In message , at 13:05:13 on Thu, 8 Mar
2018, D A Stocks remarked:
"Roland Perry" wrote in message
...
In message , at 17:16:08 on Wed, 7
Mar 2018, D A Stocks remarked:

A £5 fare would be (at 20mph) 2.6 miles, £20 11.5 miles. That's a
stupendous amount of "getting lost"

Is Uber any good?

I've not been encouraged by their website. For a journey that we do
occasionally by taxi from our local station to home, it shows a range
of fares from £4 to £16 (a black cab typically costs £5.50).

Once you get outside metropolitan areas the cost per mile is a
killer. Even a short-ish trip to an airport (let's say 50 miles) is
grossly uncompetitive with local minicabs.

I've just got a quote for central Brighton to Gatwick Airport (around
30 miles) that compares reasonably well with a turn up and go fare in
a minicab.

It's not as different as I expected for a trip to Stansted (~1hr on
the road) where I've got an estimate of £75 from Uber, and a fixed
fare of £55 from a local minicab firm.

Is the minicab firm a pre-booked fare? Generally these are cheaper - I
assume this is because the firm has a better chance of finding a
customer to pay for the return trip.

Such fares are generally pre-booked with the minicab firm, but only
offered to drivers at the last minute (the minicab firm is betting that
there will be at least one affiliated driver in their pool willing to
accept the fare when broadcast). So really it's not so much booking a
cab in advance, as booking the cab firm's solicitation broadcast to the
fleet in advance.

Most of the time the individual drivers will be fighting to get those
kinds of fares, because it's much easier and more lucrative work than
ferrying a succession of drunks a couple of miles home at night.

I would expect Uber prices to be more comparable with taking a metered
taxi off a rank.

oh dear oh dear, you'll have the utl thought-police to answer to, if I
start describing how even minicabs in my area are metered (if they don't
negotiate a fixed fee in advance).
--
Roland Perry