Ridesharing | Society | Life Lessons
10 Ways To Be a 5-Star Ridesharing Passenger: The Dos & Don’ts.
What I learned as a ridesharing driver in Miami while regenerating myself after personal life issues.
--
While seeking to get back on my feet after a depression struggle, I killed time as a ridesharing driver. It led me to rediscover human nature. I got to interact with the best and the worse of humankind, engage with generous poor people, face greedy rich bastards, visit secluded neighborhoods, transport half-naked men & women, survive rude passengers, encounter charming people, and have the most incongruous conversations. It gave me sharp images of what I wanted–and didn’t want–for the rest of my life.
In the process, I noted how several ridesharing passengers had misconceptions about Uber’s and Lyft’s services and how a few simple actions could make it a better experience for all parties sitting in the car.
I worked for both major ridesharing companies in the USA. I started on the Florida East Coast in the Cocoa Beach area. I was making some money, but I didn’t enjoy the experience. The only steady business in that part of the world was serving cruise ship passengers, and I don’t know why, but for the most part, they weren’t particularly friendly people, and they all wanted to fit three truckloads of suitcases in one car trunk. Furthermore, the procedure to pick up and drop off people at that terminal is severe pain in the you-know-what.
So I moved down the coast and eventually ended up in Miami. After trying my luck in various neighborhoods, I ended up as a regular driver in South Beach. The traffic jams can be annoying, but the rides were usually quite profitable because of frequent surge pricing and because many wealthy South Beach travelers didn’t have any problem spending $100 for a round trip to their favorite shoe store and $200 to join friends at an overpriced nightclub.
I did that for a few months until I was ready to return to my legitimate business career. And here’s what I noted.
In this article, I’m referring to a ridesharing driver as “he” because I am one. Please kindly consider “he” as inclusive of “she” and any other…
