Starting today, your Uber rating is going to stare you directly in the face. The app is introducing two new changes to its ratings system, one of which includes the placement of your rider rating.
Although access to your rating has been available through the app's "help" section for about a year now, finding yours took some know-how and extra effort on your part. Now, Uber is placing your rating directly beneath your name in the menu. Whether this is a good or bad thing will vary on a rider-by-rider basis.
An Uber rating is like getting a grade in school, but one that holds more social weight. If you have a terrible rating, you probably don’t want to see it every time you open the app — or worse, have a friend spy that oh-so-shameful low number. If you’ve somehow achieved the unattainable five stars, props to you, but constantly seeing that number might make you feel even more pressure to keep your perfect streak alive. If this all sounds a little Black Mirror to you, you're not alone.
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Why is Uber forcing you to look at your rating? “Many riders forget that their driver is also rating them, too, and things like eating in the car, slamming the door, or trying to pile in more people than seatbelts can impact whether it’s a five-star experience for drivers,” say Mike Truong and Ronak Trivedi in a blog post announcing the change. “We hope this update will remind riders that mutual respect is an important part of our Community Guidelines.”
Plus, "we found that riders who view their rating tend to improve it," Truong, a senior product manager at Uber, told Refinery29,
Along with changing where your rating is located, Uber is switching up how you rate Uber Pool rides. When you rate a ride anything less than five stars, you’ll now be able to say why you docked stars. Was it annoying fellow passenger? Or maybe an out-of-the-way route to drop someone else off? You can now choose one of those options, and the driver’s rating won’t be tarnished.
"People should know when it’s appropriate to choose uberPOOL," Truong told Refinery29. "Rides to the gym, for example, are a good idea. Rides home from the gym after you’ve been working out and sweating for an hour? Not so much."
According to Uber, today’s changes were prompted by driver feedback — namely, feeling that the app's rating system should be fairer.
If today's announcement leaves you feeling the need to give your rating a boost, head here. But remember: Nobody's perfect, so don't let the quest for those elusive five stars take over your life.