UberPool Rates and Fare Pricing for Uber Drivers
UberPool is still one of the irritating features for many drivers, yet it is the most misunderstood feature. In the beginning when UberPool was first launched, the trips were calculated based on the total distance and time of the entire trip. This was advertised to us as a way to keep busier and to make more. Most drivers quickly figured out that UberPool trips made us much less money because the rates were so much lower.
Since many drivers were making less with UberPool, Uber quickly changed the way UberPool fares are calculated. Even with the new system, Uber drivers typically make a bit less than regular UberX trips. For some Uber drivers, they need to accept UberPool trips in order to make any money during certain times of the day.
UberPool Rates and Fare Pricing for Uber Drivers
Un-matched UberPool Trip:
If you accept an Uberpool request and you only drive one set of passengers, you have an unmatched pool ride. This means that the trip should be calculated as a regular UberX trip. About half the time, the calculations are off so you will need to do a manual fare review on the Uber driver app. Make sure to include the starting and ending destination in your request since they will ask for it anyway in their email to you. You initiate the fare review on the Uber driver app, but the rest of the communication can be done through email.
Matched UberPool Trip:
If you have a matched Uberpool request, each individual passenger will be charged the Uberpool rate for drivers. You can find out what the Uberpool rate is in your waybill (see below for how to do that). This often differs from the UberX rate. Typically, it is anywhere between 10-25% lower than the UberX rate. For the first passenger, they are charged the base fee and the Uberpool rate for time and distance. The second and subsequent Uberpool passenger fare doesn’t include the base (pickup fee), and is only calculated based on the Uberpool rate for time and distance. Remember that your payout for each individual Uberpool passenger isn’t the same as what the passengers are paying. They have their own separate fare calculations and it depends on a variety of factors.
Below is an example of how it works:
Here is a non-surged UberPool trip:
Here is the UberPool pricing in Seattle:
As you can see, the pricing is:
- Base (pickup fee): $1.35 (only for the first passenger of the Uberpool trip)
- Per Minute: $0.13 (compared to $0.24 for UberX)
- Per Mile: $1.37 (compared to $1.35 for UberX)
Detailed UberPool Calculation:
Below is a spreadsheet representation of the above trips:
| Minutes | Seconds | Time (m) | Distance (mi) | Calculated | Actual | |
| Total | 27 | 11 | 27.18 | 5.48 | 10.41 | |
| Trip 1 | 7 | 52 | 7.87 | 1.67 | 3.728 | 3.72 |
| Trip 2 | 8 | 7 | 8.12 | 1.83 | 2.850 | 2.86 |
| Trip 3 | 11 | 11 | 11.18 | 1.98 | 3.333 | 3.83 |
You can see that Trip 1, 2 and 3 follow very closely to the calculations based on the UberPool fare rates as if they are individual trips. Note that I added the pickup fee to only Trip 1 and not Trip 2 and 3. I also took my 20% commission in the calculations since the actual data as seen in both the spreadsheet and the picture above are with the commissions already taken out. You can see that I got $0.50 extra for trip 3.
The overall trip total is the sum of the three trips in terms of time, distance and price of each trip.
How Do I Find UberPool Pricing in my city?
There are two ways to find this exact pricing in your city:
Method 1: During an UberPool Trip:
Click on the Waybill on the bottom, after clicking trip details during an UberPool trip:
Method 2: After an UberPool Trip:
You can go through the account tab in the Uber Partner App, then click on Waybill. It will show you the waybill for the previous trip.
What about Surge Pricing?
Surge pricing is calculated on top of the above rates. The biggest difference is if the first passenger has a smaller surge price than the subsequent passengers, you won’t get the high surge on the pickup fee. You will get the surge pricing for each individual passenger. The math is a bit more complicated in that case since the surge can be different for each passenger.
Does the Pickup Fee Affect My Earnings?
In my experience, it only reduces your earnings by a little. The longest Uberpool ride I had was about 20 minutes. The longer your Uberpool ride, the less you earn from the pickup fee. If you constantly have more passengers added to your Uberpool ride, then your earnings will gradually suffer because you are not getting the pickup fee for the subsequent passengers. You are staying busier with more passengers,
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