Supreme Court Rules Uber Drivers are Now Workers

After a long running legal battle that started with former Uber drivers James Farrar and Yaseen Aslam winning an employment tribunal against the ride hailing service in October 2016, the UK supreme court has ruled that the drivers participating in the service are now classified as workers.

The long lasting court battle consisted of the original employment tribunal in October 2016 which Uber lost. Uber then attempted to appeal against the decision made in the original tribunal but the Employment Appeal Tribunal upheld the verdict in November 2017. Again Uber appealed the decision but this time they took the case to the High Court which again upheld the ruling in December 2018. Still not satisfied, Uber took their case for its 3rd appeal and this time to the Supreme Court ,which has the final say on all legal matters, and once again the previous ruling was upheld.

Several elements had to be considered by the court in its judgement:

The fare for journeys was established by Uber therefore they dictated the amount drivers could earn.

Drivers had no say in the terms of their contract as it was all decided by Uber

Uber can penalise drivers if they reject too many rides which therefore means requests for rides is constrained by Uber.

Uber has the capability to monitor driver’s service quality through the star rating system and has the capacity to terminate the relationship if following repeated warnings to improve the quality of service no improvement occurs.

As a consequence of the ruling siding with the newly titled workers it means that Uber could be liable to some large compensation bills and also have wider consequences in the realm of the gig economy. But more importantly the workers are entitled to a minimum wage and holiday pay whereas they were formerly regarded as self-employed so would not have been entitled to such benefits.

This has been pointed out by Mr Farrar to be especially critical in this instance because fares are down 80% due to the pandemic and many of the drivers have found themselves financially struggling and feeling trapped in Uber’s system.

The reasoning attributed to the verdict reached by the Supreme Court was that they had determined that drivers were in a position of subordination to Uber and the only possible way to increase earnings would be to work longer hours.