Author: bedelman

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Victims of sexual assault, rape, harassment, and gender-motivated violence criticized Uber’s arbitration clause

Fourteen victims of sexual assault, rape, harassment, and gender-motivated violence criticized Uber’s arbitration clause, which prevented them from bringing lawsuits about the harm they suffered. Their letter to Uber’s Board of Directors asked that Uber remove (or agree not to enforce) its arbitration clause as to these complaints. They noted a California case in which Uber aggressively sought to force one of their complaints into confidential arbitration. They also noted pending legislation in the United States Congress and New York State Senate that would disallow companies from requiring victims of sexual harassment or assault to proceed in arbitration.

News coverage from The Mercury News and Recode.

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Australian competition regulator scrutinized Uber Eats contracts

The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission said he would examine controversial contract provisions Uber required restaurants to accept when selling food through the Uber Eats delivery service. Restaurants complained about contract terms that said they, and not Uber, were responsible for late deliveries — though they thought it was Uber, and not them, that caused delays and was better positioned to make sure deliveries were on time.

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EU’s top court said France can bring criminal charges against Uber managers

The Court of Justice of the European Union (Europe’s highest court) ruled that France can bring criminal proceedings against Uber. Uber had argued that its service was an “information society service,” but the Court said that Uber is a transport service. The difference was important: A new national law regulating an information society service would require that a member state (such as France) notify the Commission, and the absence of such notification would make the law invalid and unenforceable. But regulation of transport requires no such notification, making the law valid and enforceable.

Uber responded by saying the service at issue, UberPOP, was already discontinued in France.

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Denied refund to passenger whose driver extended ride and used passenger phone to give himself a tip

After a passenger forgot her phone in a driver’s vehicle, the driver realized — and drove a lengthy additional route, plus gave himself a large tip. He also used the Uber app to file a complaint against the passenger and, using the passenger’s phone, wrote a fake response.

The passenger complained to Uber, which initially gave her a partial refund but then removed that refund. Uber later suggested that she contact local law enforcement, and only after she did so did Uber refund the charges (ultimately adding a gift card for a future trip).

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Female engineers sued, claiming unequal pay and benefits

Three Latina software engineers sued Uber, alleging that they, as women and people of color, were paid less than white male and Asian colleagues. They sought to represent all engineers similarly suited in a class action.

Uber ultimately agreed to settle the suit for $10 million. As part of the settlement, Uber agreed to enhance its systems for compensation and reviews, to regularly report diversity metrics, and to assure that company executives review diversity efforts twice a year.

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Holder report offered devastating critique

In the midst of a series of scandals, Uber retained former US Attorney General Eric Holder to review the company’s practices and problems. The report recommended forty-seven changes, including restructuring Uber’s board of directors, restricting alcohol and drug use at company events, and firing then SVP of business Emil Michael .

Reviewing the version of the Holder report available to the public, one compliance consultant described the findings as “one of the most remarkable discussions of a complete workplace culture disaster that has ever been rendered for a multi-billion business.” The consultant continued: “If you changed some of the business and legal language, you might well think you were reading a report on Animal House.” (quote from New Yorker)

The version available to the public (linked above) is just 13 pages long and focused on recommended improvements, but Mike Isaac’s Super Pumped (p. 324) reports that the full report was “hundreds of pages long” and listed numerous specific concerns.  Isaac summarized:

It was … a winding, repetitive list of infractions that had occurred across Uber’s hundreds of global offices, including sexual assault and physical violence. The company had numerous outstanding lawsuits against it, and would likely face many more.

No one outside Uber’s Board of Directors would see the full text of the report. (Isaac p. 330)

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Uber backup drivers fell short in safety functions

CityLab reported widespread shortcomings of the backup drivers who were responsible for supervising Uber’s self-driving cars. One, it is unclear whether humans can do a good job supervising machines that work well most of the time — requiring intense concentration to identify the occasional error, when most of the time, there are tempting distractions. Uber’s 8 to 10-hour shifts, with one 30 minute lunch break, were grueling — and drivers were often assigned to repeat the same driving “loops” which likely made the task particularly dull for drivers. Additional challenges included working entirely alone (without other humans) (after Uber removed a second staff person from each vehicle), and, CityLab reported, the vehicles’ frequent hard braking.

Meanwhile, CityLab spoke with multiple drivers who were dismissed from Uber for safety infractions, including using a phone while a vehicle was in motion — undermining any suggestion that all safety drivers do as instructed.

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Multiple competition regulators questioned Uber-Grab deal

Reviewing Uber’s proposed sale of its Southeast Asia business to Grab, the Competition Commisison of Singapore (CCS) announced that it is looking into the transaction.

Broadly, CCS said the proposed transaction would bring “substantial lessening of competition in relation to the chauffeured personal point-to-point transport passenger and booking services market in Singapore.” CCS therefore required Uber and Grab to maintain their pre-transaction pricing, policies, and products, and not to exchange any confidential information.

After CCS’s statement of concern, Malaysia’s Land Public Transport Commission also announced that it would examine the proposed transaction. The Philippines’ anti-trust agency, the Philippine Competition Commission, then stated similar concerns: “There are reasonable grounds that the said acquisition may likely substantially lessen, prevent, or restrict competition.”

Coverage from TechCrunch and prior critique from the author of this site.

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