Uber to pay drivers more for Pool trips

SAN FRANCISCO — Uber pitched its carpooling service as a way for passengers to save cash. But for drivers, UberPool felt like a raw deal because taking on extra passengers didn’t mean they would collect extra payouts.

That changed Tuesday, when the San Francisco company announced that it will start paying drivers for each additional passenger picked up.

Fares will vary from city to city. In Los Angeles, drivers will earn an extra 95 cents per UberPool pickup.

Previously, drivers were paid only a base fare when they picked up their first passenger, and were compensated for distance traveled and time spent performing the rides. Drivers received no additional compensation for picking up additional passengers as part of an UberPool trip. Now, drivers will earn the extra pickup fee on top of the base rate and mileage.

Uber will shoulder a portion of the cost by reducing its service fee, the company said.

“We heard from drivers that Pool feels like extra work without additional pay,” said Aaron Schildkrout, Uber’s head of driver product. “Multiple pickups in particular made Pool trips more challenging.”

Uber does not tell drivers before they accept a passenger whether the ride is a regular Uber ride, in which only one stop is typically made, or if it’s an UberPool ride, in which a driver may have to pick up multiple passengers from different locations and make more than one stop.

Some drivers had a tepid response to the announcement, taking to message boards and Facebook groups to say they didn’t think the added fares were adequate. Others welcomed the added compensation as long overdue.

In Los Angeles, UberPool accounts for 31% of all Uber rides. The service is available in 14 cities across the U.S. and Canada.

The change to UberPool is part of a broader campaign the company started earlier this year titled “180 Days of Change,” in which it launched a slew of features to appease existing drivers and woo new ones.