It's cheaper than Uber if you're the type of person to tip your Uber driver 20%. Very infrequently it's cheaper without tip, but usually it's a bit more expensive.
Crucially, it doesn't care if you ask it to drive into heavy traffic. I'm so over Uber giving me an estimated time for pickup, having the driver get within range to learn additional details about the trip, then cancelling on me because it doesn't fit their desires. I was late to a reservation a couple of weeks ago because I wanted to go downtown during Superbowl Weekend and an estimated 3 minute pickup morphed into a ~20 minute delay as I waited for an Uber driver to commit to the drive.
> I'm so over Uber giving me an estimated time for pickup, having the driver get within range to learn additional details about the trip, then cancelling on me because it doesn't fit their desires.
I remember waiting for a Lyft that was perpetually 8 minutes away, because driver after driver canceled the ride when they saw the destination and presumably didn't want to drive that far. After about 9 or so cancelations and about 45 minutes, I finally got a pickup. Not having to deal with that shit is worth a few extra bucks to me.
It's certainly going up in price as people get off the waitlist and the number of vehicles allowed in service stays fixed. I'm optimistic, though. I would travel a lot more if the price was cheaper, I assume Waymo has enough data to realize that, and they will act in a way that creates a larger market, rather than squeezing the existing market, once they have the legal ability to do so.
They don't really need to decrease in price so much as not increase in price. Human labor keeps getting more expensive while the tech is probably getting cheaper, if they are just competing with Uber/Lyft, they can wait this out. On the other hand, they could definitely grow the market for taxi-like services like Uber did when it initially came out, but without unsustainable VC subsidies.
I've tried them about three months ago. They're a good experience, but maybe slightly worse pickup/dropoff than an Uber, and no less expensive, so they're kinda more "fun to have done once," than anything else.
In SF, up-front prices have been comparable to Uber’s, except that you don’t have to pay tip, which automatically makes it 15–20% cheaper.
The few times I’ve tried it, the service has been good and its driving was safe. The only downside is that there seems to sometimes be longer wait times.
Legally, it’s not compulsory. Socially and culturally, it definitely is. In the US, if you don’t tip 15%, you’re either an asshole, or you’re saying there’s severe issues with the service.
I’m not going justify this culture—I don’t like it either—but that is the way it is.
I'm in the US and a frequent Uber users, and I've only tipped once over 10 years. My rating is 4.93, so I don't think the drivers see me as an asshole.
It is possible there exists a table called dbo.user_ratings with a boolean column called IsAsshole, and you might have tons of rows there all with a 1 on the boolean column but the Uber APIs don't return that value. CEO Travis could tell us if it exists
I have friends who tip and tbh when I don't get a ride, they don't get a ride and when they get a ride, I get a ride. So obviously the tipping means nothing.
Occasionally I might tip, but only if I got something out of it. And it's rare. I think I might have tipped on 10 out of the 1500 rides.
I'd only tip a uber/rideshare driver if the experience was above and beyond... I do not expect this kind of service from every driver, nor do I expect them to try to provide it every time.
It should be a reward for exceptional service, not a default assumption for average (or so help me, sub average) service.
How many of them really wanted it? To me when Uber added tipping it seemed to come out of the blue. (And it was stupid and bad for everyone except possibly Uber, because the equilibrium total fare in a marketplace with reputation tracking is not going to be raised by turning part of it into a tip, it just adds uncertainty and friction.)
I don't know how many of the wanted it but here is an article that talks about it. Atleast is New York City they were forced to implement it and then it expanded from there.
> Uber might finally be forced to change its tune after New York City's Taxi and Limousine Commission introduced a proposal this week that would require ride-hailing companies operating in the city to allow riders to tip their drivers. The need to follow a rule like that in one of Uber's biggest and most important markets could force the company to allow tipping across the country or around the world.
> The Independent Drivers Guild lobbied for the New York proposal, which it estimates will lead to over $300 million per year in tips for New York drivers.
I take them in SF regularly, for trips that aren't well-served by Muni. It works well. I've never had even the slightest criticism of how it drives. Compared to Uber, it costs more but never drives on the sidewalk and doesn't operate a Prius with 900,000 miles on the odometer and no windshield wipers.
For the free rides they've been doing in LA, they still tell you what it would normally cost. It's usually been within a couple bucks of Uber/Lyft, but Waymo doesn't ask you to tip.
It works pretty well. Sometimes it makes nonoptimal choices for where to drop off, but I can't say that it's worse than humans at making those decisions.
The screens in the car showing it's view of the environment are super impressive. It often sees pedestrians before I do, and it has some really cool features like warning you about relevant traffic when you get out of the car (not generic warnings but detailed info like "there's a scooter passing on the left" when you unlock the doors).
Some minor annoyances: storage space isn't great. I don't think the frunk is user accessible. Driver's seat isn't usable.
Crucially, it doesn't care if you ask it to drive into heavy traffic. I'm so over Uber giving me an estimated time for pickup, having the driver get within range to learn additional details about the trip, then cancelling on me because it doesn't fit their desires. I was late to a reservation a couple of weeks ago because I wanted to go downtown during Superbowl Weekend and an estimated 3 minute pickup morphed into a ~20 minute delay as I waited for an Uber driver to commit to the drive.