Hey there, beautiful. Welcome to the second day of 2016. We’re not 100% sure what’s on the horizon – if you are, shoot us a message, ’cause that kind of prescience would work a treat for us – but we could have called these things with total certainty after NYE:
- A glut of unwanted novelty sunglasses
- An increased chance of life-altering hangovers
- People copping astronomical Uber fares for their groggy rides home.
Amidst the haze of the past 48 hours, punters around Australia have woken up to some legitimately huge charges after catching Uber or UberX rides. Today, W.A man Kris Keen said he’d been slogged $332 for a half-hour trip home from NYE revelry in Perth, which was racked up by Uber’s surge pricing. According to Uber’s site, the same ride would usually cost under forty bucks.
His admission comes after a Sydney woman also announced she’d dropped a soul-crushing $700 on a ride. Still, that’s nothing compared to this unlucky bloke from NYC:
Thx for the #NYE ride last night @Uber! Look, if you can’t afford #surge, just drink and drive like a normal person. pic.twitter.com/b2EK2cJUMw
— Kyle Ayers (@kyleayers) January 1, 2016
FWIW, Keen mistook the 8.9x fare multiplier displayed on the app as a call-out fee, and has taken his complaint to Consumer Affairs W.A. Whether there’s any merit to the claim is – as we said before – yet to be determined, but it’s unlikely the service is going to buckle any time soon.
