There’s no question that if you’ve had too much to drink, you should definitely find a way home that doesn’t involve climbing behind the wheel. The prevalence of ride share services like Lyft and Uber make it even easier to avoid such a scenario. What they don’t tell you, though, is that sometimes sobriety is necessary to responsibly Uber home.
A New Jersey man found that out the very hard way when he accidentally entered his home address while traveling, before blacking out in the backseat.
Here’s NJ.com’s Jeremy Schneider with the details:
After a night of partying with buddies in Morgantown, W.V. last Friday, Kenny Bachman thought he had called an Uber to take him back to where he was staying near West Virginia University’s campus.
Instead, he woke up in the passenger seat of a 2011 Toyota Sienna minivan next to an Uber driver that was taking him home. Not where he was staying with friends in West Virginia, but home home.
Like, where he lives. In Gloucester County. More than 300 miles away.
“I just woke up,” Bachman told NJ Advance Media in a phone interview. “And I’m thinking, ‘Why the f— am I in the car next to some random ass dude I don’t even know?”
The price? A hefty $1,635.93.
Whoops!
It’s an easier mistake than you’d think, which if you’ve ever used the apps you already know. Your home address is saved as a default option, which is likely what happened to Bachman. We’ve covered Uber stories like this one featuring an $18,000 charge ; typically those can be challenged and removed. But in this case, it’s apparently not going to happen:
The Uber driver didn’t have money for tolls, Bachman says, and was fined at every tollbooth. When they did get back to New Jersey, Bachman went to a CVS in Sewell and got cash back to give him money for tolls on the way back.
Bachman got back to New Jersey safe and sound. He even gave his driver five stars. But he challenged the charge; he claims he never put in the home address for the Uber. Bachman says the driver had his phone, even having answered a FaceTime call from a friend while he was asleep.
“Obviously I sent the Uber, I don’t know where to, I know I wouldn’t send it to my house, I knew where I was,” Bachman said. “He was on my phone, without me allowing it.”
Uber confirmed that the ride did indeed occur and that the driver took the rider to the destination he requested. Uber also connected with Bachman and resolved the matter, which ended with him agreeing to pay the fare.
What a weird story, though it remains unlikely that an Uber driver willingly entered a destination multiple states away, taking toll fines throughout. That’s probably what led to Bachman just deciding to pay the fare.
Regardless, it’s less than a DUI would have cost, so there’s that, at least.
[NJ.com]
