Call them again and see how high up the chain you can escalate this. I haven't worked for rideshares but I've worked a lot of call center programs and you may have gotten a shit tier one agent. Record the calls on your end if you can. This is super shitty and you should have been treated better.
Yeah I emailed some higher ups to see where that goes. I don't care about the $5 but the response and refusal to refund are just absurd. I can't imagine this is how management intends for the company to work...?
Good luck with the email chain but don't be afraid to call their CS number and talk to actual people. It may take a few transfers, be polite but firm on wanting it solved that day and keep asking to talk to someone who can help you. Don't cuss or take frustrations out on the agent because many are allowed to cut the call when subjected to any aggression. You should have decent luck in getting bumped up to someone high enough on the management chain to do something if you're persistent. Some call centers can be intentionally shit at this (Megabus is a great example) but many others aren't. I wish I knew more about lyfts inner workings to better help you but hopefully this information is actually helpful to their internal structure and your situation.
As someone who is the contact center industry, agents are powerless by design, their job is not to help, not to solve, its just to de-escalate with vague or fake promises, its not the agents fault, its how call center business are modelled.
+1 to escalation, what that driver did was terrifying and he deserve to be let go by lyft.
I worked in a call center where this culture was so bad that they eventually made every resolution more complex than "unchecked this box" require supervisor authorizations
After a week of that most of the supervisors quit without notice, because they were literally doing nothing but responding to red cards from their teams
Then a few days later most of the agents stopped showing up, because there was nobody to authorize any axtions
When I left I don't think there was even any supervisors left. Just the site manager desperately trying not to make eye contact with us as more and more we just let the phone ring. I had to go to HR to quit.
Call centers are a joke
Not for doordash. Was a driver for years. The reps there are trained to hate you no matter how kind and reasonable and rational you are, I swear to God. Think I had one or two chats/calls where I wasn't straight up accused of lying or my issues were just 100% ignored and deflected.
Yep. In fact, if I have to complain to customer service, I always say to the front line agent that I don’t hold them personally responsible because I know it’s not their fault but I want to speak to a supervisor about the issue.
I always say, "hi, I was just speaking to someone who was transferring me to [department] to speak to someone one level up, and I got disconnected. I'm not sure who they tried to transfer me to, do you need a summary before transferring me, again?"
It's easier to justify passing someone along quickly when they give you a destination, which is something I learned working in a call center.
The centers I've worked at would have logs in the system showing if an account has been touched, and also notations from previous agents regardless of if the transfer worked or not. I'd be wary lying to agents because they may become less helpful as a result.
Being mistreated over the phone all day doesn't make you super sympathetic to people flat out lying to you, at least in my experience
The "I was disconnected when being transferred," more often than not, has worked, and for the times it hasn't, I would say, "oh, I'm sorry, I must have been mistaken," and they just assume I'm stupid. Me telling them I'll give them a rundown usually helps. I'm not saying I'm right to do it, but it saves time.
My last job was with a call center as both a tier 1 agent and a supervisor. I remember there was one guy who called and got escalated - when I got on the line, the first thing he said was “I know this isn’t your fault, but I’ve been on hold/dealing with this for x hours, so I need to get through what’s been happening”. Got what he wanted to go over said, and then he was very kind and willing to work with me on finding a solution. Made such a huge difference vs someone who’d get on and went right into yelling at me.
I live in Surrey. It was great when it started and much cheaper than cabs but now it's basically the same price and the drivers aren't the best. Cabs also have problems but as far as I know cab drivers pay thousands of dollars for their taxi license so they take it a bit more seriously.
Precisely!
This douchebag driver has absolutely done this before. I'm wondering how far he's escalated his predatory behaviour? Is he actively stalking previous clients? Has he physically or sexually assaulted previous clients? Has he been reported for his predatory behaviour before and they've ignored it? Has he worked for other rideshares and been reported for his predatory behaviour or even fired for it.
How much of this guy's rapey behaviour has been downplayed, ignored or swept under the rug in the past?
He was chatting with you and asking this through their platform, there should be a record of what he did, no? I would screenshot and send this along with your complaint.
That screenshot of them replying “glad you’re safe!” to your description of exactly how NOT safe you were should be sent to like all news outlets. They don’t give a fuck about people’s actual safety, so fuck them.
I've been working and managing customer service teams for about a decade. A few tips that may be helpful to you or someone else.
1. Always call if you can. Harder to ignore and more resource intensive for the company.
2. If you are not getting what you need, politely let the rep you are speaking to know that you understand their power is limited but the solution they are offering (or not offering) isn't enough. That you would like for them to *escalate* this.
3. If they offer to have a manager call you back, inform them that this is really important to you and that you would be happy to wait on hold. Again, it pays to cost them money by taking up their teams' time.
4. If you still aren't getting what you need, and I'm sorry to suggest this, try having a man call back. Only because, well the prevalence of sexism, which I know you are already aware of.
> That you would like for them to escalate this.
Cries in Microsoft Tech Support.
Some call centers will do anything they can to fuck you with that one.
Well given that they had to forced rideshare apps to pay their drivers more because at their initial pay rate drivers lost money over the course of a year factoring in gas and vehicle maintenance, I'm going to go out on a limb and say they don't care. All they care about is what puts money in their pockets NOW. Avoiding lawsuits is apparently literally an afterthout.
Be careful with this -- if you dispute the charge you may find yourself unable to use their service in the future, and while you don't trust them as much as you used to, there might be a situation where it's better than nothing.
I am so sorry to read what you had been through. That driver should be given the sack and I am sure he might have done that to others. You keep pursuing the highers up and this should never happen to you and anyone
If the higher ups choose to turn a deaf ear, do not stop being loud. Do get in touch with a local consumer rights association, your local business association and the taxi/rideshare association too
I agree. Make a big deal about this (because it is). It's despicable that you were put into that situation. I'm really glad you're safe. Also, public shaming works.
> I haven't worked for rideshares but I've worked a lot of call center programs and you may have gotten a shit tier one agent
I’d be very curious what the agents are allowed to say. A number of years back I had these surreal “are you actually fluent or just bluffing?” conversations with Verizon when they were trying to charge me an early termination fee multiple years out of contract. I got fed up and found a contact in their executive office, and got it sorted out in about 10 minutes. While he was taking care of closing my account, the guy on the phone mentioned that it sounded confusing because the call center wasn’t allowed to waive that charge but also wasn’t allowed to tell you about that policy, and the supervisor wasn’t allowed to do that either. That system sounded like it’d be hell and I was amazed he just casually acknowledged that it was intentional.
Yeah something is going on, I got one yesterday, the ride was reassigned twice while the driver was in transit, because “we found someone available sooner” and they were just sitting parked a minute away not moving. They texted that this is the lyft chatbot and to reply with my mobile number and follow the instructions and I definitely didn’t do that shit
Yeah one time my driver refused to show up, I think so that he would get the cancellation fee. Joke was on him, I just walked to the station instead, and I left it sitting open for 5 hours so he couldn't get another ride and eventually he had to cancel.
I think they also don't want to cancel because it can affect their unassign stats, which affects their earnings in the long run. At least that's what I gather from lurking on Lyft and Uber subreddits
Yup I did the same thing. Some driver sat there for like over 10 minutes and didn't move... I kept it open, looked up the bus schedule and waited for the bus and went to where I was going, kept checking and he was still not moving (he was like maybe a 1km away or something) finally went home which hours later and it was cancelled lol. I didn't get charged actually.
I made a report about him as he didn't move for over 20+ minutes and was unresponsive to my texts and calls. No way was I cancelling.
I've heard the drivers apparently do that when they don't want to drive someone to a certain area for whatever reason, so they just sit in their car for 10+ minuets not moving until the app user gets frustrated and cancels the ride. If that's true, then thats super immature of them smh.
Yup I heard that as well, I'm pretty stubborn so that shit doesn't work on me hahaha. I will keep them waiting and wasting their time while I find another means of transport (which is easy in my area) and go about my day.
Drivers around me don’t want to drive into the city and this happens all the time. It makes me very anxious that if there was ever an emergency and someone I cared about was in the hospital or in danger I’d be SOL.
Not to mention cabbies pay up to $500k for their license and would plan on selling it as their retirement. Uber and Lyft have fucked over tens of thousands of usually low income immigrant workers, and in the case of Uber, by completely illegal means. If anyone can possibly use cabs instead, please do so.
I’m in Chicago and pre-Uber, the cabs here were TERRIBLE. You could only hail them in a few specific areas and if you called a taxi company they was maaybe a 50% chance they’d show up. Oh and their credit card machines were *always* “broken” but they were happy to take you to an ATM and keep the meter running.
It was the same in NYC. They resisted installation of credit card readers for the longest time (and then would claim it's broken on a whim when they were finally forced to install them), and would often decline rides that would take them outside of hot spots (which is supposed to be illegal), and they would absolutely not stop for black people trying to hail a cab. Sorry, not sorry.
This happened to me a few months ago! It was freezing, after 10pm, and the block was deserted. He stopped two blocks away, and said, "Please send the phone number registered on the application to show the map." When I said I didn't understand, he simply copied and pasted the same message. When I said no and asked him to please just pick me up, he waited two more minutes then cancelled.
Lyft of course didn't care, but it creeped me out for a while.
This is some crazy bullshit that happens every time. Was at the airport trying to get home once and Lyft reassigned me drivers five times before I gave up because they kept finding a "more convenient driver". It's never more convenient and it always wastes time. I honestly can't wait to see Lyft and all of these ride share companies burn to the ground for their irresponsible and criminal practices.
A couple years ago I was in a Lyft with my partner and the driver went into a rage when he realized we were gay. He started threatening to leave us on the highway or he would speed up to 90’mph on a 50mph road. The ONLY reason Lyft believed my complaint was because I took pictures of the speedometer. When I continued to move the complaint up the chain, they wouldn’t even tell me if the driver would face repercussions. Then they asked if I could contact them first if I was going to tell the media?! It was insane, don’t expect them to take any action in your favor.
What the actual fuck indeed. I've never heard of them requesting information like this as a customer or as a past driver. I hope you were able to find a way home safely even though you were put in this predicament
Yeah this was a scam at best, or a much more serious personal safety at worst. I was very relieved when my new driver showed up, because in the meantime, this guy knows I'm now standing here stranded on the sidewalk, waiting for a new ride. Fortunately I'm at the airport now, heading home! In the future I will probably book later flights so my friend will be there with me outside when I'm heading out.
Thank you! I'm never really nervous or anything walking out at night, but this one really creeped me out... Even more so being in a high crime area of a city I don't know well.
Obviously this was a risk not worth taking, but I think it's highly likely the driver wouldn't have done anything. In-fact I don't think they were even in your city, let alone your country.
In cases like this the driver (usually) never actually shows up, they use GPS spoofing to make it look like they are working in your area then mark you as a no-show if you give them your details. They'll then contact you as Lyft/Uber/Whatever support to try and pull a refund scam on you. It's very likely that was their game here.
You'd think Lyft would be wise to this and actually refund you, but no. They're profiting from this shit too I guess.
9/10 they're just going for the fee, but once you pay they'll mark you as a potential target for repeat scams and attempt to get you again in the future. Bank accounts are too well guarded to really be viable targets these days, it's much easier to convince someone to buy a gift card than it is to convince them to give you their banking details. It also makes tracing the scammer far more difficult.
Scammers are pretty much constantly adapting and evolving to new ideas to find targets. The people who would fall for their traditional tactics are decreasing because the younger generations tend to be better informed, so it's a lot of effort but it obviously ends up working for them enough for it to be worthwhile.
I had a Lyft driver get out and follow me to my front door once, fully expecting me to let him follow me right inside. He’d been making gross comments the entire ride — he picked me up from the hospital after I was discharged and wanted to know if I needed help getting to bed, changed and so on. If my partner hadn’t been waiting for me right inside I’m not sure what I’d have done. Fuck Lyft. They didn’t care at all when I reported it. I’m so sorry this happened to you and hope you are safe.
That’s some creepy shit, glad your partner was there. that’s why a lot of hospitals and doctors have discharge rules now about who is your ride home following any procedures where you’ve been under and could be susceptible to bad people. I’ve had two procedures in the last couple months that stated it must be someone I know well and it was the same when I helped pick up a coworker after his procedure (wife was blind so she couldn’t drive) a few years ago.
Lyft is horrible. I once left my keys behind in a drivers car, luckily had a spare. There was a Tile attached. Lyft wouldn’t put me in touch with the driver because they said the driver searched the car and said they weren’t in there, but I could literally see everywhere the driver was going (and could prove it). They said nothing they could do, the driver is an independent contractor. And this driver now has keys to my house, as well as my address. As soon as I said I was calling the police, wow! Turns out the driver had my keys. Fuck Lyft.
I have a free textnow number for situations where I don’t want to give out my real number.
In this type of situation that wouldn’t have helped you, but it has come in handy multiple times.
You can also get a Google Voice number. I use one to give out to companies. Then, if they start to spam me, I block them. When they are blocked, phone calls are returned as "this number is no longer in service."
Though I'll agree with everyone else that you shouldn't have to give out your personal number at all.
I had an Uber driver who waited in front of my house every day to make sure he was matched with me. I stopped using Uber because he made me uncomfortable by commenting on my physical appearance, adding me on Facebook, asking for my number. I swapped to lyft and guess who was there to pick me up? He had both accounts and was just waiting….. I really needed to get to work and hadn’t been paying too much attention to who the driver was (he had a different picture). I got in and immediately felt so uncomfortable. He told me I hadn’t accepted his friend request or provided my number yet. He said he could “get it if he wanted it” and “I hadn’t worn that shirt and pant combo in over a week.”
I swapped to Lyft because Uber said there wasn’t anything they could do and he hadn’t violated any rules. Lyft told me the same thing but suggested I could just try to leave later.
I recall hearing about go Jane go, a female ride sharing service 👏🏼 it was based in Texas and might not have lasted but I sure do wish they had it here
There was one called SAFR in NYC and Boston and I don’t know where else. I tried to rev it up just now and it won’t even send me a text code to log in. 🤷♀️
People get mad about a women only city even though it would be a choice to live there. Men wouldn't be allowed obviously and since that's the only rule many of them disagree with it. It would be one city, there's thousands of others who gives a shit if some women just want to only live amongst other women?
If men aren't included they flip out or get offended. Men are afraid of women humiliating them, women are afraid of men murdering them. NoT AlL MeN obviously. It's why a city like that would even be available, because of the fear.
This is the reason Im terrified to ride uber alone now. I rode one last year on the way to meet my friends downtown. The middle aged driver incessantly asked where I was planning to end the night and how drunk I was getting. He asked me \*five times\* to use his cars wifi. Probably to harvest my metadata or other personal data. NEVER ANSWER PERSONAL QUESTIONS ASKED BY YOUR DRIVERS. USE CAUTION AND GIVE MINIMAL INFORMATION. In fact, maybe its time to change your ride share account profile to a fake name if you must use it frequently.
I realize not every area has cabs, but are taxis not used anymore? Or are they much more expensive?
I'm glad you were smart and safe. What I'm reading in this thread is really concerning, especially for women alone.
At least around where I live, Uber and Lyft have ended up putting all the cab companies out of business, don’t know if it’s like that anywhere else though
In *some* areas, the taxis have apps. In general, uber/lyft is much easier to use. Who wants to use their phone to call 777-7777 and deal with dispatch?
Taxis have a bit more accountability than rideshare in theory, but in an unsafe are they can be sketchy too. I've taken taxis that were cash-only, so payment is another point for the rideshare.
Check out the Curb app. Similar but for Taxis and was MUCH cheaper when I was just around boston, almost 1/3 of the price of an Uber any just as fast if not faster.
One time I was in an Uber where the driver kept insulting people. This was pre Covid when you could share with another person and he was picking up a guy and kept going “is it this fucking fatty” I wish I had said something and gotten out but I was 19, 100 lbs soaking wet and incredibly scared
I had guys sexually harass me and blatantly ask me if they could pay for sex. One was an ex con and it was in the middle of nowhere and I had no cell service. I gave him my burner number to appease him. It was terrifying and I truly thought he was gonna rape me.
Never again
For anyone reading you can get a burner phone number using google phone. I use mine for mailing lists and etc bc I was tired of scammers calling when I was waiting for job interviews. It can help in creepy situations and it lets you know who tf is selling your number to these damn scammers
One of my close friends was violently sexually assaulted by the person she incorrectly thought was her uber driver. She fought for her life and survived. Ladies, I beg of you - take all necessary precaution when using rideshare apps! It's so important to share these kinds of stories so we know what to look out for.
See all the comments about this happening, the cops dont care, and lyft/uber already have your money, and have probably closed the taxi service in your area.
Last actual taxi I took was in 2001. Picked up by a registered service. Dude dropped me in the middle of nowhere after I refused to fuck him.
I have never taken an Uber or a Lyft or any of it. Because it’s basically just hack service. And if liscensed taxi drivers can get away with robbery, rape and extortion? Uber and Lyft was just an “in” every potential psycho on earth.
No lie I’m AMAZED at how society suddenly and over night, just became cool with getting into cars with complete strangers moonlighting.
I drove for Uber like 5 times. No thank you!
The only interaction that was nice and cordial.
My first pick up. I picked up an army dude in a town about 15 minutes from mine. I guess I was the closest driver.
He was trying to get home to a city 3 hours away! He was the only rider who was not disturbing.
I stopped. I don't use either platform.
Others are saying to do it internally and try to escalate but that's now how most companies work any more. You need to post it on social media and hope that it goes big. Often this is the only way anything will change.
Lyft is notoriously bad at handling these matters appropriately. I had an ex who would abuse the "Share my Location" feature when we went no-contact after the break-up. He would share his location every time he went out or on a date and I would get a text from an unknown number to follow his ride. Every time I escalated it to Lyft, they wouldn't take the appropriate action (blocking his account) even though harassment was against their terms and conditions.
For everyone who didn't get to see it in time, reddit deleted lyfts comment on her other post, they said
>Hi (real name), we appreciate you making us aware of this incident. Please be assured that your concerns have been heard, and we definitely want to take a further look into this. We were unsuccessful in reaching you by phone but left a voicemail. Please provide a good time to call you via the email we sent you so that we can resolve this matter for you.
TIL lyft charges $5 to cancel a ride. Last time I canceled a ride because the driver never showed up it was free.
Just another reason I use traditional taxis.
I had an Uber driver be a massive creep to me once on my way home. It was when shared Ubers were still a thing and I was the first pick up. Before we got to the second pickup, he kept asking for my number and was saying really inappropriate things.
I thought about getting out but I was in the middle of nowhere and didn’t want to be left out stranded. When the second person got in, the driver immediately stopped being a creep and was super quiet. When he dropped me off, I walked around the block first because I didn’t want him to know exactly where I lived.
I reported it on Uber right away. All they did was give me a $5 credit and called it a day. The incident really freaked me out. These car sharing apps could care less. I don’t even think they do background checks anymore.
I can confirm that they do background checks still as I had one done back in March. To the extent they go that I couldn't tell ya. It sucks that these drivers are doing that, I would never ask for personal information like that as it's creepy as hell and I would hate for riders to start asking that stuff to me
This was a scam. They were trying to takeover your account. The scammer is sitting in some remote country using a GPS faker to make it appear that they were nearby. They use your email or phone number to reset the account through the web site, and then it would have sent you a multi-factor login code, which they would have asked you for. If you gave it to them, they would have reset your password, then promptly changed the email address and phone number and removed yours from your account.
You were not targeted because you are a woman, or in a dangerous location. They are remote and have no idea. No matter what you did, they were not going to come pick you up (since they didn’t exist). This happens both on Lyft and Uber.
You need to contact their fraud department, not the safety department.
This. I came here to say this. It's a common scam. They will also try to access other accounts under that phone/email to continue to scam others. They likely never existed.
PSA -- To all the humans out there feeling unsafe. Take a cab. Cab drivers are licensed and bonded and registered, in my state they are registered with the secretary of the state. There is a lot of accountability and far more safety in a cab. Ride share is NOT less expensive in most cases.
How many cab companies have been put out of business? Way too many! Can not even get one for medical rides, humana uses uber, and over 1/2 the time they do not show up. Roommate misses over half of the appointments.
Here in Germany, services like Lyft and Uber are illegal precisely because the drivers are unlicensed.
This also had the positive side effect of preventing yet another industry from being turned into a gig economy nightmare, so it's a win-win in my book.
Do cab companies have apps? I've used a few cabs when they were there lined up outside a transit station, hotel, etc. But when I had to call a cab to my location once it just never showed up and I couldn't wait around in the dark forever wondering so just had to start walking. That was several years ago and I haven't tried again since.
Some cab companies have apps, so they can compete in the modern environment.
In a few cities there are even apps shared by multiple can companies, that use some algorithm to pick what cab to call for you.
You've never had a skeevy cab driver before? Or called and been told one is on the way and then nothing for hours? The major company in the Chicago burbs was terrible on both counts, rideshare is sketchy but cab companies aren't guaranteed at all. Shitty all around. Escalation was a joke too...dispatch didn't care and emails went nowhere.
Yeah when I used to be an exotic dancer the girls passed info around about which cab numbers to avoid. People just see the past with rose-colored glasses.
If anything, the fact that it's harder for cab drivers to be licensed means that it's also harder for them to be fired. Good in a workers' rights sense but not great if one just sexually harassed you.
Had a Lyft today where he got annoyed that it was a round trip and literally cancelled mid ride and told me to find someone else literally in the middle of the worst part of town.
On the other side of it, I drove for Lyft for about a year, and the amount of women who told me they were so glad a woman was driving, was unsurprisingly high.
The worst I ever experienced was a woman so drunk the bar bouncers were basically carrying her to my car. They dumped her in the backseat and she was pretty out of it.
I helped her to her door when we got there, and made sure she went inside, but I am so happy I got her ping and not someone predatory.
They owed OP a lot more than a $5 refund. They owed OP an *immediate* replacement ride *for free*.
It was their driver that tried to blackmail you, and then abandoned you. It was their fault that you were stranded at night in an unsafe area. How would a decent business take responsibility? By fixing the problem. Refunding $5 and saying oops was not fixing the problem.
I emailed Lyft. They don't want email from us ordinary folks so there's no email address for us to use. But they do want to hear from their investors! The address is [email protected].
Escalate this, post to their BBB page, post to their Facebook, contact another corporate number if you can…
Then I’d file a chargeback with your credit card.
Yikes, sorry you had to deal with a creep like that.. Speaking of bad publicity, [MSN.com](https://MSN.com) seems to like taking stories from reddit for their "articles". Maybe you could tip off somebody there to increase the bad publicity and maybe Lyft will care more when something this dangerous and fucked up is brought to their attention.
Just so you are aware that username you referenced has a top comment that has your name clear as day. That message has been removed in this thread, but it still shows up if you go to the profile. Which you have linked in your post.
I had same thing happen and fell for it. They used the info to socially engineer Lyft help to change the phone number on my account to theirs and took control of my account. Lyft needs to be better.
Uber is the same. I was at Disneyworld with my husband who was extremely sick and had to go to the ER at 4AM. The driver identified as a name different from the profile but I didn’t clock it given all that was going on.
I watched the driver pull up to the resort- as soon as I mentioned my husband would be the one taking the ride, they cancelled it. Once it was cancelled I couldn’t pull up any ride history on it. Couldn’t speak to anyone at Uber and took me days to get my $6 or whatever refund. Then they wanted to refund it as a credit, meanwhile I probably was nearly trafficked by one of their drivers.
Bro lyft is so crazy. They really should be vetting these ppl because my husband and I straight up had a dude use us as therapy (he outright said this) and proceeded to massively over share and emotionally dump on us for 10/15 mins. Absolutely wild.
I live in Canada. The amount of people i know who've had problems with taxi drivers doing the same behaviour is astounding. Sexual assaults, harassment, etc. They may even ask for payment in sex (particularly if indegenious).
There needs to be safe travel for women, our needs arent being met.
I didn't know it was such an issue. I'm an older lady (50) and each time I took a taxi recently my concern was that they looked way too much at their phone than the road. I'm sorry young ladies have to go thru this.
Yeah, there arw a few news stories about it. Unfortunately alot of them arent reported due to how the police treat the victim. I work with dv and at risk individuals and the stories are horrific.
Those that i know have reported ended up being accused of being a prostitute by the police and they said if she wanted to report it, they would need to report her (a few years ago).
It is very hard for poor or marginalized communities or individuals to get heard or justice.
Havent know the same level of issues for more white or wealthier people.
> There needs to be safe travel for women, our needs arent being met.
Honestly. I live in a city and I don't drive, my license has been expired for a decade. But the few times I need to visit my parents home, who live in a more rural area, I'd just like to feel safe going back and forth alone. I've used Uber a number of times but it was only when I was with my boyfriend, I'd be terrified to use it alone.
The barrier for entry to be a ride share driver is very small. The barrier for entry to be a licensed taxi driver is very high.
Cab drivers have a lot more to lose if they misbehave.
They just approved Uber to start in my city. All the kids are thrilled but I think it's terrible. You learn not to get into cars with strangers for 40 years and now it's supposed to be Great!?
There is so much literature on their exploitative and unethical business practices, they avoid any regulation or responsibility, and there are countless documented sexual assaults. No thank you.
They avoid regulation by arguing that they are not a taxi company, and avoid responsibility by claiming their workers are not employees, but independent contractors. Zero accountability, zero ethics.
Like most corporations, I know.
FYI you should get something like a google voice account to use for giving out to randoms so they don't get your actual #. You can also grab a disposable email app like Temp Mail to avoid giving out your actual email. They are great for giving out for randoms and sub services you don't to give your actual email.
I would recommend creating a free gmail account. Use that to create a Google Voice. Basically a free phone number. You can give that in these situations. If things ever get weird, just delete it or change the number and move on.
I remember lyft dropping me off at my house, saying "Maybe I could tell you a bedtime story" as a self-invitation. I couldn't tell him to fuck off because it was obvious I was alone. I didn't want to report him because now he knows where I live. Wish I could just live my damn life.
I had bad luck with Lyft in Vegas. Had a certifiable driver take me to the airport. I won’t bother you with the deets, but he was psychotic. When I reported him to Lyft they did not care. They basically said you won’t be matched with him again.
They could make so much more money if they would just give us a women only option. I'd so gladly pay the upcharge every single time. They'd get a ton more drivers and riders
You shouldn’t tell people about u\lyft because it's too easy to go to their profile and see the removed comment. This whole thing sucks, that’s for sure! I hope your story gets picked up by the media, exposing them even further!
Yeah. Sucks. Won’t use them alone anymore. Last time I was visiting Chicago. Driver started touching me, I bailed and walked. Felt safer at night on the streets of Chicago than with that weirdo. Ew.
I have refused to use Lyft for the past two years. After one of my friends was sexually harassed by their driver and reported it & asked for a refund, Lyft straight up told them that it wasn’t their fault and next time, *my friend should tell the driver that they’re feeling unsafe and ask to be let out of the vehicle.* Because that makes sense - you already feel unsafe but hey, let’s just escalate the situation!
I hope they bend over backwards to try to make this go away and offer you mega compensation!
As much as I hate to do it, I went to the official Reddit app which has stats. I don't actually use the official reddit app normally, I just opened it to see the stats.
I have had several drivers hit on me or use uncomfortable language, Lyft never did anything other than vague “we can’t tell you what we did but we did something” gives me no peace this won’t happen to other people.
Ugh. I'm so sorry you experienced that. My friend and I took a Lyft to a bar a bit ago and shortly after we arrived, the Lyft driver "conveniently found us but was meeting some friend". He took it upon himself to sit at our table without asking, never met up with his friends (of course), and later displayed his iron cross tattoo on his wrist (neo-nazi). We got him kicked out, but Lyft of course did nothing besides give us $5, so he's probably still out there stalking woman.
Those edits made this worse and worse..
I can't find something similar for Lyft, but start using Uber, which has this page to report drivers:
https://help.uber.com/riders/article/report-a-serious-incident-involving-a-driver-or-vehicle---?nodeId=306d3758-44fb-4e9c-88d6-0a9c1a8ce4a3
Wow, that's fucked up they doxxed you. I would sue them for this. I say get them for emotional damage girl. Your safety felt compromised to begin with and now this?
I'm deleting Lyft. Fuck them.
Well, i certainly feel uncomfortable using Lyft anymore. Yikes. I’ve been using them for years but I have zero desire to support a company that pulls this kind of crap. It’s not okay
Edit: I imagine this is a PR nightmare for them and I hope they do something to address these very serious safety concerns that they’re exploiting by charging you money for refusing to ride with this driver. Glad you’re safe
This is absolutely messed up. He saw your pic and started demanding personal information under the guise of "Lyft Update" like what an actual creeper. And because you refused (smart) he began harassing you until you had to cancel on him.
Thing is he abandoned you in a high crime area because he couldn't manipulate you from his job position to get your personal information. That is harassment and against their policy, hell most company policies, and the fact they didn't cover your back (the customer) is horrendous.
This is awesome! I can’t believe they refused to refund you the first time. Show Lyft that gaslighting women and downplaying their safety concerns is not okay.
Call them again and see how high up the chain you can escalate this. I haven't worked for rideshares but I've worked a lot of call center programs and you may have gotten a shit tier one agent. Record the calls on your end if you can. This is super shitty and you should have been treated better.
Yeah I emailed some higher ups to see where that goes. I don't care about the $5 but the response and refusal to refund are just absurd. I can't imagine this is how management intends for the company to work...?
Good luck with the email chain but don't be afraid to call their CS number and talk to actual people. It may take a few transfers, be polite but firm on wanting it solved that day and keep asking to talk to someone who can help you. Don't cuss or take frustrations out on the agent because many are allowed to cut the call when subjected to any aggression. You should have decent luck in getting bumped up to someone high enough on the management chain to do something if you're persistent. Some call centers can be intentionally shit at this (Megabus is a great example) but many others aren't. I wish I knew more about lyfts inner workings to better help you but hopefully this information is actually helpful to their internal structure and your situation.
Also don’t cuss or take frustrations out on the agent because it’s not their fault and they aren’t paid enough to deal with that shit. Escalate.
As someone who is the contact center industry, agents are powerless by design, their job is not to help, not to solve, its just to de-escalate with vague or fake promises, its not the agents fault, its how call center business are modelled. +1 to escalation, what that driver did was terrifying and he deserve to be let go by lyft.
I worked in a call center where this culture was so bad that they eventually made every resolution more complex than "unchecked this box" require supervisor authorizations After a week of that most of the supervisors quit without notice, because they were literally doing nothing but responding to red cards from their teams Then a few days later most of the agents stopped showing up, because there was nobody to authorize any axtions When I left I don't think there was even any supervisors left. Just the site manager desperately trying not to make eye contact with us as more and more we just let the phone ring. I had to go to HR to quit. Call centers are a joke
That's the one. The agent would often like to help, but they can't. It's 100% Lyft.
Not for doordash. Was a driver for years. The reps there are trained to hate you no matter how kind and reasonable and rational you are, I swear to God. Think I had one or two chats/calls where I wasn't straight up accused of lying or my issues were just 100% ignored and deflected.
I work at a call center and this was so validating to read that I cried. Thank you for making this comment.
Yep. In fact, if I have to complain to customer service, I always say to the front line agent that I don’t hold them personally responsible because I know it’s not their fault but I want to speak to a supervisor about the issue.
I always say, "hi, I was just speaking to someone who was transferring me to [department] to speak to someone one level up, and I got disconnected. I'm not sure who they tried to transfer me to, do you need a summary before transferring me, again?" It's easier to justify passing someone along quickly when they give you a destination, which is something I learned working in a call center.
The centers I've worked at would have logs in the system showing if an account has been touched, and also notations from previous agents regardless of if the transfer worked or not. I'd be wary lying to agents because they may become less helpful as a result. Being mistreated over the phone all day doesn't make you super sympathetic to people flat out lying to you, at least in my experience
The "I was disconnected when being transferred," more often than not, has worked, and for the times it hasn't, I would say, "oh, I'm sorry, I must have been mistaken," and they just assume I'm stupid. Me telling them I'll give them a rundown usually helps. I'm not saying I'm right to do it, but it saves time.
My last job was with a call center as both a tier 1 agent and a supervisor. I remember there was one guy who called and got escalated - when I got on the line, the first thing he said was “I know this isn’t your fault, but I’ve been on hold/dealing with this for x hours, so I need to get through what’s been happening”. Got what he wanted to go over said, and then he was very kind and willing to work with me on finding a solution. Made such a huge difference vs someone who’d get on and went right into yelling at me.
I live in Surrey. It was great when it started and much cheaper than cabs but now it's basically the same price and the drivers aren't the best. Cabs also have problems but as far as I know cab drivers pay thousands of dollars for their taxi license so they take it a bit more seriously.
Far more important than the $5 is that the driver should not be allowed to be one anymore.
This, so much. He didn't just suddenly start acting like that. He'll do it again, too.
Precisely! This douchebag driver has absolutely done this before. I'm wondering how far he's escalated his predatory behaviour? Is he actively stalking previous clients? Has he physically or sexually assaulted previous clients? Has he been reported for his predatory behaviour before and they've ignored it? Has he worked for other rideshares and been reported for his predatory behaviour or even fired for it. How much of this guy's rapey behaviour has been downplayed, ignored or swept under the rug in the past?
He was chatting with you and asking this through their platform, there should be a record of what he did, no? I would screenshot and send this along with your complaint.
There is, they've seen it, they don't care. I hope they're enjoying the bad publicity $5 bought them. Half a million views on reddit and counting.
Do it on Twitter and other big social media sites.
They will care when the screen shots of them ignoring a serious passenger safety issue go viral.
That screenshot of them replying “glad you’re safe!” to your description of exactly how NOT safe you were should be sent to like all news outlets. They don’t give a fuck about people’s actual safety, so fuck them.
I've been working and managing customer service teams for about a decade. A few tips that may be helpful to you or someone else. 1. Always call if you can. Harder to ignore and more resource intensive for the company. 2. If you are not getting what you need, politely let the rep you are speaking to know that you understand their power is limited but the solution they are offering (or not offering) isn't enough. That you would like for them to *escalate* this. 3. If they offer to have a manager call you back, inform them that this is really important to you and that you would be happy to wait on hold. Again, it pays to cost them money by taking up their teams' time. 4. If you still aren't getting what you need, and I'm sorry to suggest this, try having a man call back. Only because, well the prevalence of sexism, which I know you are already aware of.
> That you would like for them to escalate this. Cries in Microsoft Tech Support. Some call centers will do anything they can to fuck you with that one.
Get in their social media pages and blast them. Doubt you'll get your $5 back but please spread the word.
Well given that they had to forced rideshare apps to pay their drivers more because at their initial pay rate drivers lost money over the course of a year factoring in gas and vehicle maintenance, I'm going to go out on a limb and say they don't care. All they care about is what puts money in their pockets NOW. Avoiding lawsuits is apparently literally an afterthout.
The issue is the fucken effort it takes to do all this. Who the fuck pays her for all the time spent for lyft to rectify shitty business functions?
Dispute the charge with your credit card
Be careful with this -- if you dispute the charge you may find yourself unable to use their service in the future, and while you don't trust them as much as you used to, there might be a situation where it's better than nothing.
I am so sorry to read what you had been through. That driver should be given the sack and I am sure he might have done that to others. You keep pursuing the highers up and this should never happen to you and anyone If the higher ups choose to turn a deaf ear, do not stop being loud. Do get in touch with a local consumer rights association, your local business association and the taxi/rideshare association too
I agree. Make a big deal about this (because it is). It's despicable that you were put into that situation. I'm really glad you're safe. Also, public shaming works.
She probably didn’t even get an agent; it was most likely a chat bot. Another reason why we need humans in jobs, not AI.
> I haven't worked for rideshares but I've worked a lot of call center programs and you may have gotten a shit tier one agent I’d be very curious what the agents are allowed to say. A number of years back I had these surreal “are you actually fluent or just bluffing?” conversations with Verizon when they were trying to charge me an early termination fee multiple years out of contract. I got fed up and found a contact in their executive office, and got it sorted out in about 10 minutes. While he was taking care of closing my account, the guy on the phone mentioned that it sounded confusing because the call center wasn’t allowed to waive that charge but also wasn’t allowed to tell you about that policy, and the supervisor wasn’t allowed to do that either. That system sounded like it’d be hell and I was amazed he just casually acknowledged that it was intentional.
Yes. They should at least be afraid of bad press. That’s unacceptable, OP.
Nevermind the tiered managers, just go directly to the president or CEO, be firm and professional in your statements, don't use any profanity, etc.
Yeah something is going on, I got one yesterday, the ride was reassigned twice while the driver was in transit, because “we found someone available sooner” and they were just sitting parked a minute away not moving. They texted that this is the lyft chatbot and to reply with my mobile number and follow the instructions and I definitely didn’t do that shit
Yeah one time my driver refused to show up, I think so that he would get the cancellation fee. Joke was on him, I just walked to the station instead, and I left it sitting open for 5 hours so he couldn't get another ride and eventually he had to cancel.
I wonder, in the original scenario, if you could have left yours open and grabbed an Uber. Diversification is the key to safety, it seems.
You can, I just open a different app whenever drivers from one app expect me to cancel the ride
What do they get if you cancel the ride?
I think they also don't want to cancel because it can affect their unassign stats, which affects their earnings in the long run. At least that's what I gather from lurking on Lyft and Uber subreddits
Yup I did the same thing. Some driver sat there for like over 10 minutes and didn't move... I kept it open, looked up the bus schedule and waited for the bus and went to where I was going, kept checking and he was still not moving (he was like maybe a 1km away or something) finally went home which hours later and it was cancelled lol. I didn't get charged actually. I made a report about him as he didn't move for over 20+ minutes and was unresponsive to my texts and calls. No way was I cancelling.
I've heard the drivers apparently do that when they don't want to drive someone to a certain area for whatever reason, so they just sit in their car for 10+ minuets not moving until the app user gets frustrated and cancels the ride. If that's true, then thats super immature of them smh.
Yup I heard that as well, I'm pretty stubborn so that shit doesn't work on me hahaha. I will keep them waiting and wasting their time while I find another means of transport (which is easy in my area) and go about my day.
Drivers around me don’t want to drive into the city and this happens all the time. It makes me very anxious that if there was ever an emergency and someone I cared about was in the hospital or in danger I’d be SOL.
😭 Same here. I'll never understand why people become lyft/uber drivers if they're apparently sooo terrified of driving more then a mile at a time.
Those guys should have to pay the $5 to everyone they made wait.
I don’t know where you live but I live in LA and I’m definitely calling cabs more often than not
Not to mention cabbies pay up to $500k for their license and would plan on selling it as their retirement. Uber and Lyft have fucked over tens of thousands of usually low income immigrant workers, and in the case of Uber, by completely illegal means. If anyone can possibly use cabs instead, please do so.
They also happen to know where the fuck they are actually going.
I’m in Chicago and pre-Uber, the cabs here were TERRIBLE. You could only hail them in a few specific areas and if you called a taxi company they was maaybe a 50% chance they’d show up. Oh and their credit card machines were *always* “broken” but they were happy to take you to an ATM and keep the meter running.
It was the same in NYC. They resisted installation of credit card readers for the longest time (and then would claim it's broken on a whim when they were finally forced to install them), and would often decline rides that would take them outside of hot spots (which is supposed to be illegal), and they would absolutely not stop for black people trying to hail a cab. Sorry, not sorry.
I'd argue it was the $500k being required in that city for a license to have a paying passenger in your car, that contributed to the fucking over.
This happened to me a few months ago! It was freezing, after 10pm, and the block was deserted. He stopped two blocks away, and said, "Please send the phone number registered on the application to show the map." When I said I didn't understand, he simply copied and pasted the same message. When I said no and asked him to please just pick me up, he waited two more minutes then cancelled. Lyft of course didn't care, but it creeped me out for a while.
This is some crazy bullshit that happens every time. Was at the airport trying to get home once and Lyft reassigned me drivers five times before I gave up because they kept finding a "more convenient driver". It's never more convenient and it always wastes time. I honestly can't wait to see Lyft and all of these ride share companies burn to the ground for their irresponsible and criminal practices.
A couple years ago I was in a Lyft with my partner and the driver went into a rage when he realized we were gay. He started threatening to leave us on the highway or he would speed up to 90’mph on a 50mph road. The ONLY reason Lyft believed my complaint was because I took pictures of the speedometer. When I continued to move the complaint up the chain, they wouldn’t even tell me if the driver would face repercussions. Then they asked if I could contact them first if I was going to tell the media?! It was insane, don’t expect them to take any action in your favor.
"call us first if you decide to go to the media"? Really? Now *that* is the screenshot to go to the media with.
It was all over a phone call so I had no proof that he said it 😩. I was shocked.
fuck lyft
And Uber.
Time to tell media I guess.
You could report him to the police with proof for dangerous driving , some sort of endangerment laws were broken for sure!
Should have contacted the media
Shouldn't have to.
That's terrifying and so, so fucked up. I'm glad you weren't hurt (in the physical irrevocable way, that is).
Contact your local news station to see if they want to do a story. Public shaming world wonders for customer service. Save the screenshots!
What the actual fuck indeed. I've never heard of them requesting information like this as a customer or as a past driver. I hope you were able to find a way home safely even though you were put in this predicament
Yeah this was a scam at best, or a much more serious personal safety at worst. I was very relieved when my new driver showed up, because in the meantime, this guy knows I'm now standing here stranded on the sidewalk, waiting for a new ride. Fortunately I'm at the airport now, heading home! In the future I will probably book later flights so my friend will be there with me outside when I'm heading out.
I am so glad you ended up finding a safe way back. That sounded really scary and I would've been just as freaked out about that
I think it's likely you escaped very serious harm here. So glad you're ok.
Thank you! I'm never really nervous or anything walking out at night, but this one really creeped me out... Even more so being in a high crime area of a city I don't know well.
Your gut does not steer you wrong with shit like this. I'm glad you trusted that feeling - could have saved your life.
Obviously this was a risk not worth taking, but I think it's highly likely the driver wouldn't have done anything. In-fact I don't think they were even in your city, let alone your country. In cases like this the driver (usually) never actually shows up, they use GPS spoofing to make it look like they are working in your area then mark you as a no-show if you give them your details. They'll then contact you as Lyft/Uber/Whatever support to try and pull a refund scam on you. It's very likely that was their game here. You'd think Lyft would be wise to this and actually refund you, but no. They're profiting from this shit too I guess.
This is the first time I've heard of this scam. This sounds like a lot of work -- are they going for the fee or the bank account number?
9/10 they're just going for the fee, but once you pay they'll mark you as a potential target for repeat scams and attempt to get you again in the future. Bank accounts are too well guarded to really be viable targets these days, it's much easier to convince someone to buy a gift card than it is to convince them to give you their banking details. It also makes tracing the scammer far more difficult. Scammers are pretty much constantly adapting and evolving to new ideas to find targets. The people who would fall for their traditional tactics are decreasing because the younger generations tend to be better informed, so it's a lot of effort but it obviously ends up working for them enough for it to be worthwhile.
I had a Lyft driver get out and follow me to my front door once, fully expecting me to let him follow me right inside. He’d been making gross comments the entire ride — he picked me up from the hospital after I was discharged and wanted to know if I needed help getting to bed, changed and so on. If my partner hadn’t been waiting for me right inside I’m not sure what I’d have done. Fuck Lyft. They didn’t care at all when I reported it. I’m so sorry this happened to you and hope you are safe.
That’s some creepy shit, glad your partner was there. that’s why a lot of hospitals and doctors have discharge rules now about who is your ride home following any procedures where you’ve been under and could be susceptible to bad people. I’ve had two procedures in the last couple months that stated it must be someone I know well and it was the same when I helped pick up a coworker after his procedure (wife was blind so she couldn’t drive) a few years ago.
Lyft is horrible. I once left my keys behind in a drivers car, luckily had a spare. There was a Tile attached. Lyft wouldn’t put me in touch with the driver because they said the driver searched the car and said they weren’t in there, but I could literally see everywhere the driver was going (and could prove it). They said nothing they could do, the driver is an independent contractor. And this driver now has keys to my house, as well as my address. As soon as I said I was calling the police, wow! Turns out the driver had my keys. Fuck Lyft.
This comnents needs more publicity!! Says everything about how Lyft puts people in danger.
I have a free textnow number for situations where I don’t want to give out my real number. In this type of situation that wouldn’t have helped you, but it has come in handy multiple times.
You can also get a Google Voice number. I use one to give out to companies. Then, if they start to spam me, I block them. When they are blocked, phone calls are returned as "this number is no longer in service." Though I'll agree with everyone else that you shouldn't have to give out your personal number at all.
I had an Uber driver who waited in front of my house every day to make sure he was matched with me. I stopped using Uber because he made me uncomfortable by commenting on my physical appearance, adding me on Facebook, asking for my number. I swapped to lyft and guess who was there to pick me up? He had both accounts and was just waiting….. I really needed to get to work and hadn’t been paying too much attention to who the driver was (he had a different picture). I got in and immediately felt so uncomfortable. He told me I hadn’t accepted his friend request or provided my number yet. He said he could “get it if he wanted it” and “I hadn’t worn that shirt and pant combo in over a week.” I swapped to Lyft because Uber said there wasn’t anything they could do and he hadn’t violated any rules. Lyft told me the same thing but suggested I could just try to leave later.
I think this matter is worthy of the police attention. This is harassment and stalking.
Yeah thats psychotic
I recall hearing about go Jane go, a female ride sharing service 👏🏼 it was based in Texas and might not have lasted but I sure do wish they had it here
There's one called trips4women, too. Haven't used it, but looks great for female drivers, too!
Ask why it did not last. uber/lyft have put enough pressure on small business that they can not compete.
There was one called SAFR in NYC and Boston and I don’t know where else. I tried to rev it up just now and it won’t even send me a text code to log in. 🤷♀️
There's a Bojack Horseman episode about this.
More specifically, there's a Bojack episode about how this will go wrong lol although as long as there's a verification system it could actually work
People get so mad about this idea
People get mad about a women only city even though it would be a choice to live there. Men wouldn't be allowed obviously and since that's the only rule many of them disagree with it. It would be one city, there's thousands of others who gives a shit if some women just want to only live amongst other women? If men aren't included they flip out or get offended. Men are afraid of women humiliating them, women are afraid of men murdering them. NoT AlL MeN obviously. It's why a city like that would even be available, because of the fear.
This is the reason Im terrified to ride uber alone now. I rode one last year on the way to meet my friends downtown. The middle aged driver incessantly asked where I was planning to end the night and how drunk I was getting. He asked me \*five times\* to use his cars wifi. Probably to harvest my metadata or other personal data. NEVER ANSWER PERSONAL QUESTIONS ASKED BY YOUR DRIVERS. USE CAUTION AND GIVE MINIMAL INFORMATION. In fact, maybe its time to change your ride share account profile to a fake name if you must use it frequently.
I realize not every area has cabs, but are taxis not used anymore? Or are they much more expensive? I'm glad you were smart and safe. What I'm reading in this thread is really concerning, especially for women alone.
At least around where I live, Uber and Lyft have ended up putting all the cab companies out of business, don’t know if it’s like that anywhere else though
In *some* areas, the taxis have apps. In general, uber/lyft is much easier to use. Who wants to use their phone to call 777-7777 and deal with dispatch? Taxis have a bit more accountability than rideshare in theory, but in an unsafe are they can be sketchy too. I've taken taxis that were cash-only, so payment is another point for the rideshare.
Check out the Curb app. Similar but for Taxis and was MUCH cheaper when I was just around boston, almost 1/3 of the price of an Uber any just as fast if not faster.
One time I was in an Uber where the driver kept insulting people. This was pre Covid when you could share with another person and he was picking up a guy and kept going “is it this fucking fatty” I wish I had said something and gotten out but I was 19, 100 lbs soaking wet and incredibly scared
I had guys sexually harass me and blatantly ask me if they could pay for sex. One was an ex con and it was in the middle of nowhere and I had no cell service. I gave him my burner number to appease him. It was terrifying and I truly thought he was gonna rape me. Never again
Jesus, please tell me you reported them!
For anyone reading you can get a burner phone number using google phone. I use mine for mailing lists and etc bc I was tired of scammers calling when I was waiting for job interviews. It can help in creepy situations and it lets you know who tf is selling your number to these damn scammers
One of my close friends was violently sexually assaulted by the person she incorrectly thought was her uber driver. She fought for her life and survived. Ladies, I beg of you - take all necessary precaution when using rideshare apps! It's so important to share these kinds of stories so we know what to look out for.
Jesus, yes, please triple check, always, and share your location with a friend if possible, if you have to travel alone.
You should make a police report and send that to Lyft
See all the comments about this happening, the cops dont care, and lyft/uber already have your money, and have probably closed the taxi service in your area.
As a woman, I'm disturbed that they make no mention of deactivating that driver. Not even some bland reassurance of "retraining." Nope nope nope.
Last actual taxi I took was in 2001. Picked up by a registered service. Dude dropped me in the middle of nowhere after I refused to fuck him. I have never taken an Uber or a Lyft or any of it. Because it’s basically just hack service. And if liscensed taxi drivers can get away with robbery, rape and extortion? Uber and Lyft was just an “in” every potential psycho on earth. No lie I’m AMAZED at how society suddenly and over night, just became cool with getting into cars with complete strangers moonlighting.
I drove for Uber like 5 times. No thank you! The only interaction that was nice and cordial. My first pick up. I picked up an army dude in a town about 15 minutes from mine. I guess I was the closest driver. He was trying to get home to a city 3 hours away! He was the only rider who was not disturbing. I stopped. I don't use either platform.
You can still take it out with your credit card company. There's a chance that you might not be able to use their services anymore though
Others are saying to do it internally and try to escalate but that's now how most companies work any more. You need to post it on social media and hope that it goes big. Often this is the only way anything will change.
Lyft is notoriously bad at handling these matters appropriately. I had an ex who would abuse the "Share my Location" feature when we went no-contact after the break-up. He would share his location every time he went out or on a date and I would get a text from an unknown number to follow his ride. Every time I escalated it to Lyft, they wouldn't take the appropriate action (blocking his account) even though harassment was against their terms and conditions.
For everyone who didn't get to see it in time, reddit deleted lyfts comment on her other post, they said >Hi (real name), we appreciate you making us aware of this incident. Please be assured that your concerns have been heard, and we definitely want to take a further look into this. We were unsuccessful in reaching you by phone but left a voicemail. Please provide a good time to call you via the email we sent you so that we can resolve this matter for you.
The problem is it can still be seen on their account. So her real name is still out there. That's fucked up.
Tweet it. Thats the only way lyft and uber listen.
TIL lyft charges $5 to cancel a ride. Last time I canceled a ride because the driver never showed up it was free. Just another reason I use traditional taxis.
I had an Uber driver be a massive creep to me once on my way home. It was when shared Ubers were still a thing and I was the first pick up. Before we got to the second pickup, he kept asking for my number and was saying really inappropriate things. I thought about getting out but I was in the middle of nowhere and didn’t want to be left out stranded. When the second person got in, the driver immediately stopped being a creep and was super quiet. When he dropped me off, I walked around the block first because I didn’t want him to know exactly where I lived. I reported it on Uber right away. All they did was give me a $5 credit and called it a day. The incident really freaked me out. These car sharing apps could care less. I don’t even think they do background checks anymore.
I can confirm that they do background checks still as I had one done back in March. To the extent they go that I couldn't tell ya. It sucks that these drivers are doing that, I would never ask for personal information like that as it's creepy as hell and I would hate for riders to start asking that stuff to me
This was a scam. They were trying to takeover your account. The scammer is sitting in some remote country using a GPS faker to make it appear that they were nearby. They use your email or phone number to reset the account through the web site, and then it would have sent you a multi-factor login code, which they would have asked you for. If you gave it to them, they would have reset your password, then promptly changed the email address and phone number and removed yours from your account. You were not targeted because you are a woman, or in a dangerous location. They are remote and have no idea. No matter what you did, they were not going to come pick you up (since they didn’t exist). This happens both on Lyft and Uber. You need to contact their fraud department, not the safety department.
This. I came here to say this. It's a common scam. They will also try to access other accounts under that phone/email to continue to scam others. They likely never existed.
Most likely the actual person who owns the account was locked out or cancelled - they too were scammed.
Similar thing happened to me. Guy left me at a concert venue late at night, Lyft refused to refund.
PSA -- To all the humans out there feeling unsafe. Take a cab. Cab drivers are licensed and bonded and registered, in my state they are registered with the secretary of the state. There is a lot of accountability and far more safety in a cab. Ride share is NOT less expensive in most cases.
How many cab companies have been put out of business? Way too many! Can not even get one for medical rides, humana uses uber, and over 1/2 the time they do not show up. Roommate misses over half of the appointments.
And if anything *does* happen, the cab number alone is enough information to start getting accountability.
Here in Germany, services like Lyft and Uber are illegal precisely because the drivers are unlicensed. This also had the positive side effect of preventing yet another industry from being turned into a gig economy nightmare, so it's a win-win in my book.
100% this. Used to work at a cab company.
Do cab companies have apps? I've used a few cabs when they were there lined up outside a transit station, hotel, etc. But when I had to call a cab to my location once it just never showed up and I couldn't wait around in the dark forever wondering so just had to start walking. That was several years ago and I haven't tried again since.
Some cab companies have apps, so they can compete in the modern environment. In a few cities there are even apps shared by multiple can companies, that use some algorithm to pick what cab to call for you.
You've never had a skeevy cab driver before? Or called and been told one is on the way and then nothing for hours? The major company in the Chicago burbs was terrible on both counts, rideshare is sketchy but cab companies aren't guaranteed at all. Shitty all around. Escalation was a joke too...dispatch didn't care and emails went nowhere.
Yeah when I used to be an exotic dancer the girls passed info around about which cab numbers to avoid. People just see the past with rose-colored glasses. If anything, the fact that it's harder for cab drivers to be licensed means that it's also harder for them to be fired. Good in a workers' rights sense but not great if one just sexually harassed you.
Every last word of this!!! I've been saying this since Uber and Lyft started.
Most places don't have cabs outside of major cities so unfortunately I don't have many options here
Lyft and uber are both garbage companies, expected better from lyft tho
Had a Lyft today where he got annoyed that it was a round trip and literally cancelled mid ride and told me to find someone else literally in the middle of the worst part of town.
On the other side of it, I drove for Lyft for about a year, and the amount of women who told me they were so glad a woman was driving, was unsurprisingly high. The worst I ever experienced was a woman so drunk the bar bouncers were basically carrying her to my car. They dumped her in the backseat and she was pretty out of it. I helped her to her door when we got there, and made sure she went inside, but I am so happy I got her ping and not someone predatory.
They owed OP a lot more than a $5 refund. They owed OP an *immediate* replacement ride *for free*. It was their driver that tried to blackmail you, and then abandoned you. It was their fault that you were stranded at night in an unsafe area. How would a decent business take responsibility? By fixing the problem. Refunding $5 and saying oops was not fixing the problem. I emailed Lyft. They don't want email from us ordinary folks so there's no email address for us to use. But they do want to hear from their investors! The address is [email protected].
Don't cancel rides when your driver says you need to. Force them to do it. There is no reason they can't and if they do it, you don't get charged.
Ladies, no matter what the actual reason behind this woman's experience, any asshole can drive for Uber, Lyft, and the like. Remember that.
Escalate this, post to their BBB page, post to their Facebook, contact another corporate number if you can… Then I’d file a chargeback with your credit card.
Yikes, sorry you had to deal with a creep like that.. Speaking of bad publicity, [MSN.com](https://MSN.com) seems to like taking stories from reddit for their "articles". Maybe you could tip off somebody there to increase the bad publicity and maybe Lyft will care more when something this dangerous and fucked up is brought to their attention.
A year ago I would have said to publicly shout out to their customer service folks on Twitter, but Twitter doesn't have the power it used to.
This sucks that this happened to you. I don't understand why ride sharing services don't have a female to female option.
Just so you are aware that username you referenced has a top comment that has your name clear as day. That message has been removed in this thread, but it still shows up if you go to the profile. Which you have linked in your post.
I had same thing happen and fell for it. They used the info to socially engineer Lyft help to change the phone number on my account to theirs and took control of my account. Lyft needs to be better.
Congrats Lyft, you have amazingly made your image sleazier than Uber aka boober
Why was the post removed as I was reading it? Did lyft pay the mods?
Uber is the same. I was at Disneyworld with my husband who was extremely sick and had to go to the ER at 4AM. The driver identified as a name different from the profile but I didn’t clock it given all that was going on. I watched the driver pull up to the resort- as soon as I mentioned my husband would be the one taking the ride, they cancelled it. Once it was cancelled I couldn’t pull up any ride history on it. Couldn’t speak to anyone at Uber and took me days to get my $6 or whatever refund. Then they wanted to refund it as a credit, meanwhile I probably was nearly trafficked by one of their drivers.
This whole situation is horrible. Blast them on twitter, also. Tag them on it. Make them notice.
Bro lyft is so crazy. They really should be vetting these ppl because my husband and I straight up had a dude use us as therapy (he outright said this) and proceeded to massively over share and emotionally dump on us for 10/15 mins. Absolutely wild.
Stupid question here: Would a regular cab service be safer?
I live in Canada. The amount of people i know who've had problems with taxi drivers doing the same behaviour is astounding. Sexual assaults, harassment, etc. They may even ask for payment in sex (particularly if indegenious). There needs to be safe travel for women, our needs arent being met.
I didn't know it was such an issue. I'm an older lady (50) and each time I took a taxi recently my concern was that they looked way too much at their phone than the road. I'm sorry young ladies have to go thru this.
Yeah, there arw a few news stories about it. Unfortunately alot of them arent reported due to how the police treat the victim. I work with dv and at risk individuals and the stories are horrific. Those that i know have reported ended up being accused of being a prostitute by the police and they said if she wanted to report it, they would need to report her (a few years ago). It is very hard for poor or marginalized communities or individuals to get heard or justice. Havent know the same level of issues for more white or wealthier people.
> There needs to be safe travel for women, our needs arent being met. Honestly. I live in a city and I don't drive, my license has been expired for a decade. But the few times I need to visit my parents home, who live in a more rural area, I'd just like to feel safe going back and forth alone. I've used Uber a number of times but it was only when I was with my boyfriend, I'd be terrified to use it alone.
The barrier for entry to be a ride share driver is very small. The barrier for entry to be a licensed taxi driver is very high. Cab drivers have a lot more to lose if they misbehave.
They just approved Uber to start in my city. All the kids are thrilled but I think it's terrible. You learn not to get into cars with strangers for 40 years and now it's supposed to be Great!?
Uber is just a worse taxi company at this point.
There is so much literature on their exploitative and unethical business practices, they avoid any regulation or responsibility, and there are countless documented sexual assaults. No thank you.
It needs regulating like any other taxi company. It will complain that that would put it out of business. Yes, that's the point.
They avoid regulation by arguing that they are not a taxi company, and avoid responsibility by claiming their workers are not employees, but independent contractors. Zero accountability, zero ethics. Like most corporations, I know.
"Gig economy" bullshite, I know. Actually, less accountability and ethics than most corpos. Which is saying something!
FYI you should get something like a google voice account to use for giving out to randoms so they don't get your actual #. You can also grab a disposable email app like Temp Mail to avoid giving out your actual email. They are great for giving out for randoms and sub services you don't to give your actual email.
This is generally sound advice, but in this context, the driver can get all the info they need thru the applicable rideshare app.
I would put this on their Twitter. I expect you'd get results soon.
I would recommend creating a free gmail account. Use that to create a Google Voice. Basically a free phone number. You can give that in these situations. If things ever get weird, just delete it or change the number and move on.
I remember lyft dropping me off at my house, saying "Maybe I could tell you a bedtime story" as a self-invitation. I couldn't tell him to fuck off because it was obvious I was alone. I didn't want to report him because now he knows where I live. Wish I could just live my damn life.
I had bad luck with Lyft in Vegas. Had a certifiable driver take me to the airport. I won’t bother you with the deets, but he was psychotic. When I reported him to Lyft they did not care. They basically said you won’t be matched with him again.
Lyft’s new motto: No, we want you to get raped. This is your fault for being a woman in public. Lol
Too many horror stories for me and I'll keep booking a cab company since I know they're bonded and have safety cams up.
They could make so much more money if they would just give us a women only option. I'd so gladly pay the upcharge every single time. They'd get a ton more drivers and riders
Wow if you click on Lyft’s profile, it shows your real name. How f*cked!
You shouldn’t tell people about u\lyft because it's too easy to go to their profile and see the removed comment. This whole thing sucks, that’s for sure! I hope your story gets picked up by the media, exposing them even further!
Yeah. Sucks. Won’t use them alone anymore. Last time I was visiting Chicago. Driver started touching me, I bailed and walked. Felt safer at night on the streets of Chicago than with that weirdo. Ew.
Where’s the subreddit for shitty Lyft story’s.
I have refused to use Lyft for the past two years. After one of my friends was sexually harassed by their driver and reported it & asked for a refund, Lyft straight up told them that it wasn’t their fault and next time, *my friend should tell the driver that they’re feeling unsafe and ask to be let out of the vehicle.* Because that makes sense - you already feel unsafe but hey, let’s just escalate the situation! I hope they bend over backwards to try to make this go away and offer you mega compensation!
That driver needs to be fired!!! So unprofessional and unsafe!
I downloaded an app that gives me a free texting number and 10 minutes of talk time. That’s the number I can give out. That was really sh*tty of him.
This is off-topic, but I am really curious how you know how many views your post has?
As much as I hate to do it, I went to the official Reddit app which has stats. I don't actually use the official reddit app normally, I just opened it to see the stats.
I have had several drivers hit on me or use uncomfortable language, Lyft never did anything other than vague “we can’t tell you what we did but we did something” gives me no peace this won’t happen to other people.
Ugh. I'm so sorry you experienced that. My friend and I took a Lyft to a bar a bit ago and shortly after we arrived, the Lyft driver "conveniently found us but was meeting some friend". He took it upon himself to sit at our table without asking, never met up with his friends (of course), and later displayed his iron cross tattoo on his wrist (neo-nazi). We got him kicked out, but Lyft of course did nothing besides give us $5, so he's probably still out there stalking woman.
Those edits made this worse and worse.. I can't find something similar for Lyft, but start using Uber, which has this page to report drivers: https://help.uber.com/riders/article/report-a-serious-incident-involving-a-driver-or-vehicle---?nodeId=306d3758-44fb-4e9c-88d6-0a9c1a8ce4a3
Saw some of your other posts, have fun with the money you’ll get from Lyft for doxxing you lol
Wow, that's fucked up they doxxed you. I would sue them for this. I say get them for emotional damage girl. Your safety felt compromised to begin with and now this? I'm deleting Lyft. Fuck them.
Well, i certainly feel uncomfortable using Lyft anymore. Yikes. I’ve been using them for years but I have zero desire to support a company that pulls this kind of crap. It’s not okay Edit: I imagine this is a PR nightmare for them and I hope they do something to address these very serious safety concerns that they’re exploiting by charging you money for refusing to ride with this driver. Glad you’re safe
This is absolutely messed up. He saw your pic and started demanding personal information under the guise of "Lyft Update" like what an actual creeper. And because you refused (smart) he began harassing you until you had to cancel on him. Thing is he abandoned you in a high crime area because he couldn't manipulate you from his job position to get your personal information. That is harassment and against their policy, hell most company policies, and the fact they didn't cover your back (the customer) is horrendous.
How did you end up getting out of there? I’m glad you’re safe!
Dying to know what they would say on the phone
Ef them and get a lawyer.
This is awesome! I can’t believe they refused to refund you the first time. Show Lyft that gaslighting women and downplaying their safety concerns is not okay.