When I’m in Las Vegas, I usually drive my own car to go places. Sometimes, though, using rideshare is convenient. Like going to or from the airport. Or taking me to physical therapy appointments when I’m recovering from one surgery or another and I’m not supposed to drive. While I do enjoy a glass of wine with dinner periodically, I haven’t been too impaired to drive safely since my college days more than 50 years ago, but I suppose it could happen again.
I have both Lyft and Uber accounts set up, but in 20 trials, Lyft was always cheaper than Uber. So, I only use Lyft. It’s possible that Uber might be cheaper than Lyft some of the time. Since many of the Lyft drivers also drive for Uber, I’m assuming the experience itself is pretty similar between the two companies.
Bonnie and I go to Reno 20 times a year or so. While most of our play is at one casino, we do play at others there and so earn free play. We schedule our trips, among other parameters, so we can pick up any free play we’re offered.
If we have three or more casinos to visit during a trip (or if Lake Tahoe, which is 60 miles away, has one of those casinos), we’ll rent a car. But if it’s only two casinos, we’ll take the shuttle from the airport to get to the first casino offering free play, and Lyft our way to the casino where we’ll stay. While we could take a shuttle back to the airport and get another shuttle from the airport to the second casino, that can easily take an hour or so and Lyft is much quicker.
On one occasion, we did this in reverse. That is, we took the shuttle to the main casino we were going to stay for the trip and used Lyft to take us to the second. From there, we would take a shuttle to the airport.
On this occasion, I brought most of our luggage down to the video poker machine I play, and was waiting for Bonnie to join me. She was still in the room and was going to meet me at the machine. I opened up the Lyft app to check how much it would be to go to the second casino and found out it was $12.50. I didn’t order the ride (Bonnie wasn’t there yet), but I left the app open. Five minutes later, the price was $9.75, and ten minutes after that it was $18.
While I knew rideshare pricing is based on supply and demand, I didn’t realize it jumped around so much so quickly.
When Bonnie arrived, the price was $14.35. I waited a few minutes and it dropped to $10.95, which I took. That wasn’t the lowest price of the day, but if I took the earlier price of $9.75, the ride would have come and gone before Bonnie got there. And leaving Bonnie behind wasn’t an option.
But $10.95 was a relatively low price. It was much lower than $18 and was the second-lowest price I’d seen in the last half hour. It’s possible the next price would be $8.35, but it’s also possible it would be $17.70. I have to pull the trigger some time, so I pick a price that is relatively low.
It’s possible that the first price I see will be the lowest one for quite some time. I won’t get that price, usually. Unless we’ve taken the same route at the same time of day several times, we don’t know a good price from a bad price. So we almost always get a few prices and pick a relatively low one.
Now, Bonnie and I make a game out of which Lyft price to take. If the price drops when we’re ready to go, we jump on it and feel good about saving $1.25 or so. Never mind that we might be up or down $40,000 for the trip.
In Las Vegas when we take Lyft from the airport home, I expect the price to be rather stable. During normal business hours, there are always a lot of people wanting to use Lyft to get away from the airport. The last time we took it, the price was $19.99, and it stayed that way for almost ten minutes. Finally, it dropped all the way to $19.85. I took it.
When I “bragged” to Bonnie about saving a whole 14 cents, we both laughed. This time, what we saved was essentially zero. But doing this over and over again, we’ll get lower prices in total than if we blindly just take the first one.
Congratulations Bob! You responded to a reader comment about “frugalness” with a funny story about Lyft/Uber. Calling it an Advantage Play and the article in general made me laugh. I even learned something about prices on such rides changing so much in a short period of time. I knew about supply/demand pricing, but not this. And $40,000 plus or minus on a short trip? Significant wins are short spikes, while significant losses occur grindingly over a period of time. Finally, I am four years older than you are and I wonder where you get all the energy to do this. Twenty trips a year to Reno??
I was trying really hard to go w/o having to use a rideshare but had to give in a few years ago when staying at the M Resort. Have used them a dozen or so times and agree Lyft is generally cheaper and sometimes a lot more than 14 cents lol.
Question — are you ever carrying large amounts of cash and does that factor into the equation of Lyft/Uber/regular cab/shuttle?
And does being a couple and/or being male factor much into the same decision-making?
I used to tote fairly large amounts of cash, so I felt better in a regular cab, which seems to vet it’s drivers in a more rigorous fashion. And my superior half when traveling alone has a stronger regular-cab bias.
I also had a really good friend who drove cab, and I knew a bunch of cab drivers, so I guess I’m biased in that direction because I’ve seen a little bit more clearly how regular cab companies work. I just think you are less likely, as an elderly statesman, to run into an issue in a regular cab setup.
Note: I do not own stock in any cab companies, but as the general population ages, I don’t see that as a terrible idea.
FWIW, Robert, I consider rideshare safer than regular cabs simply because there’s always an electronic record of who the driver was and who ordered the ride. With cabs, if you just flag one down, you’re much more anonymous – and hence easier to rob without consequence
You’re right, but I almost never just flag a cab without calling for the pickup. But thanks for that angle, as I had not really considered it. And certainly, some cabbies will try to do some rides off the books. Not sure how often that occurs in LV, but it does occur elsewhere.
Now that I think about it, the implementation of flat “no meter running” rates in LV would likely lead to more of this off-the-books thing. So thanks for steering my brain in that direction.
The real advantage play is getting the $100 Uber giftcards at Costco for $80. I always load up before each trip.
That happened to us when we stayed at Red Rock and had to check out in the morning and go to the airport. I woke up at 4:30am and for giggles I looked at Uber to see if and how much it would be. It said $25 range. When we actually checked out at 7:00 am that same ride went to $70.
Ouch!
Thanks for the tip. I never knew that.
I knew the rates varied, but had zero idea they varied that much. That is wild.