A Melbourne woman is warning Aussies to “be careful” of “scammers” when using rideshare services after she was falsely charged $170 for a six-minute DiDi ride. A spokesperson for the popular rideshare platform told Yahoo Finance an “error” was to blame for the charge.
Isabella shared she was slapped with a $150 cleaning fee on top of her $20 fare from Richmond to Prahan. In a message, DiDi informed her she had left the driver’s vehicle “messy/damaged” and “based on the supporting info provided by the driver” the fee was applied to get the car cleaned and “back on the road”.
But Isabella said she and her friends had “done nothing” to warrant the cleaning fee, with the driver also not raising any issues with them at the time.
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“We were sober, we had no food, no drinks in the car with us,” she shared on TikTok.
“[We] said goodbye to the driver, it was all good. Then this morning, I woke up to this $150 cleaning fee when we had done nothing.
“Keep in mind, this is the biggest fee that they could have charged us. It was literally a six-minute ride and I still got charged $170.”
DiDi can charge customers a cleaning fee if they make a mess, litter or damage the vehicle in any way. It is applied based on evidence submitted by the driver, including photos of the mess and damage.
Isabella said she spent an “entire day” trying to get the charge appealed through the app, as well as emailing, calling and contacting DiDi on social media.
“There’s no way I’m letting this guy get $170 for a six-minute drive. It’s so unfair,” she said.
“We just wanted to get home safe from the Weeknd concert and we were sober and had no food, no drinks, nothing.”
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DiDi responds
A DiDi Australia spokesperson told Yahoo Finance Isabella had now been refunded the cleaning fee.
“In this matter, there was an error in the cleaning fee investigation, which led to the cleaning fee amount being automatically deducted from the rider account,” the spokesperson said.
“Once the passenger reached out to DiDi, the matter was investigated and the cleaning fee charged was immediately refunded.”
The spokesperson said the “safety and experience” of its rideshare community was its “top priority”.
“This is certainly not the ideal DiDi experience, and we’ll take this as an opportunity to further improve our processes to help in our mission to provide the best possible affordable rideshare experience for Australians,” the spokesperson said.
‘Happened to me’: Aussies share rideshare experiences
Isabella shared the frustrating experience online, calling it a “scam”.
Aussies flooded the comments to share their support and incidents where a similar thing had happened to them.
“I literally had the exact thing happen to me, it was the most infuriating thing! On top of the $150, they went the wrong route too adding $25 to our $75 trip and he was dangerously driving as well,” one wrote.
“This happened to me on Uber! I got accused of throwing up in the back of the Uber and charged $200 which did not happen, I was coming home from work and there is no way to dispute it on the app,” another added.
An Uber spokesperson previously told Yahoo News cleaning fees were only applied to riders when the driver provided “visual evidence of the mess that occurred in the vehicle”.
“Riders are able to dispute the charge, which is then reviewed closely by our team, and may be refunded,” the Uber spokesperson said.
While Isabella confirmed she received a refund from DiDi, she said she planned to report the incident to the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission.
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