A common first reaction to Neo Cab's economy is "wow, daily goal ¢35, don't know how to reach that!"

But fear not. There aren't a lot of things Lina can even spend her money on. In fact, the game offers just four ways to get rid of money:

• Pay for charging your car.
  
• Pay for a bed.
  
• Give money to the police.
  
• Give money to charity (for some definitions of it).

Obviously, getting a charge is very necessary, and paying the police for a ticket is very avoidable. The "charity" options turn out to be ... limited. This leaves spending the night as Lina's money drain of primary interest.

Quality sleep is important. It can have a huge impact on your mood, and hence on your Feelgrid. Starting a day angry about a nightmare or depressed because you didn't like the mattress can influence your emotions in a way that takes away courses of action (or dialog) you wish you would have had.

Paying more for a better night in Los Ojos has the potential of resulting in a better experience the next day, but that isn't guaranteed. Sometimes, sleep on a budget is the best sleep.

Crashr has a wide range of options to stay at in Los Ojos, from luxurious hotels with suites at an outragous price right down to places where you can stay the night for free. Not all of these choices are available to you all of the time, but rest assured that you'll always be able to sleep somewhere.

In many ways, having a wider range of choices for spending the night is the reward of having earned more money in the game. Each of the five different kinds of places you can stay at has their own side story line that is furthered when you visit it multiple times.
 

To increase your profits, income needs to go up or costs need to come down. Ideally both.

• Take as many paying rides as you can in a day. Don't go to bed early.
  
• Prefer rides with higher fares if you can. (The fare seems to be calculated based on the length of the ride.)
  
• Try not to go too far out of your way to pick up a ride. The passengers only pay for the distance they travel, not for the distance you need to travel to pick them up.

• Passengers can give you a tip through their Neo Cab app. The tip is the difference between the "ride fare" and the "coin earned" you see in your app after you complete a ride.
  
• Each of your passengers is looking for a certain experience. If they get whatever it is they're looking for, they're more willing to tip you.
  
• Getting to know your passengers may be essential both to maximize tipping, and to keep a good star rating. However, tip and star rating are not directly related.

• Never use a charging station with a price above average (above ¢1.50/bar).
  
• At charging stations with average prices (around ¢1.35/bar), only get a recharge if you really need it in order to avoid getting stuck in a high-priced area later. Don't get more than one or two bars.
  
• If you're near a charge station with a below-average price (below ¢1.20/bar), use the opportunity to get a full charge.
  
• Going to a cheap charging station is often worth a small detour. The less charge you have left, the larger a detour can be justified.
  
• When picking a ride, always consider where you'll end up once your passenger disembarks:
  
  • Is it right next to one of the cheap charging stations in the West? That's great, you can arrive there with an empty battery and get a full charge at a bargain.
    
  • Does the ride go to one of the more expensive districts in the East? Not ideal, but perhaps you'll be able to find a passenger later who will pay for a ride to the cheaper districts in the West. Make sure you have enough charge to do this ride and the next one to avoid having to use one of the expensive charging stations in the East.
• A full charge of 4 bars costs ¢3.76 at the cheapest station or ¢8.36 at the most expensive one.

• Getting a ticket can be a very expensive experience. Try to avoid breaking the law, even when your passengers request it. They'll probably understand.
  
• If you do get in trouble with the police, consider finding a way to grease the cop. Extremely unethical and it may have unintended consequences, but it does save money if successful...

 

Trying to increase your regular Neo Cab profits through careful planning and passengers paying tips only goes so far. Squeezing out that extra ¢6 or so a night does help, but if you're looking for big bucks, you may need to go further than that.

The following are options for Lina to make money outside of the Neo Cab app.

Lina may meet a passenger who expresses some uncertainty about the destination. She will have an opportunity to discuss another location in the city, upon which the passenger will randomly decide to go there. The Neo Cab app doesn't seem to support a change of destination mid-ride, so the fare will be calculated based on the original route, which was shorter. But the passenger may be eager to pay for the difference.

This passenger is:
Oona (first ride), who seems very eager to give you ¢30 extra
Choose this dialog option when it comes up:
* Taking in a burlesque show in Luz Rouge.

Lina may have doubts about giving a ride to a certain passenger in a very specific situation, while the passenger simply wants to get to the destination they've requested. And the passenger is in a hurry. If you argue long enough, the passenger may be eager to promise you extra cash for departing right away.

This passenger is:
Gideon (second ride), who has no problem giving you ¢20 of "dirty DeKalb money"
Choose this dialog option when it comes up:
"We could get in a lot of trouble." (once the choice "OK let's go" comes up)

Lina will meet a passenger who urgently needs to get away from something. This passenger will be eager to pay a fare, but is unwilling to use the Neo Cab app, so offers to pay cash. You have the option to decline the money—they were in a bit of a predicament, after all.

This passenger is:
Azul, who would accept a fare of ¢10
Choose this dialog option when it comes up:
"¢10 should cover it."

Lina may meet a person who tries to mug somebody else. Of course, the right thing to do always is to step in on the victim's behalf. But perhaps there are also one or two other ways to look at it in this particular case. If you play it cool, you might have a chance to walk away from this with a tidy profit.

This passenger is:
Sam (second ride), who tries to con Luke into giving him ¢180
Choose these dialog options when they come up:
* Until I knew more, it was best to just keep quiet and keep an eye on Sam.
  * I had to laugh.
  * I flipped the locks so I could pin Sam down.
  "Damn right." or "My cut is more like 50%."

From the conversation it seems there should be many different possible yields for Lina here:
¢0, ¢10, ¢20, ¢30, ¢45, ¢60, ¢90, ¢120, or even ¢180. But as of October 2021, most of these seem bugged out. I can only get ¢60 or ¢90. When Sam offers me ¢30 or ¢120, I actually end up getting zero, but if I ask for ¢10, Sam first agrees and then proceeds to give me ¢90.

Lina needs to drive to survive, needs charge to drive, and needs money to charge. Running out of money would be a serious problem. The good news is: Lina has a backup plan ready to go at a moment's notice. The bad news: It involves working for Capra...

Lina will take this second job automatically if you head to a charging station with no more than about ¢4 cash on hand. She will earn about ¢20. This can be done as often as you like, but will only trigger when being almost broke. Taking this second job should earn you the Hit Bottom achievement.
 

It's not actually necessary to meet the "daily goals" at all in the game Neo Cab. Doing so every day offers no particular benefits either, and may in fact cause unnecessary stress and a bad star rating. Still, if you really wanted it, you could try spreading out the "Extra Money Sources" outlined above as evenly as possible.

Here's what you would need to do in order to actually come close to meeting your "daily goal" of earning ¢35 every single day. You would need to do all of these things over the course of the game, one every day:

• Pick up more than three paying passengers per day.
  
• Accept payment from someone afraid for their life.
  
• Take part in a mugging and ask for a cut.
  
• Accept a bribe for doing your job.
  
• Influence a passenger to take a more expensive ride.
  
• Get a second job.

Here's how it can work:

NB: I have not actually played this out yet. Will update the guide once I do.

1. Pick up Gideon. Be nice; you're gonna need the tip. This sets up night three.
   
2. Take money from Azul. It's not much, so you may still end up missing the daily goal even if you do everything else right. But that's okay, you just arrived in LO and you'll make up for it over the course of the next couple of days.
   
3. Pick up Luke. Be nice; you're gonna need the tip.

If all goes well, you should make about ¢30 on the 1st night.

1. Pick up Oona; you'll have an opportunity to get something extra from her.
   
2. Pick up Sam. This sets up night five.
   
3. Call it an early night.

If all goes well, you should make about ¢40 on the 2nd night.

1. Pick up anyone you like. (Carlos / Charlie / Liam / Oona)
   
2. Pick up Gideon; you'll have an opportunity to get something extra from her.
   
3. Pick up Liam (or retire early if you want).
   
4. Stay at the Babylon.

If all goes well, you should make about ¢35 on the 3rd night.

1. Keep driving from charging station to charging station without picking up any passengers. Pretty soon, you'll be running low on money and will have the opportunity to get some extra money from Capra.
   
2. Pick up anyone you like. (Carlos, Liam, Oona 2)
   
3. Pick up anyone you like. (except for Sam)
   
4. Pick up anyone you like.

If all goes well, you should make about ¢35 on the 4th night.

1. Pick up anyone you like.
   
2. Pick up Sam; you'll have an opportunity to get something extra from him.
   
3. Call it an early night.

If all goes well, you should easily surpass ¢35 on the 5th night.
This section may be a mild spoiler for the main story line.
The night where you get to meet Savy is special: It won't end until you actually go see her. Because of this, the passengers in the Late slot will keep appearing until you've maxed out their story lines. As a result, this night is your chance to pick up more than three passengers. However, this is only possible if the passengers in the Late time slot still have enough of their story lines available. You need to pick up about 6 passengers in total in order to make your daily goal. This should be easy, especially if you haven't met Agonon or Klaus more than once before.

Enjoy!