make sure you are clean, smell good, presentable.
make sure your car is always clean, smells good.
Greet customer. open door if safe and possible.
Breathe, relax. ask them where they are going.
enter info/address into GPS, but ask if they have a preferred route. if they don’t show them the route Waze or google maps has selected. ask them if that looks good.
Offer them water. turn on air conditioner
make small talk. if they talk back engage in conversation. if not leave them alone. be positive. don’t complain about stuff.
started with Lyft a week ago, I did 30 rides with 5.0 rating
so I was surprised about getting 4.5 stars with Uber after the first day.
I do everything right I believe except maybe talking too much with customers, I’ll tone it down.
Not sure. usually by end of night but that depends on what hours you work. also its possible that some customers don’t rate you right away. someone on a drunken or drugged out bender you gave a ride to today might not rate you for a few days.
The rating keeps changing / updating as the customer rates you… Takes days after the last ride to stabilize.
The rider does not have to rate you right away… Or ever!
One thing I noticed is that if a Lyft rider rates lower than 5 stars, the rating screen changes substantially. Four big buttons show up asking what area does the driver need to improve on, as well as the comment section. So it is more apparent that a rating on Lyft below 5 means there was a problem. That could be part of why Lyft ratings are generally higher.
Mine runs about .10 higher on Lyft than it did on UberX. On Uber there is almost no indication to the rider that under 5 stars means anything is wrong. There also seems to be a difference in the expectations of riders using UberX vs. Lyft which could explain lower ratings on UberX as well.
I’ve also noticed Lyft ratings generally all get posted within 24 hours. My Lyft rating never seems to change after I have stopped driving for 24 hours. UberX ratings can lag for days or weeks. You can get hit by ratings from trips done days ago and not have any idea what’s going on. This may be because the window to close a Lyft trip and set the tip is 24 hours I believe, so people get on it sooner. UberX I think can stay open until the next trip, whenever that is.
Hidden forever. That’s why you shouldn’t obsess about it (easier said than done, I know). If your rating stays low for a while, you’ll get the obligatory generic Uber email with tips on how to do better. It’s a cut and paste from the driver FAQs and the training/orientation information.
Let me ask you this, besides “talking too much” (your words), what do YOU think you are doing “wrong”? Put yourself in the rider’s shoes for a moment and try to look at it from their perspective. Uber riders want a safe, fast, and cheap trip. Every rider is different. Some are chatty and some are shy. Try your best to match their mood/energy level.
Paranoid and impatient riders may not appreciate you writing down their destination. My impression has been that they want us to get moving right away. Some riders may think you are writing down their destination as creepy? Maybe?
The youngsters who tried to stuff your car with 5 people probably did ding you. That situation comes up all of the time and it’s always difficult for me personally. Do we risk breaking a law for a rider for a good rating or do we politely turn down their request because their safety / our driving record is more important?
It’s sounds to me that you are doing everything right. You seem to really care about your riders and you are putting in a great effort! Keep doing what you are doing. My only thought (and I’m not in the car with you so I am only guessing here, so I could be totally off-base) is possibly your riders may feel a sense of a lack of confidence from you? You will keep on gaining experience and your confidence will come after you encounter more and more different situations.
My numbers are reversed to yours. Uber 5.0 and Lyft 4.95. I dropped to 4.9 first weekend with Lyft and have slowly been climbing back up. I think I got a few low ratings that first weekend because I was trying to get the hang of things and made a few navigation errors. My nerves got the better of me.
Four days in, and I’m at a 4.33. I would worry more about this if I wasn’t getting Harvard Square pickup requests while I’m driving by the Agganis Arena. Seems to me that supply is nowhere close to demand in Boston, at least where I lurk around. I even got a 2.75x tonight from Brighton to the North End.
Just started two days ago. Did 11 trips. On the iPhone, At the end of my last shift I noticed a 4.8 with a star at the bottom of the iPhone. I thought I got a 4.8 rating. I go to my dashboard and it say’s 4.71. The 4.8 rating I suppose is what I rated the passengers.
Odd thing is I rated all 11 passengers 5.0 believe it or not. Maybe I didn’t press all five stars one time. I think this rating system so far seems a little unfair. One wrong press of the button…
The 4.8 on your phone is your rating that will be seen by the riders on their app when you have accepted the ride. It is your 4.71 rating rounded up to the next whole 10th, being 4.8. If your rating was 4.64 it would show as 4.7 on yours and the riders app.