Hi all. I live in SF without a car. I'm anticipating some onsites with a few companies (fb, apple, etc). How are y'all usually commuting to their onsite location for interviews if its not in the city? Would it be too much of a hassle or look bad to ask to take a lyft/uber And expense it to the company??
Just ask your recruiter. When I interviewed at Facebook near the exit gate I saw some flyer describing how you can get Uber or Lyft through them. I did not read the whole flyer but from the looks of it it seems that the company would be able to cover some Uber expenses. Again just ask the recruiter no one will judge you for that.
Take Caltrain and then a ride and just pay for it. Or zipcar for further out. Or ask about shuttle, maybe they can give passes. Way more scrappy.
Come on man ... you earn a good salary and interviewing for even better and u want to ask for a $150 reimbursements. I feel that’s really really cheap
Take Lyft/Uber and have it expensed, that is absolutely fine. You don't even need to give it a second thought unless you're expensing something like a 100 mile Uber ride.
I live in SF. Every time I’ve interviewed in the south bay, I’ve been able to expense an Uber/Lyft from my place to the interview location. Google, Apple, etc HQ’s. With one exception: LinkedIn. Surprising because they’re supposed to be high paying and stuff.
Typically the recruiter hands you off to a scheduler or some other kind of administrative assistant so asking to get your money back will go to someone who isn’t even directly involved in the process and won’t have any bearing on the decision. Just use cash so you have receipts instead of your Clipper. Google transit directions can usually do a good job of getting you down near where you need to go and you can finish off the last couple of miles from Caltrain/VTA via Uber. And really, if a company is going to decide against you for a $175k+/yr job because you asked for your $12 back AFTER you’ve already used the very expensive time of their employees interviewing in their very expensive to light and heat facilities there’s probably something malignant and ugly about that company’s culture. Your time has value, too. Tech interviews are basically coin flips even if you’re qualified. If this industry was anything close to fair you’d be able to expense an entire day’s wages to the company for the time you’re giving them for free at great risk to yourself.
It’s totally fine to ask them to expense an uber/lyft. Do this after you pass the phone interviews and are planning/scheduling the onsite. They do not have input into the decision process for minor things like this.
Facebook had no problem expensing Lyft’s between SF and MPK. Remember they also do things like fly people in from all over for world. They can handle a $150 expense.
I live in South Bay and went for onsites in SF. I used to take Uber/Lyft and then reimburse. It used to be $125-$150 one way.
$150 one way? Did you take Premium rides? I would consider that overboard, but UberX is perfectly reasonable.
I took UberX. But most of the interviews are morning times so South Bay to SF is expensive. Having said that most of the companies that I interviewed gave around $250 for commute.
I did the same when I interviewed in Mountain View, etc. and I asked the recruiter what the policies were before doing it. In any case, I highly doubt that would factor into whether the interviewers like you or not from the actual onsites. Perhaps only if the recruiter worries that you don’t like to commute, but it’s usually the other way round...