Dallas teens can hail Uber rides, travel alone starting next week

Uber Technologies Inc. is launching a brand new provider in Dallas that permits youngsters between ages 13 and 17 to hail a journey and travel alone. This new provider, known as the teenager rides program, might be introduced in 14 towns together with Atlanta, Nashville, New York, Phoenix and extra. Parents can upload their youngsters to a circle of relatives profile and make allowance them to perform their very own Uber account. Parents can observe their teenager’s shuttle in real-time and can immediately touch the drivers. To be sure that further protection measures, Uber is introducing PIN verification and an audio recording possibility that can be activated through each passengers and drivers. These audio recordsdata are encrypted so solely Uber can get admission to them if a consumer opens an incident record.

Only highly-rated and skilled drivers might be to be had for teenager rides. Uber has a strict background take a look at procedure for all its drivers that features a complete prison historical past record, riding data, and extra. Drivers additionally wish to move the background take a look at yearly and obtain indicators for DMV and prison file updates.

CEO Dara Khosrowshahi mentioned, “It is all about helping you manage the craziness that encompasses family life in 2023. It has incredible safety features embedded in it from the booking experience all the way to the end of the trip so that you as a parent can have peace of mind, which absolutely is something that’s priceless.”

In the previous, Uber had an advanced historical past with unaccompanied minors. But now, with the teenager program, the corporate is legitimizing the observe and presenting a profitable alternative. The proportion of teens with driving force’s licenses has greatly declined through the years. According to the most recent statistics from the Federal Highway Administration, solely 25.3% of 16-year-olds in 2022 had a driving force’s license, as in comparison to 47.8% in 1984.

The job of ferrying youngsters round the city comes with a large number of legal responsibility. But a handful of businesses, together with HopSkipDrive and Zum, explicitly focal point on getting youngsters to and from college. HopSkipDrive lets in oldsters to organize a journey for kids as younger as six.

This is not Uber’s first try to be offering rides to unaccompanied minors. The corporate attempted to roll out the providing in 2017 however was once embroiled in a sequence of scandals underneath former Chief Executive Officer Travis Kalanick, who left the corporate later that 12 months. Uber has labored laborious to fix its symbol underneath Khosrowshahi who has offered new protection measures and disclosures, together with publishing Uber’s first protection record in 2019.

In addition to the teenager program, Uber introduced a slew of latest choices at its annual product match in New York, together with the power to ebook rides by means of a telephone name within the U.S. and bookable boats in Mykonos, Greece, over the summer season. In any other announcement, teens will have the ability to arrange their very own accounts on Uber Eats to pay for foods and deliveries.