I have no way of proving this, but really convinced the gift cards/passes are all a scam. Others on Reddit have complained about this as well.
Take Uber to/from work almost every day. Pool price for around a year was always around $11-$13 (located outside NY). Started buying gift cards and passes in an effort to save some money. All of a sudden, the typical $11-$13 rides shot up to around $15-$19. SAME EXACT ROUTE. Had my friend who doesn’t have the pass/gift card order the identical ride and magic: the ride went back down to $11-$13.
I’ve had the same problem with Lyft and Via. The latter was terrific in the beginning since I bought a weekly pass that covered any rides up to $7 (anything over and I’d pay the difference), and almost all the rides fell within this range. Then, again, after around 6 months, the rides mysteriously became more expensive. A ride 5 min from my house that would normally cost $5 increased to $8-$9 and I was forced the pay the overage. Complete waste of $.
I posted now because I see that buying “discounted” Uber gift cards is becoming increasingly popular on this site. Uber doesn’t disclose its pricing algorithms and I’m convinced that once the company has you “locked in” it can essentially charge you whatever it wants to make up for the difference. Also, if you noticed recently, when you order Uber pool rides and elect to wait a bit longer, Uber will now offer you $1 in Uber Cash. This, in my opinion, is a way for them to provide suckier service without any cost since they’ll just make that money back when they overcharge you on a future ride.
Please excuse any typos/grammatical errors, typing on my phone here. Just want to reiterate that this is purely conjecture. Reason why I’m posting is because I want to hear others’ opinions and whether they have experienced the same issues. I’m so fed up with these ride share companies. Yes, they provide a great service, but they’re not transparent at all.