With more and more travel apps being developed and launched, more people are now able to travel to more places with less friction. Once I realized this I decided to take some time to write a few blog posts about Uber as a means of traveling more. Here are a few reasons to ride use Uber.
If you don’t already use Uber, you can get a free $15 ride here.
You don’t have to make a phone call
This is not a huge problem but sometimes hailing a cab in a foreign country can be a little difficult if you have to call the cab company for a pickup and you don’t speak the local language.
You can see how far away your driver is before they arrive
It’s often very stressful when you’ve called a cab to the airport and you aren’t sure when they are going to be there to pick you up. Uber has helped to solve this problem by showing you the location of your driver in real time.
GPS Tracked Route
You can see the exact GPS route that you took after your ride is done and give a rating. This allows you to know if your driver tried to scam you or they took the shortest route. Taxi Cabs in Las Vegas, Rio, Paris and Rome are all known for taking “short cuts” to get you there “faster” or just taking the longer route unless you request the shortest one. Knowing exactly the route you took, so you know if you got “taken for a ride” can be a nice help.
Avoid Parking
looking for parking, paying for parking, paying a valet, paying parking tickets, finding an open meter, etc.
At such a point you need to do some sort of cost analysis and see if it is cheaper to take an Uber somewhere vs. driving around looking for a place to park and then paying to park there. Maybe you just got a $75 parking ticket because you ran out of time on the meter 10 mins before you got back. Valet’s are usually more expensive than just parking yourself but does it just make sense to take a $10 Uber ride each way to be picked up and dropped off at the door?
Rating System
This is one of the main reasons why I think that taxi cabs don’t really evolve. They have nothing to lose from giving you a bad ride. An Uber driver fights to keep their rating high so they try to provide you with their best possible service. Make sure to give a good rating for a good experience. If you don’t have a good experience, then you can give a poor rating and never get paired with them ever again.
Know Before You Go
Cabs are a guessing game to see how much the ride os going to cost. With Uber, you know how much the ride os going to cost before you even call the driver to your location.
Uber is Cashless
Paying a cab driver is unnecessary friction in modern society. This is especially helpful when you use the Fare Split feature amongst friends. You pay automatically with your credit card so there is no need to carry cash and settle up with each other. It can also be difficult to pay in a foreign country if you don’t know the local language. Disclaimer: I’m pretty sure that Uber in India is all cash so you will still need cash there 😉
No vehicle Maintenance
A number of people in large cities are now choosing to not own a car. Instead they have opted for alternative forms of transport and Uber is playing a big role for a number of them. After the cost of a car payment, insurance, registration, storage, maintenance, gas, collisions, etc. it is often more expensive to own a car than to just take Uber all over the place.
Accident Free
“You can’t wreck your car if you don’t drive your car.” This is what I heard some girls say to each other as I was checking out at a store one day. Apparently one of them had recently wrecked their car due to snowy roads and now has to take Uber everywhere.
Uber Reduces Traffic
Transit grids all over the world is congested are bloated and in desperate need of anything that help to alleviate that congestion. Well, Uber has been experimenting with services named Uber Pool and Uber Hop to pair passengers with each other who are headed to the same basic destination. This makes for less empty seats and lower costs for the passengers and often higher earnings for the driver.
Uber is Door to Door
You can ride a bike or take subways and trains but if you want to be picked up at your front door and driven to the entrance of your destination, an Uber ride is the choice for you.
Uber with a Sober Driver
We have all been out with friends and maybe one of them offers you a drink and you weren’t planing on it but you have a drink or two. It’s not worth it to risk a DUI when you can get home with a few quick screen taps. There have even been a number of studies that Uber helps to reduce the number of drunk drivers on the road. Don’t be an idiot. Just call an Uber if you’ve been drinking.
These are just 12 reasons to use Uber but if you can think of more, please let me know and I will add them to this list.
