Lyft and Uber duke it out with competing subscription plans
Lyft released a new monthly subscription plan on Monday for routes you take often, like home to the office or from the gym.
The "personal plan" is now available after the ride-hailing company had tested its all-access plan and other variations starting late last year. The all-access plan, which offers a set number of rides for a discounted up-front price, is still available.
The new plan locks in set pricing between two routes for a monthly fee. So for $7.99 per month you can guarantee unlimited rides at a rate of, say, $9.99 per ride, or whatever it would be between the two locations you choose.
If the plan looks really familiar, it's because Uber started offering pretty much the same thing back in June. Uber's ride pass offers a one-time fee of $9.99 for set prices for shared and regular rides between two locations that you want.
The only difference is Uber's is a 28-day pass, while Lyft's is an on-going monthly (30-day) plan that you can cancel anytime. Uber also offers pass holders 15 percent off on other routes not on the plan.
These subscriptions are a big push to grab passengers and commit them to a sole platform that they'll use consistently. Even if someone already takes a lot of Uber or Lyft rides, this formalizes their commitment to one of the companies. With a pass riders aren't going to switch between the two or find another method to get around -- they've already essentially paid for their rides for a month.
It's heating up between the two major ride-sharing services.
Sasha is a news writer at Mashable's San Francisco office. She's an SF native who went to UC Davis and later received her master's from the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism. She's been reporting out of her hometown over the years at Bay City News (news wire), SFGate (the San Francisco Chronicle website), and even made it out of California to write for the Chicago Tribune. She's been described as a bookworm and a gym rat.
