Diane K.

Summary: Use all their first-time rider coupons and then go with UBER!

I've been using Lyft for three weeks now (mainly to get to work during the cold weather) and I'm sad to report that everyday has been an ordeal using Lyft! Uber is soooo much better and the drivers seem more knowledgeable in terms of street smarts and navigation.

Here is a summary of the problems I've encountered with LYFT:

1) Drivers, while nice, are not great drivers and cannot navigate (even with a GPS). I had one driver turn from a middle lane and otherwise drive awfully, one driver who didn't even know where SE was and another driver who didn't even know what the difference was between car pool and single passenger service (I HAD TO EXPLAIN IT TO HIM!)

2) Car pool sucks! I tried car pool and first, it takes 10 minutes for them to pick you up and then they drove (in my case, about 4-5 miles out of my way in the opposite direction) to pick up the other person (who was late!) and then drops her off in (I'm going to SE - could she be even further out of my way?!?). Then the driver doesn't know how to use the Lyft app and ends up driving us back to the office building in Georgetown (where the other girl got off) as our "next stop." When I told him that my address was in SE, he didn't know how to use his own GPS. He kept turning on PA Avenue rather than K Street. We ended looped around the same block THREE TIMES (during rush hour traffic, pedestrians and lights adding over 15 minutes to my trip) before he finally listened to me that he was making the wrong turn each time! My otherwise 15 minute commute to work took over 55 minutes!

3) One morning, the driver's ETA was "2 minutes." Well AFTER 8 MINUTES, I could see on my app that the driver NEVER MOVED the car and NO PROGRESS was made to come to my home. YET the app still said she was "2 minutes away." I cancelled my ride because at this point I was late to work and they had the audacity to charge me a $5 cancellation fee when their own software could have told them that their driver NEVER moved her car to even try and pick me up!

4) The way they apply credits towards rides is a total rip off. In short, I had a few credits on my account. One $10 credit expiring tomorrow and one $20 credit (for referring a friend to Lyft - BIG MISTAKE) that expired a month from now. Well the geniuses at Lyft and their app, used my $20 credit this morning for a $12 trip instead of applying the $10 credit that EXPIRES TOMORROW even though there is nothing in their policies explaining the logic and method for applying credit. After multiple backs and forth with Lyft, telling them that their app was faulty, irrational and defies commonsense, they refuse to return my $20 credit. Basically, now I'm stuck with a credit that expires in less than 14 hours while they wasted my $20 credit for a $12 trip (so I lose $8 in credit). STUPID!

I HATE LYFT! I hope this sub-par company is finished off by UBER!