Woman upset after bad Uber experience

A DUNEDIN woman has criticised Uber after her experience fraudulently losing almost $900 through the app, and the subsequent difficulty dealing with the company.

Connor Marner said she downloaded Uber Eats on August 8, but did not end up using it.

The next day when she checked her emails, she found Uber messages about recent trips around New York, costing a total of $877.31.

She cancelled her card and tried to dispute the costs, she said.

After a difficult back and forth through the app, she sent proof of the charges, she said.

About two hours later she was sent Uber’s final correspondence through the app, but her login was denied, and she received a message saying her account did not exist.

She assumed access was blocked due to fraudulent use.

This left her unable to contact the company, she said.

She had so far been refunded $779.57 of the $877.31 in charges, she said.

The experience left her concerned with the ‘‘lack of security’’ Uber applied to her personal information.

‘‘It took less than 12 hours for the first charges to appear. My password was eight characters long and a mix of upper and lower case letters and numbers.’’

She also thought she was poorly treated as a customer.

‘‘I never felt they believed me or cared that I had just lost a significant amount of money . . . due to charges they made.’’

Her bank was investigating and would have to ‘‘clean up Uber’s mess’’, she said.

An Uber spokeswoman said the company had reimbursed charges in full, despite Ms Marner’s bank statements showing nearly $100 outstanding.

‘‘The privacy and security of our riders and driverpartners is incredibly important to Uber and we want to assure riders that their payment information is encrypted when entered into the Uber app, meaning fraudsters can’t steal credit card numbers from a rider account.’’

❛ I never felt they [Uber] believed me or

cared