That is freeway theft.
A New Jersey influencer obtained taken for a journey by Uber after the rideshare firm slapped her with a shock $321 invoice — almost quadruple her quoted value — for a carry dwelling from Midtown.
Sophie Greene hailed an Uber XL simply earlier than midnight Saturday to take the social media stunner and her associates again to the Backyard State after celebrating her birthday at Flaming Saddles Saloon on West 53rd Road.
Uber quoted $89 for a roughly 3.4-mile journey from Midtown to Weehawken by way of the Lincoln Tunnel. However when Greene, 28, checked her app afterwards — following a glacial, almost two-hour crawl down 10 blocks — she was shocked to see the massive invoice.
“My jaw dropped,” Greene informed The Put up, simply days after ripping Uber in a viral TikTok that’s racked up 1.7 million views.
“We didn’t have management over the state of affairs. It’s not like we had been telling him to make stops and doing all these items” to decelerate their journey, she added.
Greene, who normally shells out for vehicles at evening versus taking public transit attributable to security considerations, famous the late evening journey took for much longer than the standard 20-minute dash attributable to hellish midtown gridlock, probably stemming from a partial closure on the Lincoln Tunnel and drunken SantaCon pandemonium.
However whereas Uber despatched updates checking in on her security through the bumper-to-bumper crawl to the tunnel, it gave zero warning concerning the triple digit shock to come back.
“They did textual content me a number of occasions, saying, ‘It appears such as you’ve been stopped for some time. Are you protected?’… However there was no letting me know concerning the value change,” she mentioned.
Greene instantly started making an attempt to dispute the tab, however the journey share firm didn’t budge till she posted her saga on Instagram Sunday morning. Inside half-hour, they refunded the distinction for her authentic quoted value of $89, she mentioned.
“They’re most likely considering lots of people gained’t discover or … due to this time of yr everybody expects it to be costlier,” Greene mentioned.
Different riders shared their very own Uber horror tales on her TikTok video, with one recalling a $250 invoice on a visit quoted at $80. One other mentioned Uber tried to stay her surreptitiously with a further $150 final week.
Final yr, Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi was shocked to listen to a journalist forked over $52, together with tip, for a 3-mile journey throughout midtown to their interview.
Because the shock invoice, Greene mentioned she’s pumping the brakes on hailing Ubers for rides dwelling from after-hours outings in Midtown.
“I positively opened up Lyft the subsequent time we would have liked a journey,” she mentioned.
Josh Gold, an Uber spokesman, mentioned that Greene was considered one of a number of riders whose Uber journeys had been delayed attributable to building on the Lincoln Tunnel and had been hit sizable fare hikes because of the longer rides.
“We perceive riders’ frustration and have issued partial refunds,” Gold mentioned.