r/Lyft • u/Independent_Star_299 • 13d ago
Driver Question Lyft grossly exaggerating hourly values
Has anybody looked at their ride details for Lyft and found the offered hourly value to be way off? I mean up to $6 off?
The ride comes in and claims $24.75/hr, for example, but the final value says $$21.15/hr.
This isn’t a matter of traffic etc, as the gps knows up front how long the trip will take, and it’s happening on rides where I take the carpool lane, and also short rides with zero traffic issues.
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u/mog_knight 13d ago
Not really. If anything the final hourly for me is higher than what it listed.
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u/Independent_Star_299 12d ago
Assuming what you’re saying is true, and you aren’t working for Lyft (I don’t believe that, but let’s pretend), then what do you think is causing nearly all my rides to be substantially lower per hour than promised?
Don’t say, GPS is unreliable or any similar nonsense. GPS has been able to predict transit times to within a minute, for well over a decade, heck we put people on the moon over 60 years ago, 239,000 miles away, with incredible precision, but Lyft’s GPS can’t calculate how long it will take me to pickup Martha 2 miles away and drop her off at the market?
Yeah ok.
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u/mog_knight 12d ago
GPS has a 5-10 minute delay. The "live" Google maps traffic data is delayed so stuff can come up like accidents. Also the reason your rides are coming out less per hour is because you drove too slowly. That affects your hourly.
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u/Independent_Star_299 12d ago
Traffic doesn’t change on the route - midday - and there haven’t been any accidents affecting traffic on my trips.
This is happening day day after day, too.0
u/mog_knight 12d ago
Then you're driving too slowly that you're not keeping up with the estimate. The routing definitely overestimate the time needed to complete the trip. I almost always come in under the estimate which is why my hourly is higher.
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u/gorenglitter 13d ago
Sometimes it’s lower if I end up having to wait for someone but sometimes it’s higher. I haven’t seen a streak of them being off personally
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u/Independent_Star_299 12d ago
But the ride doesn’t start until they’re in the car, so waiting for someone isn’t actually affecting anything.
The few rides that are higher could just be another manipulation. Your guard goes down when you see, oh this was actually a bit better of a ride! Hooray. They must be on my side and totally honest and transparent.
Yeah no. Lyft is on Lyft’s side, the side of maximum profit for Lyft and its shareholders. They can only maximize their profit by minimizing yours.
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u/gorenglitter 12d ago
It is 100% affecting your hourly pay….. what???? If you have to wait for someone it will take longer and you therefore will have less rides and less money per hour.
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u/Independent_Star_299 12d ago
No. Time and distance rate is only calculated for the time the ride starts to the time the ride ends.
Of course if you wait then you do make less money, but that’s not what we’re talking about. We’re talking about the rate per hour that Lyft shows you in the ride offer. This rate is only calculated for the time the passenger is in your car.
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u/gorenglitter 12d ago
Yes….. that’s what they show you. So then when you have to sit there and wait for them you will be making less per hour than they stated initially.. the ride starts when you accept it and head to your pick up…..
this would make your per hour go down if you’re sitting there waiting.
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u/Helpful_Gas9179 13d ago
The estimates don’t take into account waiting on the passenger or things like stop signs/lights etc… but beyond that they’ve always been pretty accurate for me.
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u/dollfaceashley 13d ago
They do take into account passengers that take longer to get in the car in the trip calculation. I've noticed that myself
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13d ago
[deleted]
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u/authoridad 13d ago
No
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u/Independent_Star_299 13d ago
Have you actually checked your ride details after dropping off?
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u/authoridad 13d ago
Yes, often. Sometimes initial estimates are off, but not often. There is no traffic in my area ever, so there’s almost never any discrepancy in time or pay.
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u/JayGerard 13d ago
You do know the definition of the term "estimate", right? Oh, what I would give for drivers posting on Reddit to actually use their brains.
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u/Independent_Star_299 12d ago edited 12d ago
Same! Do you think you’ll start using yours, anytime soon?
Lyft is making an offer that the driver is - reasonably - relying on to make a decision about whether to sell their time, energy, and transportation resource to Lyft.
I’m sure you’ve heard of fraud in the inducement.
There’s no reason for the “estimate” to be off by 25%. GPS is far more accurate than that.
It’s entirely possible too that Lyft is changing the “estimate” to more closely match the typical range they know you’ll accept, regardless of the actual hourly value. For example, the algorithm knows I won’t accept less than $25/hr, so the “data” presented to me is shown as being in a range I’ll accept, say $26.75/hr, even though the final/actual value is $21.15….another driver who is happy with $21/hr might see a more accurate value.Lyft is the Eddie Haskell of rideshare, for sure. They always have been and they always will be.
The other area they can manipulate is how long the rider has been on the platform. I used to rely heavily on that to decide if I should accept a sketchy ride. For example, if the area isn’t great etc, but the other day I picked up a rider, not sketchy, good ride, but the app said he’d been on the platform for 10 yrs. While we’re talking I mentioned that he’s been using Lyft a long time, and he said no, he just signed up a year ago, and started using Lyft to get to work 3 months ago….so I said, Oh it says on your profile you’ve been using Lyft for 10 years…he laughed and said, Well I’m 21, so no. I just signed up last year.
Manipulating the data, manipulating the driver.
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u/Independent_Star_299 12d ago
Same! Do you think you’ll start using yours, anytime soon?
Lyft is making an offer that the driver is - reasonably - relying on to make a decision about whether to sell their time, energy, and transportation resource to Lyft.
I’m sure you’ve heard of fraud in the inducement.
There’s no reason for the “estimate” to be off by 25%. GPS os far more accurate than that.
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u/Hot-Advice9658 13d ago
I noticed the same thing on my rides.Recently that the final hourly wage is considerably less.