Uber Charges Rider £18,500 for A Five-Mile Journey

Everyone knows that Uber surge prices can be ridiculous, but if you found yourself landing this one you'd be absolutely fuming.

The app-based cab service mistakenly charged a man in Toronto, Canada an enormous CA$18,518.50 (£18,518, / $14,415) for a five-mile ride that took just 21 minutes. That's more than you'd get for working a full-time job for the UK minimum wage for a year.

The ludicrous trip price was shared on Twitter by a friend of the man, Emily Kennard, who shared a screenshot of the ride receipt.

"My friend was charged 18K for a 20 Min ride (!), and they are sticking to it. What in the world??? This is insane!" Kennard tweeted.

"He could have just bought a car and driven the 20 minutes himself for less," one Twitter user said. Nailed it, mate.

The receipt for the over-priced Uber had first been shared by the Instagram "votethehish" whose account is set to private.

According to Uber's official ride estimate tool, the 8km trip should ideally cost no more than CA$12-$16 if the rider isn't picky and just asks to have the ride in a bog-standard car.

Even if the rider requests one of Uber's luxury options like UberBlack or UberSUV, the cost of the drive should still only amount to CA$31-39 or CA$40-48 - nowhere near the thousands of dollars the man was actually charged.

Credit: UberEstimate

Thankfully, Uber recognised that a cock-up had taken place - it would be pretty silly if the company didn't, right? - and agreed to issue the unlucky rider a full refund.

"There was an error here and it has been resolved," a spokesperson for the service said in a statement. "We have provided a full refund to this rider and apologised to him for this experience.

"We have safeguards in place to help prevent something like this from happening, and we are working to understand how this occurred."

That's a serious hit to take to your bank account before payday. Hope that the guy had a pretty deep overdraft.