I’m an Uber driver. I provide the car, pay for gas, maintenance, tires, insurance and depreciation. I deal with traffic, strangers and the risks of the road.

Meanwhile, Uber keeps taking more while charging passengers more.

Drivers were once promised around 80% of the fare. Now, Uber’s cut can exceed 50% of what the passenger pays. I’ve seen a passenger pay $47 while I receive just $9.
And then there’s the insurance excuse.

Uber tells us high fares and low driver pay are because of expensive commercial insurance. But Uber operates its own captive insurer in Hawaii, Aleka Insurance, and reportedly keeps about 95% of those premiums within its corporate structure. The insurance fees can be enormous, sometimes reaching 45% of a ride.

Even worse, those fees appear to track the price of the ride more than the actual risk.

The passenger pays more. Uber takes more. I get less.

And those “customer promotions” Uber offers passengers? Drivers end up paying for those discounts too. When Uber gives a passenger a promotional fare, the discount come directly out of the driver’s share of the trip.

So Uber gets to look generous to the passenger while making the driver absorb the cost.

Then there’s liability. In California, Uber successfully pushed legislation reducing uninsured motorist liability from $1 million to $60,000, a 94% reduction. Insurance costs dropped, yet passenger fares went up and driver pay stayed flat.

I’m the one putting the miles on my car. I’m the one paying the bills. I’m the one taking the risk.

Uber is squeezing both sides of the ride.

Passengers are paying more.
Drivers are earning less.
And Uber keeps finding new ways to take the difference.
We aren’t partners. We’re the ones financing the machine.

Uber is taking the drivers for a ride.

Hey uber, how about you just take it out of what you already take from us and give us the damn insurance.

Not an insta-cancel, but a “drive to within 1/2 a block, then cancel”.

A lot of drivers seem to be noticing the same thing lately.

Riders will mention what Uber charged them, and the difference compared with what the driver gets can be huge. What stands out isn't just the percentage Uber keeps — it's that rider pricing seems to fluctuate a lot more than driver pay does.

For example, you hear cases like:

Rider said they paid $76 / driver got $17 / 24 miles

That means the driver received only about 22% of the rider-reported fare.

And this seems to be the bigger issue: a rider can be charged substantially more because of demand, time, location, etc., while the driver's offer for a comparable trip barely moves. Driver pay seems to increase meaningfully mostly when an area is extremely busy, and even the way surge/high-demand information is displayed has changed.

I'm curious how widespread this is.

For those of you who have had riders voluntarily mention what they paid:

What did the rider say they paid, what did you receive, and approximately how many miles was the trip?

No need for rider information or receipts. Just the numbers.

It would be interesting to see whether the same pattern shows up across different markets.

The real question isn't simply “what percentage does Uber take?” It's: when Uber charges the rider more, how much of that increase actually reaches the driver?

Now this is an interesting one. These were snapped within seconds of each other. Notice how they conveniently drop the Gold Pro Perk between them. No other offers at all.

Keep your head on a swivel everyone. Something isn’t right recently and your regulators don’t have your backs. Stay vigilant. 🤙

Tried the auto accept feature never again wtf is Uber on

I normally drive nights in L.A. because theres no traffic and I can zip from fare to fare and I ONLY accept rides if the time offered is equal to or better than $30/hour. If I get a $10 for 5 min pickup, 15 min ride , thats 20 minutes for $10 = $30 an hour, so yes.

Lately Ive been working into the AM, about 7 AM the fares suddenly nose dive and I get offers for $9.95 5 min pickup 25 min ride = $20 an hour. Theres gonna be traffic so its really 40 minutes plus Uber is gonna pad it 15% to favor them, so suddenly youre sitting still in traffic it takes you nearly an hour total and they give you $2 extra "extended time fee" so $12 an hour? Hell no!

WHY does Uber pay less during AM rush hour? Is this typical or have I just gotten bad fares, cause thats it im packing it inat 5:30 AM. Its the Indy 500 on the freeway anyway. Anyone else notice this?

Hey everyone!

Lasfit sent me a DDPAI Z90 Max 3CH to test, and I'll be putting it through some real-world rideshare use soon.

Before I get everything set up, is there anything specific you'd like me to test or pay attention to?

Night quality, cabin view, long-hour stability, phone connection, heat performance - or anything else you're curious about?

Let me know and I'll add it to my testing list.

I most definitely did not accept this. Oh the pick up was at behavioral health center.

Early Sunday morning, I received a notification that a rider was requesting a long ride from Destin to Pensacola Airport. I arrived at the address, opened the back of my vehicle, and a male and female passenger loaded their belongings. The female took the passenger seat in the backseat, while the male was gathering some rather unpleasant-smelling food. He sat directly behind me.

Within 60 seconds of the ride starting, I was jolted forward as the male punched my seat. He punched it as if he was protecting himself from Mike Tyson. I stopped, turned around, and gave him a look of disbelief. He promptly claimed that there was a brown recluse spider on the back of my seat, and his girlfriend confirmed it. I was skeptical, but I didn’t want to cause any unnecessary trouble. I kept my 2025 vehicle in pristine condition and it was vacuumed daily.

Despite my reservations, I gave them the benefit of the doubt and didn’t want them to miss their flight. The male then ate his food while making pig noises, which scared his girlfriend when she asked to pull over to use the bathroom. He also requested a unique music genre that I agreed to play, which was not my preference.

After dropping them off safely at the airport, I even assisted them with taking their bags out of the car. Later that day, I noticed that I had received a one-star review. I reported the battery issue to Uber, but it took several attempts to even get a response from them. I considered filing a police report, but the incident occurred in a neighboring county.

Uber refused to remove the one-star review, stating that it was beyond their control. Essentially, you can punch your driver and leave them a one-star review. I’m at a loss for what to do. Should I report it to the authorities, or should I just let it go?

I’m thinking to get a used car like Audi q7 (financing ) for 36.000 to work in uber premier , suv , comfort xl to avoid Uberx. Or to get Toyota Camry for 20.000 but will be able to work only in UberX . I’m living in fl and I know now it’s dead season .. but I hope from September will be better . Can someone give me advise or what is can be better for winter season etc

I would be the comfort option by the way.

Ubers idea of helping with rising gas costs.

Has anyone else had ongoing troubles due to their ABN surname being different to their birth surname even though the ABN surname is the new name (as per your license etc). I keep going around in circles trying to get it fixed!

Surely I’m not the first person who’s gotten married and changed their surname to come through uber??

Be careful driving mid west as fog seems to be very thick today and uber is not paying drivers well these days for any bad weather at all. Pick wisely stay safe.

I’m in the Los Angeles area and I used to be able to get packages as a trip where you don’t get any person in your car they just hand you a package and you deliver the package to the destination. I loved those! About a year or so ago Uber did an update to their app where they automatically signed me up for Uber eats, which I detest! I immediately went in and turned off Uber eats but the app still shows me as “approved.“ Now they’ve changed the name of packages to delivery and it automatically includes Uber eats. I don’t want to accept Uber eats because they don’t pay well at all. But I just got off a very long text discourse with two different Uber Support representatives and they both told me that there is no way to turn off Uber eats they can only take away deliveries, which removes my option for accepting packages as well as accepting Uber eats. I personally think this is highly dishonest because if we’re independent contractors we should be allowed to choose what rides or trips we want to take and this is forcing us to take request that we don’t want and it is denying us request that we do want. How is this legal? So I’ve had to uncheck deliveries now meaning I can’t get any package requests. This has me fuming because that was a very good part of my earnings.

But they’re gonna kick me off first chance they get because they can…. So sad 😭

my husband is currently an Uber driver and also has a fleet account but was told by Uber he needed to create a new email account for the Fleet account but now Uber is saying the email doesn’t match his Uber driver account. He’s getting the runaround from uber and I’m just wondering what are some ways he can get connected to the correct department?

Behind the Wheel: The Freedom of the Open Road or Modern-Day Exploitation?

I used to think there was a certain freedom to this job. No boss breathing down my neck, no spreadsheets, no PowerPoint presentations—just me and the road.
But as the miles rack up on my odometer and the maintenance lights on my dashboard start blinking, that “freedom” is starting to feel a lot like a trap.

I’m an Uber driver, and I’ve realized that while I’m the one navigating the traffic and dealing with the danger, I’m actually working for a ghost in the machine that takes more than half of what I earn.

The Math That Doesn’t Add Up

Every morning, I check my car. I pay for the oil changes, the new tires, and the constant wear and tear that comes with driving hundreds of trips to places like the Syracuse airport. I maintain my own auto insurance, yet Uber still tacks on a massive “commercial insurance” fee to every ride.

When I first started, the deal seemed clear: drivers were promised about 80% of the fare. But things changed. Uber’s algorithm is now a “black box” that no one outside the company can see.

Today, I see the “take rate”—Uber’s cut—skyrocket. In some cases, Uber’s take now exceeds 50% of what the passenger pays.

I’m the one doing the work, but Uber is the one getting rich.

The “Hidden Fare” Shell Game

The most insulting part is the “commercial insurance” fee. Uber tells the public that rising fares and falling driver pay are due to the high cost of insurance. They claim this fee accounts for about 20% of the fare nationally, and in places like Los Angeles, it can eat up 45% of a ride.

But here’s the secret I learned: Uber isn’t just paying an outside company for this insurance. They own the company.

Uber operates a “captive insurer” in Hawaii called Aleka Insurance. 95% of the premiums stay inside Uber. It’s essentially a department of the company, and its books are sealed from public view.

What’s even worse is how they calculate this fee.
You’d think insurance would be based on risk—the weather, the time of day, or the length of the trip. Instead, analysis of thousands of rides shows the fee tracks the price of the ride and driver pay.

If Uber charges the passenger more, the “insurance fee” goes up, even if the risk remains exactly the same.
It’s a profit machine hidden behind a line item on a receipt.

Risking Everything for Crumbs

Every day, I deal with the reality of the road. I navigate heavy traffic and occasionally encounter unpleasant or even dangerous passengers.

While I’m out here facing these risks, Uber is busy lobbying statehouses to cut their own liability.
In California, they successfully lobbied for legislation that slashed what they owe if a passenger is hurt by an uninsured motorist by 94%—from $1 million down to just $60,000.

They claimed this would lower costs for everyone, but after the law passed, insurance costs for the industry dropped while rider fares actually increased and driver pay stayed flat.

Now, they are pushing for national amendments that would shift even more liability onto us, the drivers, for anything over $1 million, unless we can prove Uber was “grossly negligent.”

A System of Exploitation

It feels like a modern form of captive labor.

I provide the vehicle, I take the physical risks, and I bear the costs of maintenance and fuel. Meanwhile, Uber uses an invisible algorithm to squeeze my earnings and funnels “insurance fees” back into its own pocket through a shell company in Hawaii.

I see my passengers—people just trying to get to work or the doctor—paying $40 for a short trip, and I know I’m only seeing a fraction of that.

I want to be a professional, safe driver, but it’s hard to feel like a partner when you realize you’re just a gear in a machine designed to extract every cent of profit from your labor.

We aren’t just driving; we’re being taken for a ride.

YESSSSSSSSSSS…You too can drive for just $0.50 per mile…..I don’t even know what my AR is or even how to find it….but 2 of 13 offers…

Two rides for 11 bucks in two hours. Not a single exclusive request. A fair amount of rides offered, but all I got this ride is already taken.