Newsman: Uber and Lyft drivers rallied outside of New York City Hall Wednesday claiming that companies’ latest locking app policies are threatening the everyday living of New York City’s for-hire vehicle drivers by locking out drivers from their apps. The lock out policy ending with cutting of working hours and costing them money. Drivers who are renting the car are even facing most serious consequences of economic hardship to survive with families.
The New York Taxi Workers Alliance (NYTWA), an organization representing over 20,000 cabbies and rideshare drivers says that drivers will go on strike in October unless regulatory action is taken to curb the lockouts that have kept many drivers from being able to access the rideshare apps, and by extension earn a living.
New York City’s for-hire vehicle drivers are getting mandated minimum pay, which guarantees drivers get paid for time spent between trips. However, drivers say the companies have been locking them out of their apps at times during their shifts to avoid paying them in between rides.
Both Uber and Lyft were against the city’s minimum pay rules established a few years ago. Lyft says the company supports an environment that allows New York City drivers to earn whenever and however they want.
Head of the Taxi Workers Alliance Bhairavi Desai says drivers are threatening to strike over the issue.
Bhairavi Desai, the longtime leader of NYTWA, told news reporters that drivers are signing pledges to commit to the strike — which would be at least 24 hours long across the five boroughs.
The union also alleges that the city and the two rideshare giants illegally colluded when brokering a “backroom” deal last month aimed at reducing and ultimately eliminating the lockouts, which NYTWA claims is nonbinding and doesn’t go far enough. They even say it could be a violation of antitrust law in a letter they plan to send to City Hall on Friday.
“This agreement is a plain violation of black-letter antitrust law, which prohibits companies colluding over wages and suppressing labor outputs,” NYTWA’s lawyers write to City Hall in their letter.
“We want regulations that are going to put a permanent end to the threat of lockouts,” said NYTWA’s leader Bhairavi Desai . “We want the TLC to reject the manipulated numbers that Uber has provided them on how busy the drivers have been, so the TLC can reset the pay rate and drivers are paid for all the time that they’re working as they were promised “she said.
