Do you know your Uber rating? Trust me, you don't want to.
Ever since I discovered there was a place — nestled deep within the ride-sharing app, in an FAQ on a submenu's submenu — where this ominous magic number lives, taking Uber has been ruined.
On Uber, an app that works like a virtual taxi dispatch connecting passengers with drivers in their personal vehicles, passengers typically give out anywhere from one to five stars to their drivers at the end of each trip. The average score keeps drivers accountable with the company.
But at the same time we passengers are judging our drivers based on the cleanliness of their vehicles, how long they took to pick us up and whether they took a bad route, they're judging us, too.
Uber doesn't make it easy to see our ratings as passengers, and there's a good reason why, I've discovered: Like the taste of the forbidden apple, our ratings cannot be unknown.
I first glimpsed my rating this summer (thanks to Jen Doll's hilarious essay) only to discover, tragically, that it was low. It may not sound bad to the casual observer — 4.45 out of 5 — but in a hurried world where most people, drivers and passengers alike, simply dole out 5 stars for everything just to move on to the next ride, a 4.45 carries a certain stigma. Namely, that a lot of drivers took a moment to register what a lousy time they'd had with me in their back seat.
I've had drivers tell me they don't usually accept a passenger with anything less than 4.5 stars. Others say they will go down to 4.0 before rejecting a ride. But everyone I spoke to agreed, 4.45 is not good. On a 100-point scale between 4 and 5, it's a failing grade.
One of my friends drives Uber, and he told me he gives a 5 to everyone unless they say something racist or offensive, or spill their food all over — and even then, he'll only dock them a star if he remembers to do it. In other words, it takes some effort to lose a star.