I’m not paying a cancellation fee, that’s on you if you are refusing the trip.

Uh, I know people in Houston (the most car dependent major city in the US) who would call an uber to cross the street because it's so fucking hot in the summer you would need to change your suit if you tried the trip on foot.

tbf, in many places in America walking a couple blocks is a legitimately bad and dangerous idea, especially for kids, because pedestrian/non-car infrastructure and safety is so dog shit

Thinking back to my youth when it was just endless sprawl of houses with no side walks or even street lights… I walked around in that “neighborhood” a lot and it always felt scary and unsafe, if rideshare had been a thing back then (and I wasn’t too poor to afford it which I definitely would have been) I would have liked the option to stay off the narrow gravel road shoulders with drivers passing by me at 45-50mph

From Uber’s driver help page:

If you suspect a rider is underage

• Politely ask them to show a driver’s license or ID card to confirm their age.

• You have the option to cancel the trip if you believe the rider is underage (Select unaccompanied minor as the cancellation reason and potentially receive a cancellation fee).

They apparently do have Teen rides now but only through a connected account and only in a few cities. I would assume Lyft has similar policies.

This country is such a backwards shit hole. People are afraid to let their kids walk a few blocks, on a route they're familiar with, cause some asshole may try and call DCFS on them.

Meanwhile there are more fucking cameras deployed in public than in any time in human history, and they have the capability to network together and track people and relay information to police, emt's, for fire departments, etc all in real time... But we don't use it to help make people safer, or give them peace of mind, or allow their kids to play and be free.

That should tell you everything about the real intentions of all this surveillance bullshit.

It's not here to keep the slaves safe. It's here to keep them in line

Seeing posts like this makes me realise how lucky I am to have been born in a country with sane pedestrian infrastructure and generally safe environment.

I found it funny when I watched a video titled "10 most surprising things about Finland" and one of them was about how kids just walk about in the city, on their own. I was confused as to why that is so shocking but then I remembered that North America has sort of forgot about using legs as a mode of transport.

Sometimes people exaggerate tremendously about "a couple of blocks" in my experience. And it could also involve crossing some very busy intersections.

Or this person is just a moron, that's also an option.

So...

A) This woman doesn't trust her children to walk a couple blocks on their own, but does trust a complete stranger to pick them up in their car instead... A+ parenting.

B) I 1000% percent get that driver's hard line here. Best case scenario, you get a couple bucks for carrying some well behaved kids down the street. But the possible worse cases include kids who can't answer questions or follow instructions making your job harder, unruly children damaging your vehicle (and being forced into a position where you need to control a child that is both a stranger and your client), people seeing you pick up unattended children and calling the police, the child making a SA or other legal claim about you and immediately ending your Uber gig while threatening your livlihood and freedom... not worth the risk.