Uber ends service at T.F. Green over fees
Those in need of a ride to and from T.F. Green Airport in Warwick will, for the time being, no longer be able to rely on the country’s most popular ridesharing service, as Uber has decided to cease its operations with the airport following a dispute over mandatory fees.
The airport has subsequently made it clear that Uber is making the decision to no longer provide service to Green, and that they had tried to negotiate and come to agreeable terms. However, Uber argues that the airport’s new fees are unreasonable and that negotiations haven’t been constructive.
“T.F. Green doubled an already high fee on Rhode Islanders who use ridesharing services at the airport, making it the highest fee at any airport in the country,” said Uber spokesperson Alix Anfang in an emailed statement. “For nearly a year, Uber has tried to work with the airport in order to come to a reasonable agreement that ensures that Rhode Island residents and visitors can get an affordable ride, but unfortunately, the airport has been unwilling to do so.”
The fee in question charges Uber drivers for picking up passengers from the airport’s short-term parking lot. It was raised from $3 to $6 last summer. This fee is assessed when an Uber driver picks up a passenger from the airport and is paid for up front by the driver before being later reimbursed by Uber.
In their release, Uber said that by increasing this fee, Green’s fees are now “the highest at any airport in the country,” and compared the fees to $3.25 pickup fees at Logan in Boston, $2 in Memphis and $3.85 in Atlanta.
However, the airport has responded with two separate press releases since Uber ceased its service criticizing the company for spreading inaccurate information related to the cost of their fees in comparison to other airports, and for leaving out crucial information in their assessment of Green’s fee structure.
Rhode Island Airport Corporation spokesperson Bill Fischer said that Uber has purposefully ignored the fact that Green does not charge Uber drivers a fee to drop people off at the airport, and as such their fee structure is comparable to, or even less than, many other airports in the country who charge a fee to ridesharing companies for both drop-offs and pickups.
Fischer said in a recent release. “The narrative that T.F. Green has the highest Uber fees in the country is simply not true…For the past several months, Uber has failed to negotiate in good faith and has purposely attempted to mislead the public about this issue.”
Fischer said that the airport has to view the issue from a purely fiscal standpoint, as airports are federally mandated to be self-sustaining and can only earn revenue through means such as parking fees, service contracts with airlines and concession sales inside the terminal.
Fischer painted a picture that ride sharing has significantly affected historically dependable revenue, including an average decrease of 20,000 taxi trips annually since 2011 to the airport from Airport Taxi.
“There was no recognition in our fee structure of Uber's impact on rental cars, on long term parking, and it was real. It was substantial. Uber drives a lot of business from us,” Fischer said on Friday, speaking from a historical perspective of dealing with the challenges posed to airport revenues by ride sharing companies such as Uber. “There has to be a fee associated with that to protect the operations of the airport.”
Fischer said in a release that the airport offered to reduce the fee to $5 in recent negotiations. “We made an offer to reduce our pickup fees in March and the counter offer made by Uber was simply not reflective of the fees other airports are charging throughout the country.”
That same offer has been extended to Lyft, the smaller ride sharing competitor to Uber who will still provide service to and from the airport. Fischer also said that same deal will remain on the table for Uber.
“Lyft isn't leaving,” he said on Friday. “If Uber wants to come back, they can come back, but we're not going to be pressured into a situation that doesn't recognize the real challenge of their impact on existing revenue.”
Fischer was not able to provide numbers on how many passengers utilize ride sharing services to and from the airport in a given year, but a former Warwick resident who drove for Uber (speaking anonymously) for about three years said that, in his experience, drivers could make upwards of six trips to the airport a day depending on the time of year – such as when college students were vacationing or visiting friends during graduation season.
Although he confirmed that the $6 fee imposed by the airport and paid by the drivers was supposed to be reimbursed by Uber the following week, he said this was still somewhat burdensome, as people driving for Uber typically relied on the money they made from their rides, and that even $36 in fees taken out of their pay would be noticeable.
“That’s $36 out of your pocket that you won’t get back until the next week,” he said, adding that getting reimbursement from Uber was not always a simple procedure, and sometimes required him to have lengthy phone calls with the corporate offices over small sums of money.
Eventually, he said he got so frustrated with the situation he stopped accepting rides from the airport.
“Say you pick someone up at the airport and you were giving them $6 in fees to the airport, and the fare was going to a hotel nearby. You might only make $2 or $3 and, after you consider your time and your gas, you're actually losing money,” he said. “For me, I decided it wasn't worth it anymore.”
However, the former Uber driver predicted that the airport might start to hear negative buzz from passengers who come in and are unable to hail an Uber, as he said that Lyft has longer wait times and utilizing taxi service can also result in more time waiting.
“People are not going to be happy,” he said.
