Narrative: Uber Treats Drivers Badly

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    Uber Gears Up to Block Bid to Form a Union in Seattle – WSJ (Mar 13, 2017)

    As with Uber’s eventual exit from Austin over fingerprinting, it’s threatening to leave Seattle if its drivers there join a union, and is also actively trying to dissuade drivers from doing so in a range of podcasts and other messages arguing that unionization could be bad for them. Seattle is something like the 20th largest city in the US, and a disproportionately influential one given its status as a tech hub and bastion of somewhat left-wing values. So if Seattle went this way, other cities might follow, and Uber is therefore fighting unionization there tooth and nail. This is just one of several fronts on which Uber is fighting its drivers, from unionization to employment status and benefits to pricing. And although it argues it’s acting in drivers’ interests here, it’s clearly mostly acting in its own, possibly to their detriment.

    via WSJ

    In Video, Uber CEO Argues With Driver Over Falling Fares – Bloomberg (Feb 28, 2017)

    I know I used the phrase “another day, another ugly story about Uber” yesterday, but it’s literally another day and yet another story today. This time, it’s CEO Travis Kalanick recorded by one of his drivers who asked him some questions about pricing for the black car tier Uber offers. I’d actually argue that most of the conversation is pretty reasonable on Kalanick’s part, but right at the end he apparently loses his temper and we get to see how he really feels about all this, reinforcing the sense that Uber doesn’t really care about or understand its drivers and their needs. Here’s the point I made with regard to the sexual harassment allegations, and will make again here: as long as Kalanick himself doesn’t model the behavior he wants to see from his employees, the culture at Uber is never going to change, and it’s starting to feel like he simply can’t model that behavior because he doesn’t believe in it and isn’t capable of behaving in that way. If that’s really the case, that’s a pretty strong argument for him stepping down and allowing someone else to take over who can provide the cultural leadership his company needs – it’s hard to see how any of this gets better unless he does.

    via Bloomberg

    Uber’s public Q&A with drivers was a disaster – The Verge (Feb 17, 2017)

    Uber’s relationship with drivers has often been contentious, and it appears that even when the company is trying to “listen” to its drivers more, things often go wrong, as in this case. The big problem is that there are simply too many deep-seated frustrations and problems in Uber’s relationship with its drivers for them to be substantively addressed during such a public Q&A session, and Uber’s management should have known this. Without first establishing a level of trust and ongoing communication over a longer period of time, these occasional opportunities become venting sessions for drivers who feel like they’re not being heard, which makes them unproductive for all concerned. Uber needs to do better at really listening to its drivers regularly (something it sounds like Jeff Jones does at least try to do semi-regularly in smaller groups), but more importantly it needs to get better at actually addressing their big concerns.

    via The Verge

    Pittsburgh officials are criticizing Uber’s “one-way” relationship with the city — Quartz (Feb 7, 2017)

    The remarks quoted here are very much in keeping with those reported a few weeks back (also by Quartz), but they go a lot further. For one thing, these are on the record comments from senior officials, not sourced reporting based on a public records request. It’s increasingly clear that Pittsburgh officials are fed up with Uber’s attitude as it operates in the city, and this is one of the handful of cities where Uber is supposed to be working most closely with local authorities. That’s not a great sign for Uber’s potential to have good working relationships with other cities going forward, especially as it seeks special dispensation to test autonomous vehicles. Note also this story from the Verge yesterday about Uber’s legal battle with Seattle over unionization.

    via Quartz

    When Their Shifts End, Uber Drivers Set Up Camp in Parking Lots Across the U.S. – Bloomberg (Jan 23, 2017)

    Along with its distaste for regulation, the other big narrative that dogs Uber is its treatment of its drivers. This piece stops short of saying that Uber mistreats its drivers, but provides quite a bit of detail on those drivers and their habits, including the fact that a number sleep in their cars at night, while others regularly sleep in hostels and motels rather than traveling home between shifts. The article also says that half of its driving gets done by full-time drivers, despite Uber’s marketing to those who are looking for a “side hustle”. The pressure for Uber to treat at least these full-time drivers as employees with better benefits isn’t likely to go away anytime soon, and one of the biggest questions around Uber is whether it will ever be able to afford to give them what they want as it reaches the point where it drives towards profitability.

    via When Their Shifts End, Uber Drivers Set Up Camp in Parking Lots Across the U.S. – Bloomberg