Yesterday, I took an Uber over to visit a friend. The trip covered 6.42 miles, took 29.05 minutes and cost me $11.79. Tipping on Uber is not expected but unless there's a big surge on, I always give the driver two bucks in cash — or more for a longer haul. This one got two and he was very, very pleased and grateful. So the trip was $13.79.
Coming back, I couldn't get the Uber app on my phone to function properly. For a long time, it refused to connect and when it finally did, it would not summon an Uber car to where I was. This happened to me once before — oddly (I think oddly) when I was trying to summon an Uber car from the same location.
That time, it took about 15 minutes before the app finally sent a car to me. This time, I was in more of a hurry so I called Yellow Cab and had them send a taxi my way. The driver was there in less than five minutes and took me home via a different route which covered 6.60 miles and took 26 minutes. The fare was $24.45 and I usually tip cabbies 20% — so the damage was $29.34.
The two trips made for a good comparison of the two services. Uber, because you can't phone them, puts you at the mercy of the app and the network working properly. This time, it failed me. On the other hand, the taxi ride was more than double the price.
Uber needs to work on the tech end but this doesn't change my mind that if cab companies are going to continue to exist, they're going to have to become more like Uber.