US labour agency says Uber drivers are 'contractors', not employees

Company News

Drivers for ride-hailing company Uber Technologies Inc are independent contractors and not employees, the general counsel of a US labor agency has concluded, in an advisory memo that is likely to carry significant weight in a pending case against the company and could prevent drivers from joining a union.

The recommendation by the office of general counsel Peter Robb, who was appointed to the National Labor Relations Board by President Donald Trump, was made in a memo dated April 16 and released on Tuesday.The general counsel said in the memo that Uber drivers set their hours, own their cars and are free to work for the company's competitors, so they cannot be considered employees under federal labor law.

A ruling on the case is to be made by an NLRB regional director. Advisory memos from the general counsel's office are generally upheld in rulings. Any decision could be appealed to the NLRB's five-member board, which is also led by Trump appointees but is independent of the general counsel.
The memo will not affect scores of lawsuits claiming Uber drivers should be treated as employees under federal and state wage laws.

San Francisco-based Uber in a statement said it is "focused on improving the quality and security of independent work, while preserving the flexibility drivers and couriers tell us they value."Uber shares were up 6.4 per cent at $39.46 in late trading on the New York Stock Exchange.

 The memo signalled a sharp turn for the general counsel's office, which acts like a prosecutor in NLRB cases, and during the administration of Democratic President Barack Obama maintained that many gig-economy workers are misclassified as independent contractors.Under the National Labor Relations Act, independent contractors cannot join unions and do not have legal protection when they complain about working conditions.

Uber drivers plan 12-hr protest in 6 US cities over low wages ahead of IPO

International News

Uber Technologies Inc's drivers in six US cities are planning to shut their apps for 12 hours on May 8 to protest against low wages and working conditions, two days ahead of the company's expected market debut.

Drivers in San Francisco, Chicago, Los Angeles, San Diego, Philadelphia and Washington DC will shut their app on the day, when a separate protest will be carried out outside Uber's head office in San Francisco, a spokeswoman for Gig Workers Rising, a campaign for gig workers, told Reuters.
About "hundreds of drivers" are likely to join the protest, with Los Angeles and San Francisco expected to see a higher concentration of people, Clarkson said on Monday.

The drivers' demands also include employee benefit plans such as health care, holiday pay and representation in Uber's management structure.

Uber expects to price its IPO on May 9 and begin trading on the New York Stock Exchange the following day, people familiar with the matter have said.

"Uber's IPO will put millions in the pockets of executives, but the drivers who provide the service that is core to the company will get nothing, " Clarkson said.

To improve relations with drivers, Uber had announced plans to offer cash bonuses to some of its most active drivers with the option to purchase shares in the company's market debut.
Uber did not respond to a Reuters request for comment.

 (Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

Uber to block riders who misbehave or damage properties despite warnings

Companies News:

Uber will now remove riders who despite repeated warnings misbehave or damage the driver or co-passenger's property, as per the updated community guidelines of the ride-hailing giant.

The US-based company has also added a 'Driver Safety Toolkit' - designed on the lines of a similar offering for riders - to offer a suite of in-app safety features for its driver-partners in India.
"Courtesy matters. Riders are expected to exercise good judgment and behave decently towards other people in the car when riding with Uber... Riders may lose access to Uber if they don't meet the star ratings requirements set out in the community guidelines," Uber Head of Cities (India and South Asia) Prabhjeet Singh told PTI.

Singh explained that the company will now start removing from its platform those riders who despite repeated warnings flout Uber's community guidelines. These riders will be given enough notifications before they are removed from the platform, and the number of such riders would be "handful", he said.


 "We have updated Uber's community guidelines which extend the same behavioral standards to the riders that Uber has for the driver partners. Even though a vast majority of riders will not be affected by this update, it reminds a select few what behaviour is expected of them while using the app," Singh added...Read More