his mom. He texted me and said mom is going through menopause and is always hot can you put air on? Needs help with her bags can you please help? I thought that was great. I made sure car was cool and helped her with bags. I got 5 stars and 20.00 tip for helping with 5 light bags. Now lets say son didnt text ahead. Car wasnt cool enough and I didnt help with bags. Mom gets in doesnt ask for me to make it cooler and doesnt ask for help with bags. Mom gets home and gives 1 star. That couldve been avoided. Maybe if Uber put a few icons to choose from talk, no talk, rider wants to choose music, rider wants AC or heat. That could eliminate some issues. I am going to try and add a sign to my car this week and see if it changes anything. Not getting into details now but if it helps with ratings and/or tips I will share details. We are not mind readers we cant fix whats bothering you if you dont tell us whats wrong. Maybe Uber should have a checklist that rider can check off instead of choosing stars if there was something they feel should be changed or done differently. Give rider choice of rating 1 to 5 stars or just doing check list or both. Give them a choice. If they thought it was too cold for example instead of taking star away for that maybe they would just check that off but still give 5 stars. Uber could explain the rating system better. For example the pain scale 0 no pain at all 10 worst pain ever, never felt pain this bad. It's too harsh and not explained well. Uber doesnt care they have done nothing to address or fix the rating system.
In short no I personally dont notice a trend.
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The 5 Star rating system where 4.6 (92%) is a failing grade is pretty stupid.
not sure I would like my tests be graded on such scale. “Imagine a 5th grade teacher announcing to class. The test you are about to take has 5 questions so every questions has a weight of 20 %, but if you get even half of only one answer wrong you fail, by the way we will have students from another school district that does not have same curriculum grade your tests” what a marvelous system.
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As I mentioned in my response to JPoland, the problem lies in how Uber considers the User Reviews as Driver Ratings. There is a misalignment here because users are using the rating system to provide their feedback on the entire experience, not just the driver's function. Some things are outside of driver's control, such as how Uber's app works, how Uber's customer service is, Uber Pool's experience and who else were in the car, etc.
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Oh definitely, pool is the bane of my existence. Such cheap passengers, never get any tips either. I think my rating dropped from a 4.92 to 4.87 with pool rides.
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I have heard a lot of drivers speculating on this, however, I personally have never seen a trend with pool/non-pool ratings. Just a trend with jerks and non-jerks lol
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The worst is when the passenger gets mad for being picked up AND dropped off last.
I've had some mean comments and some claim discrimination for what *I* did. I always try to explain it but regardless of whether they get it or not, they are sure to leave a crappy review.
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Not to mention how many passengers abuse the UberPool by using it to get further discounts. Say on short trips when they know the chance is low to be paired with someone.
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...and those people who lie that they thought they ordered an UberX and start asking for things. Say like making an extra stop to pick up a friend. Really pushing it guys.
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I sense a lot of aggravation from drivers doing pool rides in this post - why are drivers still doing them? I stopped doing all pools and shared rides months ago for all the reasons that are surfacing in this post.
My colleague who also happen to drive for Lyft told me yesterday that he drove a firefighter on pool who was describing gruesome scenes from job ( driver was only listening) they picked up a copassenger, firefighter kept blabbering, 3 min later copassenger asked for car to be stopped so he can get out early (way before destination )
Left a 1 Star to my colleague and a nasty feedback. Losers at Lyft of course contacted my friend to say something along the lines “watch what you say during ride” and now all of a sudden they are running another background check on him for now 3 weeks.
Pools are nothing but headaches and at a lower pay
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Why would you ever listen to them? Just tell them that UberPool rides are set in stone and that you cannot do anything about it.
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UberPool = Bad Ratings
I am not sure if I'd say predominantly. However, there are plenty of factors for them leaving bad ratings and no factors for leaving good ratings.
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Great fricki'n question, and you hit the nail on the head. Reduced customer service means reduced ratings. Hurting big time.
You may argue that lowered price will entice people to rate higher, but nope. I don't think that's how people's minds work.
