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Uber, the San Francisco-based car service mobile app company, started offering its lowest-cost transportation option in Palo Alto Wednesday morning.
UberX, which the company launched last July, offers rides for prices 10 to 15 percent lower than taxi prices (and lower than normal Uber prices), said Ilya Abyzov, Uber’s San Francisco general manager.
This means that for a flat rate, commuters can now get from Palo Alto to Mountain View for $35, from Palo Alto to San Jose for $55 and from San Francisco to Palo Alto for $90. Also available are mid-range cars — some of them eco-friendly hybrids — Uber’s normal town cars and luxury options, which are more expensive and have been available in the South Bay since 2010.
“I lived in the South Bay for two years and I remember trying to get a taxi was basically impossible … you would sort of call one of five different phone numbers, and maybe someone would come get you and maybe not,” Abyzov said. “When I started working for Uber, I looked at taxi prices across the country, and San Jose and Palo Alto were one of the top five most expensive in the entire United States, which I thought was surprising and kind of crazy.”
Uber launched in 2010 in San Francisco with a distinct appeal: forego the cheaper but sometimes unreliable traditional yellow taxi for a smartphone application that allows users to tracks their drivers, sends a text message when a driver arrives and charges riders completely digitally. (The software works with iPhones, Androids and Blackberries, but non-smartphone users can also use Uber online via the company’s website). Uber also tapped into the luxury car market, using high-end black town cars or SUVs as taxis.
However, Uber doesn’t own cars or employ its own drivers. Instead, the company partners with professional drivers looking to make an extra buck in their downtime.
Uber has various flat rates, mostly for rides to local airports. For other kinds of trips — to a bar, Caltrain, the grocery store, a friend’s house — the base fare for a ride in San Francisco starts at $3.50 for an uberX car (the lowest-cost option, now offered in Silicon Valley) and charges $2.75 per mile. The next level up is UberBLACK, the town car option, which charges a base fare of $7 or $4 per mile. The going rate for an Uber SUV (for “when you’re rolling with more than four people,” the Uber website reads) is a $15 base fare and $5 per mile. Base fares vary from city to city.
Though Uber has faced some controversy raised by the traditional taxi industry (San Francisco cab drivers filed a class-action lawsuit against the transportation company last year, claiming unfair business competition and violations of California Statutory and city regulatory mandates), that hasn’t stopped its growth: Uber now operates in 35 cities, from Amsterdam to Los Angeles.
See some sample uberX Silicon Valley fares and rates here.
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It’s about time. Twice I have scheduled an early pick-up with cab companies to get to the airport: the cabs never showed and their numbers went unanswered. One resulted in missing the plane; for the other (an international flight), I got a friend out of bed and she drove me to SFO in her bathrobe! I just made the flight. It will be wonderful to have something dependable! (I trust it will be dependable.)
I had a similar experience with a taxi no-show when our family was leaving for an international vacation. At the last minute we drove and ended up paying a lot of money to park our car for two weeks. I haven’t used a taxi since that experience. The major airport shuttle companies are very reliable, but they only work if you are going to/from the airport and have time for them to make many stops along the way. Uber sounds interesting.
Palo Alto to Mountain View for only $35 is such a bargain.
Why would anyone in their right mind use an Uber ridesharing vehicle? You could lose everything just to save a couple bucks and be trendy.
Ridesharing passengers give up crucial insurance protections they would otherwise receive from a taxi. Ridesharing drivers place themselves at the risk of a lawsuit that could haunt them financially for the rest of their lives.
San Francisco attorney Christopher Dolan best sums up how passengers and drivers can get screwed by ridesharing apps. If you use or drive for any ridesharing app, take a minute to read the column linked to at the bottom of this comment. Dolan has other columns, too. They might save you a world of pain.
– jake at http://www.4-insure.com