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Nuride.com


Slick Vik

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Some ladies were advertising nuride.com at the building I work at today. Seems pretty cool, you get points for taking transit, walking, biking, biking, or telecommuting, pretty much anything but driving solo. The points have typical value though, 1 cent per point, but you get 1000 for signing up. So hey $10 for nothing.

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Signed up at their website.  Sounds a lot like Recyclebank in that you get coupons and bogo offers, but without any way to verify.  I recorded a daily round trip from Houston to Vancouver via public transit.  Apparently, that'll earn me 200 points a day.  From their help menu...

 

 

Points are awarded for the first two trips that you record in your NuRide account each day. One-way trips earn 100 points and round trips earn 200 points. Telecommutes and compressed work weeks count as a "round trip" and earn 200 points each.

 

200 x 365 = 73,000 points a year from my "commute".

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I'm getting $2 a day. But I see your point. It is being run by HGAC so they are probably looking to see how people commute.

 

By "getting $2 a day" I assume you mean that you are getting one of the following:

 

  • Juicy in the Sky - $2 off Smoothie, Juice Combo, or Shake
  • The John C. Freeman Weather Museum - $2 off Adult Adm or Free Child Adm w/Adult Adm
  • Salata - Free Cup of Soup with Salad or Wrap Purchase

Or if you really save up your points you can get these top-of-the-line rewards at 6000 points

 

  • Wake Nation Houston - $60 off Birthday Party Package
  • Memorial Athletic Club - Waived Membership Initiation Fee
  • Memorial Athletic Club - Free Week of Training for Warriors
  • AIM Limo - Free Hour of Luxury SUV Rental When You Buy 3 Hrs
  • Omaha Steaks - $96 off The Great Value Assortment

I particularly like how you can get an hour of luxury SUV limo rental when you use public transit.  Is that kinda like 1 step forward, 2 steps back?

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Signed up at their website. Sounds a lot like Recyclebank in that you get coupons and bogo offers, but without any way to verify. I recorded a daily round trip from Houston to Vancouver via public transit. Apparently, that'll earn me 200 points a day. From their help menu...

200 x 365 = 73,000 points a year from my "commute".

In all seriousness you get points for telecommuting also

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my wife signed up through MD Anderson when she took the bus to work. She hasn't been recording rides (switched jobs, she doesn't take public transit now), but we still have plenty of points which I just use for Ruggles Greens coupons every once and a while. Even if they are data mining, they have no information on us that's really worth any concern. They haven't sold her email address off to anyone that has caused any problems so far (been 5 years).

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Even if they are data mining, they have no information on us that's really worth any concern.

 

If the ridership information that you input has related time information then I would be cautious.  That information in the wrong hands says when neither of you are at home or worse, when she is home and you're not.

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If the ridership information that you input has related time information then I would be cautious. That information in the wrong hands says when neither of you are at home or worse, when she is home and you're not.

Good point but people figure most aren't at home anyway

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By "getting $2 a day" I assume you mean that you are getting one of the following:

 

  • Juicy in the Sky - $2 off Smoothie, Juice Combo, or Shake
  • The John C. Freeman Weather Museum - $2 off Adult Adm or Free Child Adm w/Adult Adm
  • Salata - Free Cup of Soup with Salad or Wrap Purchase

Or if you really save up your points you can get these top-of-the-line rewards at 6000 points

 

  • Wake Nation Houston - $60 off Birthday Party Package
  • Memorial Athletic Club - Waived Membership Initiation Fee
  • Memorial Athletic Club - Free Week of Training for Warriors
  • AIM Limo - Free Hour of Luxury SUV Rental When You Buy 3 Hrs
  • Omaha Steaks - $96 off The Great Value Assortment

I particularly like how you can get an hour of luxury SUV limo rental when you use public transit.  Is that kinda like 1 step forward, 2 steps back?

 

I signed up for this when I lived in Houston last year but lost interest quickly as the rewards did not seem worth the small amount of effort needed to track when I would ride Metro and my telework days.

 

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Maybe it's latent dyslexia creeping in, but I keep reading the title as "nuderide."  :ph34r:

 

 

Same here. it really caught my attention at first.  :blink:

 

Sounds like a plan to significantly expand the appeal of Critical Mass rides. 

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I signed up for this when I lived in Houston last year but lost interest quickly as the rewards did not seem worth the small amount of effort needed to track when I would ride Metro and my telework days.

 

 

Considering there are at least 260 workdays in a year, I'd rather pocket a $520 check every year, if you were getting $2 worth of points a day.

 

Instead, it reminds me of the scams that used to be pulled on elementary schools, where if kids sold enough overpriced crap door to door in the name of school fundraising, they got some piece of overpriced junk. [i certainly went to school in that era]

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Considering there are at least 260 workdays in a year, I'd rather pocket a $520 check every year, if you were getting $2 worth of points a day.

 

Instead, it reminds me of the scams that used to be pulled on elementary schools, where if kids sold enough overpriced crap door to door in the name of school fundraising, they got some piece of overpriced junk. [i certainly went to school in that era]

 

That era started a long, long time ago and is still going on today.

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Instead, it reminds me of the scams that used to be pulled on elementary schools, where if kids sold enough overpriced crap door to door in the name of school fundraising, they got some piece of overpriced junk. [i certainly went to school in that era]

 

If I like the organization, say Scouts or the school band for exampld, I just write a check directly to the troop or booster club. I  spend less money, the organization gets more money, and no one gets stuck with overpriced junk.  :)

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If I like the organization, say Scouts or the school band for exampld, I just write a check directly to the troop or booster club. I  spend less money, the organization gets more money, and no one gets stuck with overpriced junk.  :)

Yup. Which goes back to my original point, if I was getting $2/day for my commute choices, I'd rather get $10 checks in the mail every week than any of the junky coupons they offer. Wouldn't anybody?
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Yup. Which goes back to my original point, if I was getting $2/day for my commute choices, I'd rather get $10 checks in the mail every week than any of the junky coupons they offer. Wouldn't anybody?

 

I wasn't disagreeing. You are entirely correct. To paraphrase the old saying, "Cash talks all else walks."

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I don't know sometimes frequent flier points save you thousands.

Well, these days frequent flier points tend to expire, and they just don't give out frequent flyer miles like they used to. There used to be a cereal that Post sold...name escapes me...shaped like big "zeroes", dense cereal, dark brown, kinda sweet, haven't seen it in a few years...they used to have frequent flier miles just for buying and eating cereal.

Nuride doesn't have anything like frequent flier miles (much less cash), just junky coupons, and it's not even "Free cheeseburger at McDonald's", it's "X dollars off when you buy Y".

Say, how does this website know you're not BSing your commute (or at least fudging it) entirely?

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I don't know sometimes frequent flier points save you thousands.

 

That's true; frequent flyer miles are great. I was thinking more along the lines of the silly coupons that are printed out with a store receipt. Exaggerated example: I buy a 20 ounce bottle of shampoo at the drug store. The scanner "sees" this and prints out a coupon for shampoo along with the receipt. OK, except I must buy two 64 ounce bottles of shampoo to get a $1 discount! Like I have that much space in my bathroom cabinet and want to tie up money in something I will not use for weeks. BTW, I keep my hair cut short.   :)

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Say, how does this website know you're not BSing your commute (or at least fudging it) entirely?

 

They don't.  I logged a daily, recurring trip on public transit from here to Vancouver 10 days ago.  Just signed back in and I've got 2,000 points already for my pretend commute.

 

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They don't.  I logged a daily, recurring trip on public transit from here to Vancouver 10 days ago.  Just signed back in and I've got 2,000 points already for my pretend commute.

It's people like you why they have junky coupons instead of cash.  :P  ;)

 

Seriously though, it's people deliberately gaming the system to rack up rewards ruin these types of things. Remember the stamps that Subway used to give out? I think Little Caesars did something similar.

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Well, these days frequent flier points tend to expire, and they just don't give out frequent flyer miles like they used to. There used to be a cereal that Post sold...name escapes me...shaped like big "zeroes", dense cereal, dark brown, kinda sweet, haven't seen it in a few years...they used to have frequent flier miles just for buying and eating cereal.

Nuride doesn't have anything like frequent flier miles (much less cash), just junky coupons, and it's not even "Free cheeseburger at McDonald's", it's "X dollars off when you buy Y".

Say, how does this website know you're not BSing your commute (or at least fudging it) entirely?

Not sure I agree. I've flown for free to india, LA, San Francisco 3 times, Las Vegas twice, chicago, New York three times, Vancouver three times, Istanbul, charleston, Salt Lake City, Denver, and cancun for free on miles in the last three years. And Calgary this weekend.
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It's people like you why they have junky coupons instead of cash.  :P  ;)

 

Seriously though, it's people deliberately gaming the system to rack up rewards ruin these types of things. Remember the stamps that Subway used to give out? I think Little Caesars did something similar.

 

No doubt. :D

 

It was a spur-of-the-moment experiment on my part to see if they had any controls.  Without some controls this sort of thing is pointless unless it's been set up to rake in money from grants or from the stores providing the coupons.  Could be that it's just a web version of the ValuPak coupon packets that I get in the snail mail every month.

 

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Not sure I agree. I've flown for free to india, LA, San Francisco 3 times, Las Vegas twice, chicago, New York three times, Vancouver three times, Istanbul, charleston, Salt Lake City, Denver, and cancun for free on miles in the last three years. And Calgary this weekend.

Well, either way, it's something that you actually use and have a use for (people that actually use frequent flier miles to great advantage usually have places to go all over the world for their job), and the coupons are generally irrelevant and don't fit everyone's lifestyles. An analogous example, for instance, would be by logging your mass transit miles, you get free METRO tickets.

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Well, either way, it's something that you actually use and have a use for (people that actually use frequent flier miles to great advantage usually have places to go all over the world for their job), and the coupons are generally irrelevant and don't fit everyone's lifestyles. An analogous example, for instance, would be by logging your mass transit miles, you get free METRO tickets.

I agree these coupons aren't that great. However sometimes there are some good things a friend of mine got a free ticket to renaissance festival on it

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