Lyft Adds Wait-Time Fees, Seven Years After Uber
Lyft, the second largest transport service company in the USA, has surprised its customers with the decision that it will add a wait-time fee. Uber, as the leading transport service company, did this seven years ago. Lyft is available all over the USA and in some cities in Canada. Stay here to find out which rides Lyft users will need to pay for and which rides are exceptions.
Rules for Lyft’s Wait-Time Fees
Even though it’s not pleasant news, Lyft users will need to pay wait-time fees. No worry, they won’t charge you instantly as soon as a driver arrives. Since Lyft offers various types of rides, the fee will be set according to the type of ride.
In case of standard rides, you have two minutes to enter preordered taxi before your Lyft driver turns on the fee counter. It will count the fee per minute. However, it’s not said how much they will charge for waiting time. With the Black and Black XL rides, you have five minutes to enter your taxi before the fee counter kicks in.
Exceptions for Lyft’s Wait-Time Fees
As in every rule, there are exceptions here as well. You won’t need to pay wait-time fees when the driver arrives early, i.e., before the scheduled time. Also, you won’t need to pay a wait-time fee when you cancel the ordered ride - you will pay just the cancellation fee.
As Lyft offers special rides, most of them won’t have wait-time fees. Those special rides include Car Seat, Assisted, Shared, and Access rides. So, if these were your favorite Lyft rides, then you won’t need to worry about wait-time fees. So, it’s not such a disaster.
Reasons for Lyft’s Wait-Time Fees
Lyft hasn’t explained the reasons for this decision yet. Is it fair, we ask ourselves? Well, let’s see. Uber introduced this fee seven years ago, and it’s still the number one in this field. There is no reason why Lyft shouldn’t add a wait-time fee.
On the other hand, we all know how time is a precious thing. Right? Before scheduling a ride, consider the time you will need to get ready. It’s impolite to keep somebody waiting for us. In this case, it’s about the driver. Some things can happen unexpectedly, we can’t deny, but leaving a driver waiting just because we can, it’s not polite.
So, taking all the above mentioned, even if those reasons are the actual Lyft reason, this introduction of the wait-time fee is justified. Time is precious. Time is money. So, when scheduling your taxi, consider how much time you need, if you don’t want to pay the wait-time fee.
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I can definitely see this being a problem in a few circumstances. Especially in a place such as Las Vegas. There are 3 specific instances where I could see this fee kicking in if you are in Vegas.
1. Many hotels and resorts have designated rideshare drop off/pick up spots. But many of these locations are in the very back of the resort. Often with little to no signage to help you find these designated locations. You could very easily call for a ride share not know where this location is.
2. Getting accurate location when calling for a rideshare while inside a resort can also be an issue due to the size of the building.
3. Some resorts with designated drop off/pick up areas are absolute chaos. Try finding your Uber or Lyft among dozens of vehicles and people also waiting for their ride share. The Cosmopolitan is about the absolute worst in this regard. You are lucky if you find your ride share within 2 minutes of it arriving. It could even take the driver 10 minutes just to pull into the area.
Both Uber and Lyft have been losing money for years, Yet people still invest in these 2 Company’s?
These 2 companies are the perfect example of ‘socialist-capitalism’
If I needed a ride I would Call and Pay More for a ‘Real-Cab’ from a Local-Established-Cab-Company
11r20 from Texas
From my experience with Lyft. Lyft GPS app is not perfect. Lyft car can stop a hundred feet away from the requested address. Driver would wait for 2–3 minutes and then drives away. Let’s just say I had a few very bad experiences with them.
I had a Lyft driver drive away while I was locking my front door.
Can you honestly explain why a link to article: “A Reddit user pays for ChatGPT Pro, but can’t access it” [softonic.com/articles/user-pays-chatgpt-pro-cannot-access] actually relates to this Lyft article?
Or for that matter how an advert for ‘Ghacks deals’ relates to their “customers” [../collections/top-rated-deals]. I’ve never even heard of Lyft before since it doesn’t operate in my country.
Therefore, citing (www.lyft.com) would be more sensible, in context, and more user-friendly.
At least if you had relevant links, it wouldn’t look like a malfunctioning pseudo-intellectual AI Spambot was let loosed choosing link text at random. Have you even heard about Third normal form (3NF) – I suspect not. :-/
Then later on the word “charge” [../2023/01/23/oneplus-11-100w-charging-us/] links to electricity wattage for mobile phones… The word ‘charge’ in context of the article; is a fare charge.
The Outlook going offline “disaster” [../disaster-strikes-as-outlook-and-teams-go-offline/] is possibly not a major issue either… At least the image does resemble a vehicle even though the source hasn’t been credited.
Automated AI text link output is like the collected sewage of ten billion dynasties. I find it hard to believe a skilled content writer would select such link text and destination relationships. :-(
+1. Was just about to comment on the weird links. At least edit the copy before publishing!