Let's talk about scams!
The first one is the most easy to recognize and that's impersonating an Uber or Lyft employee.
There are a couple variations of this.
The first one is that you'll receive a request and then as soon as you accept it,
you'll get a phone call from someone claiming to be an employee.
They'll say that it's an identity verification and they'll ask for your Uber or Lyft password.
Obviously, you should never give anyone your password and Uber and Lyft would never want
to ask you for it.
This is just an attempt to get into your account, take your money.
Another is that someone will take a ride from you and they will claim that you will not
be getting paid through the app, you will be getting paid through some other way.
I've heard of them giving pretty legit-looking business cards and claiming that you have
to give Uber this code and then they'll pay you a bunch of extra money or something.
Obviously fraud.
Number 2! Ride theft.
Also two variations of this one.
The first is a passenger stealing a ride.
This is especially common in very metropolitan areas during the downtown hours.
This is why you never wanna ask "are you Kenneth?" you instead say "what's your name?"
Or you'll ask "what's the name associated with the account?"
You also don't want them to see your phone because they may look at the name and then
tell you that's their name.
Another one is a driver stealing a ride from another driver.
The other driver may or may not actually be an Uber driver.
What they'll do is they'll pick up the passenger and the passenger doesn't actually care if
they're in the right Uber, they just tell them where they're going, maybe give them
cash.
But a lot of times they'll see a passenger waiting and then they'll claim that there
was something wrong with the app and request to be paid in cash and Venmo or requesting
a ride separately.
Number three!
Additional people.
If you're in an area that has Pool or Line, sometimes people will request a ride, but
they will not disclose how many people they're bringing with them.
Pool and Line have a maximum of 2 people that you can bring with them.
Any more than that and you need to request the whole car.
So then once they get in the car, you can't pick up additional passengers.
The other one is bringing more than they requested.
For example, if they request an UberX, which only allows 5 passengers, and then you driving
your UberXL arrive, they'll put in more.
Or they'll just try to squeeze in additional people than there are seatbelts.
If you have an UberXL, you can request that they adjust the payment and they usually will,
but if you have an UberX and you take 6 people in your 5 passenger car, they will not adjust
it and you could risk getting in trouble, both with the law and with the companies.
If they tell you they will give you a great tip for it, never believe them.
Anything someone says about a tip is a lie.
Number four!
Incorrect destination or direction.
Sometimes they will ask you to go a different direction instead of following the GPS and
then that will drive up the price at which point they will claim to the company
that you did that yourself, and then they'll be reimbursed for the ride and you'll lose
out on it.
They may also ask for a different dropoff location and do the same thing.
Number 5! Anchoring during stops.
Sometimes passengers will request stops and being a nice person, you may or may not allow
them.
Being the savvy driver you are, you of course tell them to keep it under 3 minutes if possible.
And they say "yes, of course, no problem!" but they leave their bag in the car.
Or their dog.
Or their baby.
I'm not even kidding, I've had drivers tell me that.
So then when they're gone for 25 minutes, you can't just leave.
Or you can and you can just drop it off your Hub or, I don't know, fire department if it's
a baby.
Number six!
Surge fraud.
Sometimes the passenger will be smart enough to realize that where they're being picked
up is surging so they will change the pickup location to an area that's not surging.
They will then call up the driver and say "hey uhh I'm actually not at where the pickup
is and I don't know how to change it.
Can you pick me up at the corner of this and this?"
So now they get a ride that starts where they want without paying the surge pricing.
Never pick someone up at a different location than what's in the app.
Anything that you do that's not following what the app says is a risk for you.
Go to the pickup location, wait, cancel.
Number seven!
Lying about the driver aka "put your driver on blast."
So there's actually this uh photo that's floating around that gives you different ways to put
your driver on blast in order to get a free ride!
One example is to take trash from your bag, put it on the ground, take a photo, send that
to Uber or Lyft claiming that the car is dirty and getting reimbursed.
People who do any of these things are terrible, but these ones are the worst in my opinion.
You can literally be deactivated for things on that list.
So you could be ruining someone's livelihood.
And the last one, number 8, is canceling mid-ride.
This one is increasingly common.
There's actually a video I'll put in the description of a driver who experienced this and called
the passenger out when it happened.
By canceling the ride, they can no longer rate them and the driver is no longer getting
paid for that ride.
So if that happens, you should literally just let them out.
Some people will do it right on the freeway, personally I would get to an exit first, but
yeah, get that person out of your car.
If someone cancels the ride, you are no longer protected by the apps or your insurance and
you also are not getting paid so get them out.
Now the biggest thing that you can do to protect yourself from these kinds of scams is have
a dashcam.
Preferably one that faces both inward and outward.
The one that I have and has a lot of great reviews is the Ventrue N2 Pro.
It records bot in and out and has good night vision.
Another thing that you can do is keep your sound on for your phone to make sure that
you know if someone has canceled.
Especially if you use a different app for navigation.
And the last thing is don't rely on just one program.
If you drive for Uber, drive for Lyft as well so that if you get canceled on Uber, then
you still have Lyft as a backup.
Especially if you rely on it for paying your bills.
Hopefully this was helpful and now you know some ways to protect yourself.
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Have a great day and drive safe!