There’s a problem with Uber deactivating driver accounts, and the company is taking steps to change that.
In a company blog post on Monday, Uber announced some new initiatives to help drivers and delivery people who feel their accounts were deactivated — basically the equivalent of getting fired — for unfair reasons. Drivers allege that they can lose their accounts due to false accusations of wrongdoing by riders who might be looking for an easy refund.
To combat this, Uber is giving drivers more ways to appeal and review account deactivation, such as by providing audio and video recordings to prove their side of the story. More vaguely, Uber is rolling out some kind of functionality that can supposedly identify users who regularly (and, ideally, falsely) report driver incidents, to stop those ratings from being counted against drivers. The blog post did not provide any technical details as to how this actually works.
Still, it’s probably for the best that Uber is thinking about this at all. The gig economy is notoriously tough to succeed in, and unfairly losing access to perhaps the most popular and recognizable ride-share app would be a killing blow to any driver’s career. And anyone who has ever worked a public-facing job can tell you that the customer isn’t always right.
Anyway, don’t mess with other people’s money.
