A WOMAN WHO awoke to a credit card charge of $350 for a 20-minute taxi journey successfully crowdfunded the whole amount (and more) back.
In a GoFundMe campaign called ‘Uber Stole My 26th Birthday’, Gabrielle Wathen from Baltimore described how she fell victim to the taxi app’s ‘surge pricing’ (the hiking of fares in accordance with the busiest times).
After celebrating her birthday on Halloween, she awoke on November 1 to discover a hefty charge of $362 on her credit card for her 20-minute Uber trip home.
She panicked, as November 1 was also the day her $450 rent was due:
Not only is it my 26th birthday, it is rent day. My rent is $450 and I can no longer pay it today due to this completely outrageous charge.
She decided to ask people to donate towards the cost of the taxi fare, which she said “should never be justified, even on Halloween”:
This misunderstanding has cost me 80% of the funds I have to my name… I feel taken advantage of and cheated by the Uber name. Please donate even just $1 if you think this is utter and complete bullsh*t and also hilarious and very, very depressing at the same time.
It seems a lot of people agreed, as Buzzfeed reports that before the GoFundMe page was taken down late last night she had raised $573 in donations.
Not everyone was supportive of her choice to crowdfund the fare though, with some comments on the GoFundMe page saying it was “her own fault” for being drunk and not realising the rates had changed.
