If you read a few stories on UP you will quickly learn that there are plenty of scams that an occasional slimy passengers (pax) may pull on drivers in order to get a free ride. Some of the common ones include claiming that the driver was threatening, drunk or made inappropriate comments, the ride never occurred, or perhaps the driver was touching or stalking the pax.

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The worst driver scam of all doesn't involve passengers, and if you are a driver and don't know about this, then it's time to get educated! I wrote this article for YOU.

This one is a money scam. I had it attempted on me (while driving Uber) about a year ago, and wrote about it in another Article. Recently it happened again, this time while driving Lyft.

I did not get taken by this scam. Thankfully, it was because of reading UberPeople.net threads that I became aware of this. When the scam started, I immediately suspected foul play, and was prepared.

Here is the scam: You get a ride request. The pax calls you and claims to work for the company (Uber or Lyft), and says that there is a problem with your account, or that they want to give you a bonus for being such a good worker. You need to pull over to a safe place to talk. Then you need to cancel the ride, make sure you don't charge the customer. Then you need to verify who you are (to them). They get enough information from you to log in to your driver account (while you are on the phone). They quickly change the email, password, and bank info. Then they drain your pay using InstantPay. Boom, everything you made that week is gone.

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Pretty clever, huh? Okay, so what can you do about it…

  • Be smart. Understand that if you do get a call from someone who claims to work for the company, they will NEVER ask you to verify your info. And they wouldn't call you through a pax customer line.
  • If you are not sure if the caller is a con artist, you should ask THEM to verify who YOU are. Anyone who really does work for corporate will have your last name, and they will have your phone number. Those are two simple things that a true rep will have that a scammer will not. Whatever you do, don't give those out!
  • Wait out the 5 minutes and collect your cancel fee. On Lyft, make sure you hang up and call them back during that time, so you don't get shafted on the cancel fee. Also, make sure you play them out for at least two minutes (from the time you accepted the ride), because if they cancel the ride within 2 minutes of ordering it, you get nothing.
  • Immediately notify the company that someone tried to scam you. This one is so important… your timing may save countless other drivers from being scammed! The sooner they shut off the scammer's account, the better. Yes, the thieves will make a new account, but the harder it is for them to steal from drivers, the better.

Okay, so in anticipation of some of the comments and responses, here are a couple more thoughts.

You might think: Never answer the phone when a pax calls

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That may work for some drivers but I prefer to make my job easier. Pax rarely call, and when they do I have found it is for a good reason. They are often calling to ask if it is okay to have an animal, or tell me that the pin drop is off by XX blocks, or to tell me that I am picking up someone's daughter/husband/friend and their name is _____. I appreciate those calls, and will answer the phone for a pax whenever I can. Also, if there is an "issue" (like attitude or extended wait time), I would prefer to find this out before I drive there to pick them up. But that's just me. If you ignore all pax calls and that works for you, more power to you.

You might think: A real person from Uber or Lyft would NEVER call a driver

Not true. One time a woman left her phone in my car. I told her I would meet up with her when I got to her neighborhood, although I have no idea when that will be. Drove an entire Friday afternoon and evening without hitting that suburb. Saturday she went to the GLH (GreenLight Hub) and asked for help. A local GLH manager called me directly and asked if I would bring the phone to the GLH. The manager never tried to verify my info; and we got it all worked out.

I have also had multiple people who work directly for Lyft contact me over the years, for one reason or another. Most recently, from Trust and Safety to find out about this incident!

The point? It IS possible that someone who works directly for the company might actually call you.

You might think: Uber or Lyft will reimburse me, they don't want the negative publicity or potential legal problems.

No, Uber and Lyft will not reimburse you. You got hit with a scam, they didn't cause it. They know you're not going to get anywhere wasting even more time and money trying to go after them for something that is clearly not their fault. In fact, they might secretly wish that you do take it to the media, in the hopes that it builds awareness among other drivers to be more careful. Honestly, you have a better chance of winning a lawsuit against McDonald's for making you fat.

I have talked with past drivers who have been hit with versions of this scam, and some of them actually have been reimbursed by Uber. But that was years ago, when Uber would pay outrageous driver bonuses and even pay for parking tickets (or so I've heard). Nowadays, you're lucky if you can get a dang cancel fee!

After the incident…

So I called Lyft and pushed the buttons to report a "critical issue". To Lyft's credit, I was connected to a human being in SECONDS. I was totally floored! Hooray Lyft, you finally got something right!

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But the happiness quickly faded. As soon as I got off the phone with Lyft they sent me a generic email telling me that there was an investigation. For their safety and mine, they logged me out and I needed to log back in again to drive. Okay, no problem - or so I thought. In order to log in I needed to provide a verification code. This "technology company" didn't send the code for a good 15 minutes. Here I am, trying to make money in the middle of a Saturday night, pushing "Resend Code" over and over and I can't log in for 15 minutes. WTH, Lyft??

And shortly after that…

I told the condensed version of what happened to most of my pax that night. One pax works in the legal department at AirBnB. She says that exact same scam happens frequently to their hosts. Someone calls up, pretends to be from the company, gets their info, gets into the account, and drains all the money. What's worse is when the scammer gets ahold of a company that's doing AirBnB as a business. The fraud may not even be noticed by the host company for MONTHS! So, if you are an AirBnB host, look out for this scam in your other side business as well, people.

That is all.

Stay safe; try and have fun.