7 ms·

How Much do Boston UberX Drivers Make in a Night?

43 points by ovechtrick 12y ago

smackfu 12y ago
All these drivers talk about liking how they can work when they want. It makes me wonder if Uber ever goes into Surge pricing on times where the demand is low, but the supply is even lower, like Sunday mornings. (Also, the close button on site's popup "please sign up to be spammed" window is almost invisible with dark grey on black. So scammy.)
- elements 12y ago
  I was hanging out with a buddy while he experimented with this. The quoted fare dropped from over $30 at around 2am (when all bars are legally required to close in my state) to around $20 about 30-40 minutes later.
joosters 12y ago
The linked article - http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2013/03/30/spotlight/9eVWW7Y6RaOIqII62n2XlI/story.html http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2013/03/30/spotlight/9eVWW7... is a real eye-opener about the costs that traditional taxi drivers have to pay in order to work a shift. I'm no Uber fan but you can see how drivers would prefer working for them. The long-term question is, will Uber stay a better-behaved taxi service owner if/when it cracks the market?
- n00j 12y ago
  Thats true, it seems like a huge expense to for a shift: Boston Cab charges [the undercover Globe reporter] the standard shift rate of $77, plus an $18 premium for a newer cab, as well as a city-sanctioned, 30-cent parking violation fee. Factor in the sales tax ($5.96) and optional collision damage waiver ($5), and his cost per shift is $106.26, not including gas. But then you have to factor in that for UberX you have to own your own car, your own insurance and you have maintenance costs associated with your car. Probably still comes out cheaper / have more flexibilty with UberX, but would like to see a more in depth comparison of the costs of both.
  - mkmk 12y ago
    UberX drivers are also paid as contractors, so there is no withholding on their paycheck and they must make up the difference themselves. Does anybody know if this is the case for regular cabbies?
    - hibikir 12y ago
      In many places, drivers are independent contractors, and most of what the company does for them is deal with the equipment, vehicle insurance and the licensing. Pretty much everything else is the cabbie's responsibility. That said, regulations are different everywhere, so while this is probably the most common arrangement in the US, other setups are not necessarily illegal.
  - jtbigwoo 12y ago
    Uber doesn't check up too carefully on its drivers' insurance situation, which helps keep costs down. From other articles, it appears that Uber drivers in general don't pay for appropriate insurance.
  - elements 12y ago
    If a driver does 15 shifts per month (which would be a pretty lazy schedule for most full-time cabbies I've talked to), you're looking at roughly $1500 per month just to use the car. A quick google search indicates that the MSRPs for top-of-the-line Toyota Camrys and Chevy Malibus (just a couple of cars I thought might be well-suited to the task) are around $30,000, which, at 3% over 5 years, would require a monthly payment of about $540. But let's round that up to $600 to cover taxes and anything else that might be rolled into the loan. As for insurance, I think $200/mo is probably a conservative guess. I pay way less than that as a 20-something male driving a "high risk" vehicle. That brings us to $800/mo, leaving $700 to cover maintenance. I'm sure maintenance costs would be quite a bit above average given how much the car is driven, but I can't imagine they'd come anywhere near $700/mo, especially in the first five years (the term of the loan). After the car is paid for, you can either continue to drive it if it's cheaper to do that, or you can sell it for a few thousand bucks and start over. Plus, you don't have to buy your own car, since you've already got it, which would save you a few hundred every month. Not exactly an in-depth look at the issue, but it seem likely that you're better off owning your own vehicle. Unrelated, but my worry (for the drivers, anyway, both full-time and casual) is that given the low barriers to entry, a lot of people who own vehicles already will see how they can make some decent money on a casual basis with just slightly higher maintenance costs, and before long, there will be enough UberX drivers that the amount of time spent waiting to get a fare will bring the hourly wages down considerably. Maybe they'll limit the number of new drivers after a point or something, I have no idea, but I'd be concerned about that if I were a driver. Not exactly relevant, but I was chatting with one UberX driver a few weekends ago, and she told me that the company sends each driver a monthly spreadsheet of metrics for that driver, allowing them to track their own performance. I thought that was interesting.
noname123 12y ago
Damn, $300/night. So that's like 9 grand/month if you work every night. And probably can under-report tips and meet interesting people too instead of wasting hard earned cash buying rounds at overpriced bars and lounges on weekends. Beats working for a Boston IT company where you make about 100-120K a year but get taxed like crazy.
- mjolk 12y ago
  >And probably can under-report tips and meet interesting people too instead of wasting hard earned cash buying rounds at overpriced bars and lounges on weekends. That's one way to put "if you work every night, you won't have a social life."
  - Crito 12y ago
    Shift workers don't have no social lives. They just have social lives that are dissimilar from your own.
- mkmk 12y ago
  Uber drivers do not accept tips, in my experience.
  - genericuser 12y ago
    The few I have asked have expressed to me that tipping isn't really a thing with uber, and while they would accept a tip it was not necessary or expected.
- dnautics 12y ago
  >And probably can under-report tips I drive for both Lyft and Uber: Most passengers don't tip, and even when they do they usually use the app, so there's very little under-reporting. In my experience: The most cash tip I've ever recieved was $20 for returning an iPhone to a user, and the most cash tip I've ever gotten in a night from just rides is on the order of $10, and I'd say about 80% of my nights net $0 cash tip. You do, however, get a really nice tax advantage if you drive a fuel efficient car, the federal deduction is $.55/mile, and I estimate my operating costs (fuel, maintenance, but not depreciation since my car already has 115k), to be about $.20/mile. It might be neat for priceomics to do a report on this. Hey, priceomics, want to interview me?
vitd 12y ago
Am I misunderstanding, or did the article gloss over the cost of keeping up your car as a driver? They talk about how renting a cab costs a certain amount up-front, plus insurance, plus some other stuff. Then they sort of hand-wave that an Uber driver also has those costs. I don't doubt that the rental fees are expensive, but it seems an unfair comparison when the rental fees pay for maintenance of the car, and they don't include maintenance that Uber drivers have to do. And I don't know of any jurisdictions in the US where you don't need insurance to drive. I also found it interesting that the rental fees include a 30 cent parking-violation fee. At my office we had a problem with Uber who were constantly parking illegally in front of our building. So they're getting the benefit of illegal parking without paying the (admittedly small) fee that cabbies have to pay. Of course it costs less! Especially if you don't count keeping up your car and the community!
- autarch 12y ago
  Well, you can factor in car maintenance to your costs as a driver. Given that the drivers would probably own a car regardless (because they need it for other things) the additional wear and tear is almost certainly more than compensated for with the extra income. Also, if this is self-employment (which it sounds like it is) then the drivers can deduct $0.56 per mile they drive from their taxes. As for a violation fee, I assume that for cabbies that's to cover the cost of tickets they get, not that it exempts them from receiving them. With Uber, you can judge the risk yourself. Presumably, just like with a taxi, it makes sense to accept an occasional ticket as the cost of doing business. Overall, it seems like it's economically reasonable to be an Uber driver. The big difference between Uber and a cab is that the existing regulatory regimes in many cities allow the cab company owners to extract most of the value from their drivers.
  - objclxt 12y ago
    > Also, if this is self-employment (which it sounds like it is) then the drivers can deduct $0.56 per mile they drive from their taxes. You deduct it from your reported income, not your taxes. This is a fairly important distinction, although it is still a useful benefit.
- 12y ago
lukethomas 12y ago
I talked with a BOS driver who had a Toyota Sienna and participated in UberX and UberXL. For UberX, they take 20%, and for UberXL they take 28% (he also mentioned he ended up being paid the same on both tiers.)
dnautics 12y ago
I should add one anecdote, there is a guy in San Diego who is using ridesharing to try to make $150,000 in the year and start up a company. In order to do this, he has to make ~3k a week, and I think it's impressive that he's been consistently doing this for about 3 months now. It will take a serious toll on him (we're talking 50-60 hour weeks, and I am not sure he's taking getting sick into account) and I seriously worry about some his business judgements. Nonetheless, he is on track and about a quarter of the way there.
ollyfg 12y ago
I really like how this article answers the question in the headline in the first few lines. Too many launch into an in-depth discussion and seem to forget that the article may just be browsed over quickly.
marbemac 12y ago
I'm confused about these lines: "As self-employed, independent contractors, though, UberX drivers receive a Form 1099-MISC...Subsequently, UberX drivers are hit with a 5.6 percent tax deduction for each mile they drive...if he or she drove 100 miles, he or she will be taxed $56 (5.6 percent tax x 100 miles driven)." Why is this the case? In my experience with 1099s, they have nothing to do with miles driven. In any case, I don't understand how 5.6% of 100 = $56. Could somebody please elaborate on this?
- smackfu 12y ago
  Yeah, that's written by a confused person. There is a $0.56 per mile deduction for business miles, which is $56 per 100 miles. This is not deducted from their take-home income as the author seems to think.
- gamblor956 12y ago
  The deduction is $0.56/mile, for a $56 deduction (not a tax) for every 100 miles driven. The deduction is in lieu of the separate deductions for gas, wear and tear, insurance, etc., so the driver must choose either to take the mileage deduction or to separately deduct their driving-income expenses. It's not clear why UberX drivers are being hit with a deduction by Uber on their 1099s, since they--not Uber--are the ones that get the deduction. It sounds like the writer is simply confused about what is actually happening. Based on the magic math of the rest of the article, I'm guessing that the writer doesn't know what they're talking about.
  - chrismcb 12y ago
    Considering they mentioned several times "5.6 percent per mile driven" I'd go with confused camp... Otherwise you'll drive 100 miles and get a 560 percent tax break!
pbhjpbhj 12y ago
Surely insurance companies exclude driving for hire or similar from the insured uses of vehicles in the USA? They certainly do in UK. If you drove as an unlicensed taxi-driver and took a consideration you'd be driving without insurance.

43 points by ovechtrick 12y ago

All these drivers talk about liking how they can work when they want. It makes me wonder if Uber ever goes into Surge pricing on times where the demand is low, but the supply is even lower, like Sunday mornings. (Also, the close button on site's popup "please sign up to be spammed" window is almost invisible with dark grey on black. So scammy.)

elements 12y ago
I was hanging out with a buddy while he experimented with this. The quoted fare dropped from over $30 at around 2am (when all bars are legally required to close in my state) to around $20 about 30-40 minutes later.

joosters 12y ago

The linked article - http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2013/03/30/spotlight/9eVWW7Y6RaOIqII62n2XlI/story.html http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2013/03/30/spotlight/9eVWW7... is a real eye-opener about the costs that traditional taxi drivers have to pay in order to work a shift. I'm no Uber fan but you can see how drivers would prefer working for them. The long-term question is, will Uber stay a better-behaved taxi service owner if/when it cracks the market?

n00j 12y ago
Thats true, it seems like a huge expense to for a shift: Boston Cab charges [the undercover Globe reporter] the standard shift rate of $77, plus an $18 premium for a newer cab, as well as a city-sanctioned, 30-cent parking violation fee. Factor in the sales tax ($5.96) and optional collision damage waiver ($5), and his cost per shift is $106.26, not including gas. But then you have to factor in that for UberX you have to own your own car, your own insurance and you have maintenance costs associated with your car. Probably still comes out cheaper / have more flexibilty with UberX, but would like to see a more in depth comparison of the costs of both.
- mkmk 12y ago
  UberX drivers are also paid as contractors, so there is no withholding on their paycheck and they must make up the difference themselves. Does anybody know if this is the case for regular cabbies?
  - hibikir 12y ago
    In many places, drivers are independent contractors, and most of what the company does for them is deal with the equipment, vehicle insurance and the licensing. Pretty much everything else is the cabbie's responsibility. That said, regulations are different everywhere, so while this is probably the most common arrangement in the US, other setups are not necessarily illegal.
- jtbigwoo 12y ago
  Uber doesn't check up too carefully on its drivers' insurance situation, which helps keep costs down. From other articles, it appears that Uber drivers in general don't pay for appropriate insurance.
- elements 12y ago
  If a driver does 15 shifts per month (which would be a pretty lazy schedule for most full-time cabbies I've talked to), you're looking at roughly $1500 per month just to use the car. A quick google search indicates that the MSRPs for top-of-the-line Toyota Camrys and Chevy Malibus (just a couple of cars I thought might be well-suited to the task) are around $30,000, which, at 3% over 5 years, would require a monthly payment of about $540. But let's round that up to $600 to cover taxes and anything else that might be rolled into the loan. As for insurance, I think $200/mo is probably a conservative guess. I pay way less than that as a 20-something male driving a "high risk" vehicle. That brings us to $800/mo, leaving $700 to cover maintenance. I'm sure maintenance costs would be quite a bit above average given how much the car is driven, but I can't imagine they'd come anywhere near $700/mo, especially in the first five years (the term of the loan). After the car is paid for, you can either continue to drive it if it's cheaper to do that, or you can sell it for a few thousand bucks and start over. Plus, you don't have to buy your own car, since you've already got it, which would save you a few hundred every month. Not exactly an in-depth look at the issue, but it seem likely that you're better off owning your own vehicle. Unrelated, but my worry (for the drivers, anyway, both full-time and casual) is that given the low barriers to entry, a lot of people who own vehicles already will see how they can make some decent money on a casual basis with just slightly higher maintenance costs, and before long, there will be enough UberX drivers that the amount of time spent waiting to get a fare will bring the hourly wages down considerably. Maybe they'll limit the number of new drivers after a point or something, I have no idea, but I'd be concerned about that if I were a driver. Not exactly relevant, but I was chatting with one UberX driver a few weekends ago, and she told me that the company sends each driver a monthly spreadsheet of metrics for that driver, allowing them to track their own performance. I thought that was interesting.

noname123 12y ago

Damn, $300/night. So that's like 9 grand/month if you work every night. And probably can under-report tips and meet interesting people too instead of wasting hard earned cash buying rounds at overpriced bars and lounges on weekends. Beats working for a Boston IT company where you make about 100-120K a year but get taxed like crazy.

mjolk 12y ago
>And probably can under-report tips and meet interesting people too instead of wasting hard earned cash buying rounds at overpriced bars and lounges on weekends. That's one way to put "if you work every night, you won't have a social life."
- Crito 12y ago
  Shift workers don't have no social lives. They just have social lives that are dissimilar from your own.
mkmk 12y ago
Uber drivers do not accept tips, in my experience.
- genericuser 12y ago
  The few I have asked have expressed to me that tipping isn't really a thing with uber, and while they would accept a tip it was not necessary or expected.
dnautics 12y ago
>And probably can under-report tips I drive for both Lyft and Uber: Most passengers don't tip, and even when they do they usually use the app, so there's very little under-reporting. In my experience: The most cash tip I've ever recieved was $20 for returning an iPhone to a user, and the most cash tip I've ever gotten in a night from just rides is on the order of $10, and I'd say about 80% of my nights net $0 cash tip. You do, however, get a really nice tax advantage if you drive a fuel efficient car, the federal deduction is $.55/mile, and I estimate my operating costs (fuel, maintenance, but not depreciation since my car already has 115k), to be about $.20/mile. It might be neat for priceomics to do a report on this. Hey, priceomics, want to interview me?

vitd 12y ago

Am I misunderstanding, or did the article gloss over the cost of keeping up your car as a driver? They talk about how renting a cab costs a certain amount up-front, plus insurance, plus some other stuff. Then they sort of hand-wave that an Uber driver also has those costs. I don't doubt that the rental fees are expensive, but it seems an unfair comparison when the rental fees pay for maintenance of the car, and they don't include maintenance that Uber drivers have to do. And I don't know of any jurisdictions in the US where you don't need insurance to drive. I also found it interesting that the rental fees include a 30 cent parking-violation fee. At my office we had a problem with Uber who were constantly parking illegally in front of our building. So they're getting the benefit of illegal parking without paying the (admittedly small) fee that cabbies have to pay. Of course it costs less! Especially if you don't count keeping up your car and the community!

autarch 12y ago
Well, you can factor in car maintenance to your costs as a driver. Given that the drivers would probably own a car regardless (because they need it for other things) the additional wear and tear is almost certainly more than compensated for with the extra income. Also, if this is self-employment (which it sounds like it is) then the drivers can deduct $0.56 per mile they drive from their taxes. As for a violation fee, I assume that for cabbies that's to cover the cost of tickets they get, not that it exempts them from receiving them. With Uber, you can judge the risk yourself. Presumably, just like with a taxi, it makes sense to accept an occasional ticket as the cost of doing business. Overall, it seems like it's economically reasonable to be an Uber driver. The big difference between Uber and a cab is that the existing regulatory regimes in many cities allow the cab company owners to extract most of the value from their drivers.
- objclxt 12y ago
  > Also, if this is self-employment (which it sounds like it is) then the drivers can deduct $0.56 per mile they drive from their taxes. You deduct it from your reported income, not your taxes. This is a fairly important distinction, although it is still a useful benefit.
12y ago

lukethomas 12y ago

I talked with a BOS driver who had a Toyota Sienna and participated in UberX and UberXL. For UberX, they take 20%, and for UberXL they take 28% (he also mentioned he ended up being paid the same on both tiers.)

dnautics 12y ago

I should add one anecdote, there is a guy in San Diego who is using ridesharing to try to make $150,000 in the year and start up a company. In order to do this, he has to make ~3k a week, and I think it's impressive that he's been consistently doing this for about 3 months now. It will take a serious toll on him (we're talking 50-60 hour weeks, and I am not sure he's taking getting sick into account) and I seriously worry about some his business judgements. Nonetheless, he is on track and about a quarter of the way there.

ollyfg 12y ago

I really like how this article answers the question in the headline in the first few lines. Too many launch into an in-depth discussion and seem to forget that the article may just be browsed over quickly.

marbemac 12y ago

I'm confused about these lines: "As self-employed, independent contractors, though, UberX drivers receive a Form 1099-MISC...Subsequently, UberX drivers are hit with a 5.6 percent tax deduction for each mile they drive...if he or she drove 100 miles, he or she will be taxed $56 (5.6 percent tax x 100 miles driven)." Why is this the case? In my experience with 1099s, they have nothing to do with miles driven. In any case, I don't understand how 5.6% of 100 = $56. Could somebody please elaborate on this?

smackfu 12y ago
Yeah, that's written by a confused person. There is a $0.56 per mile deduction for business miles, which is $56 per 100 miles. This is not deducted from their take-home income as the author seems to think.
gamblor956 12y ago
The deduction is $0.56/mile, for a $56 deduction (not a tax) for every 100 miles driven. The deduction is in lieu of the separate deductions for gas, wear and tear, insurance, etc., so the driver must choose either to take the mileage deduction or to separately deduct their driving-income expenses. It's not clear why UberX drivers are being hit with a deduction by Uber on their 1099s, since they--not Uber--are the ones that get the deduction. It sounds like the writer is simply confused about what is actually happening. Based on the magic math of the rest of the article, I'm guessing that the writer doesn't know what they're talking about.
- chrismcb 12y ago
  Considering they mentioned several times "5.6 percent per mile driven" I'd go with confused camp... Otherwise you'll drive 100 miles and get a 560 percent tax break!

pbhjpbhj 12y ago

Surely insurance companies exclude driving for hire or similar from the insured uses of vehicles in the USA? They certainly do in UK. If you drove as an unlicensed taxi-driver and took a consideration you'd be driving without insurance.