Uber User Accuses Uber Of Scamming Him Out Of $157, Shares Their Terrible Reply Online
Rokas L BoredPanda staff
It’s called ‘vomit fraud’ and it can make your Uber experience an expensive nightmare. It has been around for a few years, surfacing in different parts of the USA (including New York, California, and Florida). Basically, some drivers with the rideshare are cashing in by using fake photos of their trashed seats to charge unwitting customers “cleaning fees.” According to Uber, these extra fees compensate the drivers for the time and money they spend cleaning their vehicles. But this case is a little different. The customer claims the ride didn’t even happen.
“I never saw the $157 charge because it was placed immediately before a legitimate Uber ride I took,” Mike Platt from Greater Detroit wrote. “Must be their tactic. I was only alerted when I saw that my credit card bill was suspiciously high about 30 days later.”
“I was only alerted when I saw that my credit card bill was suspiciously high about 30 days later.”
After contacting the company’s customer support, a long back-and-forth began. Mike thought the whole ordeal was so absurd, he shared everything online. “I’ve been using Uber since mid-2014,” Platt told Bored Panda. “Never experienced anything like this.”
“I’ve always liked Uber, never had a problem until this one. I was even going to give them the benefit of the doubt that this was a rare hiccup / driver-related fraud attempt until I had the awful experience with their customer service.” It was so ridiculous, Mike even wondered if anyone was reading the messages he sent or if he was talking to a bot.
“All would have been OK with me if they would have simply said ‘OK, sorry this happened, we will refund your money,'” Platt added. He also thinks that the company could easily minimize situations like this. “It would be nice if Uber had a help phone line to call ( I think they used to, must have gotten rid of it). I can see how chat-only systems may be cheaper / easier for them, but I would think they could afford it. I wonder how they can afford NOT to have it with things like this happening. Only thing I would add about my experience is that it was more confounding than frustrating for me.”
“Participating in fraudulent activity of any kind is a clear violation of our Community Guidelines,” Uber told Bored Panda. “We are constantly evaluating our processes and technology related to these claims and will take appropriate action whenever fraud may be detected.” The company also stated that they have specific criteria and a review process in place and in instances where they find a confirmed case of fraud, they take appropriate action, including removing the driver from the app.
Scroll down to check out the unbelievable exchange!
“Uber scammed me out of $157”
“I never saw the $157 charge because it was placed immediately before a legitimate Uber ride I took (must be their tactic). I was only alerted when I saw that my credit card bill was suspiciously high about 30 days later”
Thanks to people’s advice, the guy was able to get his money back after contacting his credit card company. Turns out, other people had similar experiences
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What do you think ?
The constant repetition of the same load of rubbish to this poor person is infuriating. Why won't they read the information properly? Uber - you really aren't doing yourselves any favours here! So glad he got all the money back in the end.
But he didn't get all the money back. Uber refused to refund the fare amount and then blocked him from complaining further.
It says in the post above that he got the remaining money back from his credit card company - that's what I was referring to.
Sorry Laugh Fan, you are right. I thought that section was just commentor reactions and scrolled past it. I am glad the credit card company did Uber's job for them.
Easy to miss in the midst of all those comments!
Laugh Fan, the repetitious nature should be a giveaway of the nature of the conversation. The support line is 'staffed' by an A.I. system. All it can do is respond in a pre-programmed way to certain keywords and phrases. No human ever reviewed the above statements.
That doesn't alter the validity of the points made.
I don't know why this comment isn't higher rated. THANK YOU for pointing this out.
I also received these stupid automated responses from "customer care" once - but for the life of me, I can't remember which company it was. Blocked it from my mind.
I'm pretty sure they weren't even reading it improperly. They were letting their chatbot handle it. just one more reason to not use uber.
Why is M O'Connell getting downvoted for pointing this out? It is obvious that the replies this person was getting from this chat system were automated (it is equally obvious that that is a pretty sorry way to conduct customer service). The real question is, why didn't this guy do what any normal person would do and try to get someone on the phone (rather than replying repeatedly to what is clearly an auto-reply system), or call his CC company to report fraud.
The guy got blocked by Uber's auto system! It rather suggests it is difficult to get hold of an actual human being if that is how Uber have set up their customer service systems. So your 'normal' person might have very little option. He did also call his cc company.
Chatbot or human - it is still a crap way to organise 'customer service'. That is the issue. Not whether it was AI or not. That system may be hard to avoid as well if that is the only real option on offer.
Downvoted for pointing out something that is irrelevant that's why. If the system is AI it might be nigh on impossible to get someone on the phone. Either way Uber's customer service remains dreadful. There should be a point during a repeated complaint at which their systems stop with the auto replies/AI and a human intervenes.
This is when you tweet. Blow them up on twitter and make them look bad and they usually deliver. Most companies will. It's what Twitter is most useful for.
Reading this made me so angry. They completely ignore her proof that it was a scam (the time discrepancy), repeat the same irrelevant lie to justify their scam, and then block her from replying! What the f***, Uber?
This story involved a MAN. You must be a raving feminist who only reads things about "womyn".
This comment is hidden. Click here to view.
It is very obviously an automated system that is responding to his complaints.
It doesn't matter though! The responses are set up by people and are still rubbish. The company has chosen to use chatbots and the process should have reverted to a human at a certain stage instead of continuing. Certainly not blocked them. It still means that uber made bloody awful choices.
The constant repetition of the same load of rubbish to this poor person is infuriating. Why won't they read the information properly? Uber - you really aren't doing yourselves any favours here! So glad he got all the money back in the end.
But he didn't get all the money back. Uber refused to refund the fare amount and then blocked him from complaining further.
It says in the post above that he got the remaining money back from his credit card company - that's what I was referring to.
Sorry Laugh Fan, you are right. I thought that section was just commentor reactions and scrolled past it. I am glad the credit card company did Uber's job for them.
Easy to miss in the midst of all those comments!
Laugh Fan, the repetitious nature should be a giveaway of the nature of the conversation. The support line is 'staffed' by an A.I. system. All it can do is respond in a pre-programmed way to certain keywords and phrases. No human ever reviewed the above statements.
That doesn't alter the validity of the points made.
I don't know why this comment isn't higher rated. THANK YOU for pointing this out.
I also received these stupid automated responses from "customer care" once - but for the life of me, I can't remember which company it was. Blocked it from my mind.
I'm pretty sure they weren't even reading it improperly. They were letting their chatbot handle it. just one more reason to not use uber.
Why is M O'Connell getting downvoted for pointing this out? It is obvious that the replies this person was getting from this chat system were automated (it is equally obvious that that is a pretty sorry way to conduct customer service). The real question is, why didn't this guy do what any normal person would do and try to get someone on the phone (rather than replying repeatedly to what is clearly an auto-reply system), or call his CC company to report fraud.
The guy got blocked by Uber's auto system! It rather suggests it is difficult to get hold of an actual human being if that is how Uber have set up their customer service systems. So your 'normal' person might have very little option. He did also call his cc company.
Chatbot or human - it is still a crap way to organise 'customer service'. That is the issue. Not whether it was AI or not. That system may be hard to avoid as well if that is the only real option on offer.
Downvoted for pointing out something that is irrelevant that's why. If the system is AI it might be nigh on impossible to get someone on the phone. Either way Uber's customer service remains dreadful. There should be a point during a repeated complaint at which their systems stop with the auto replies/AI and a human intervenes.
This is when you tweet. Blow them up on twitter and make them look bad and they usually deliver. Most companies will. It's what Twitter is most useful for.
Reading this made me so angry. They completely ignore her proof that it was a scam (the time discrepancy), repeat the same irrelevant lie to justify their scam, and then block her from replying! What the f***, Uber?
This story involved a MAN. You must be a raving feminist who only reads things about "womyn".
This comment is hidden. Click here to view.
It is very obviously an automated system that is responding to his complaints.
It doesn't matter though! The responses are set up by people and are still rubbish. The company has chosen to use chatbots and the process should have reverted to a human at a certain stage instead of continuing. Certainly not blocked them. It still means that uber made bloody awful choices.