What Happened After Uber Cut Fares in 48 Cities in 2015?

So hopefully many drivers already know about the fare cut in 80 cities two days ago and many are asking if these fare cuts are permanent. That is a hard question to answer. You can read up on last years fare cut in 48 cities here:

Below, you can see the my other posts on Uber fare cuts here.

It is both yes and and no. Uber did eventually raised up the fares in most cities, but they did not restore the pricing in many of those cities.

I have been tracking rates every week, and here is a summary of price increases of the original 48 cities that had a fare cut:

You can see that only at a peak of 28 cities had a price increase.

Price increase starts after March and ends in July with an average of 6 cities a month

Three cities had their fare restored

Even cities with the winter fare decrease had a few cities that were cut even further because of the summer slump (you can see a slight downtick between July and October)

The next chart is a bit harder to explain. I did a histogram of the fare cuts in the 48 cities in January, and what the net fare cut was in July when they raised the rates in about 30 cities. You can see that there were less cities with the huge fare cuts (40%+) but there were more of them less than 30%. You can see that almost all cities still had a fare cut.

Below is the average fare increase AFTER the fare cut in 2015:

Summary

So what do all these numbers mean?

There is about a 62% chance that your city will get a fare increase after the fare cuts

There is only a 6% chance that your city will have its fare cut reversed back to the original price

The average fare increase after the fare cuts was 10%, with a one unfortunate city getting further cuts

The average fare cut in January 2015 was 26%. The net fare cut as calculated in July was 20%, so the net increase from “winter pricing” was about 6% for all 48 cities.

Detailed Data

Here is also a month by month list of fare increases:

March:

Corpus Christi

Kansas City

Modesto

Oklahoma City

Raleigh-Durham

Spokane

Toledo

Tulsa

April:

Charlotte

Lexington

Louisville

Madison

Milwaukee

Modesto

Nashville

Providence

San Diego

Santa Barbara

May:

Cincinnati

Cleveland

Columbus

Dallas

Denver

Hampton Roads

Indianapolis

Salt Lake City

June

Atlanta

Inland Empire

July

Lansing

Lincoln

Richmond

October: Sacramento

The Full Comparison Data

First Column was the fare cut in January

Second column was the net fare cut as calculated in July (from fares before the fare cut to July)

Third Column: fare increase AFTER the fare cut. For example, if it is 0%, you did not get a fare increase after fare cut. If it is 5%, it is a 5% increase AFTER the fare cut.

[Update: Los Angeles, Memphis and Orange county was added to the list. They were not in the original list of 48 cities in early January, but they were cut in the weeks after and had a similar winter pricing strategy. Los Angeles and Orange County had removed base fares but the overall effect on the average fare was taken into account.

Also, Phoenix was added to the list. Price was cut after the Super Bowl.]

Cities Price Decrease in January Price Decrease as of July Increase After Fare Cut Albuquerque 27% 27% 0% Atlanta 11% 6% 5% Austin 28% 28% 0% Baltimore 16% 16% 0% Baton Rouge 25% 25% 0% Charlotte 37% 28% 9% Cincinnati 25% 21% 4% Cleveland 32% 27% 5% Columbus 15% 11% 4% Connecticut 21% 21% 0% Corpus Christi 45% 35% 10% Dallas 12% 9% 3% Denver 10% 6% 4% Detroit 28% 28% 0% Fayetteville, NC 23% 23% 0% Fresno 42% 30% 12% Grand Rapids 28% 0% 28% Hampton Roads 36% 27% 9% Indianapolis 20% 16% 4% Inland Empire 30% 26% 4% Jacksonville 26% 26% 0% Kansas City 35% 16% 19% Lansing 13% 30% -17% Lexington 55% 45% 10% Lincoln 24% 16% 8% Los Angeles 16% 8% 8% Louisville 29% 19% 10% Madison 29% 25% 4% Memphis 25% 21% 4% Miami 20% 20% 0% Milwaukee 25% 13% 12% Minneapolis 16% 16% 0% Modesto 47% 28% 19% Nashville 27% 13% 14% Oklahoma City 33% 19% 14% Orange County 16% 7% 9% Orlando 19% 19% 0% Palm Springs 10% 10% 0% Phoenix 32% 16% 16% Portland, ME 15% 0% 15% Providence 32% 25% 7% Raleigh-Durham 31% 0% 31% Richmond 11% 11% 0% Sacramento 29% 29% 0% Salt Lake City 18% 12% 6% San Antonio 25% 25% 0% San Diego 21% 8% 13% Santa Barbara 42% 31% 11% Spokane 49% 20% 29% Toledo 33% 26% 7% Tucson 18% 18% 0% Tulsa 27% 19% 8% Wilmington, NC 24% 24% 0%

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