[HN Gopher] Uber ordered to pay $1.1m to blind woman refused rides
___________________________________________________________________
Uber ordered to pay $1.1m to blind woman refused rides
Author : jeffwass
Score : 21 points
Date : 2021-04-04 16:10 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.bbc.co.uk)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.bbc.co.uk)
| xyzzy21 wrote:
| Several things about this:
|
| 1. Uber was already under a consent decree related to ADA
| violations when this both was happening and got filed. So this
| was already a known problem and executive management had AMPLE
| time to remedy it. This is mentioned at the end of the article.
|
| 2. Not mentioned was that this case was decided under Uber's own
| T&C-defined arbitration system (such systems are already biased
| against the consumer almost by definition) and yet that
| arbitrator found Uber's role so egregious that they awarded far
| more than was being sought!
|
| The thing is: the ethics and morals of executive leadership
| ALWAYS set the tone of how all employees behave. And when both
| executives and employees behave badly, then contract employees
| will either do the same or will run "open loop" and "roughshod"
| over customers and the community.
|
| Clearly that's what happened - Uber has a long reputation for
| such "bad acts" and unethical/immoral behavior so nothing new.
| jeffwass wrote:
| "One driver allegedly cut her trip short after falsely claiming
| to have arrived at her destination."
|
| Terrible
| goodells wrote:
| The issue specifically with the service animal is tough. I think
| people who benefit from legitimate service animals are seriously
| harmed by the people who claim their pet is a service animal so
| they can bring it with them. Anyone can buy a "service animal"
| vest on Amazon. And under the ADA, it's basically illegal to even
| ask if it's a legitimate service animal - you can ask "which
| tasks is it trained to perform?"
|
| The drivers are in a tough spot given that they've probably had
| poorly trained pets in their cars that were passed off as service
| animals.
| Spivak wrote:
| The flip side of this is that modern life is really really
| unfriendly to people with pets. I don't have a pet, don't want
| one either so I have no horse in this race. Basically
| everywhere where you aren't required by law to allow animals
| refuses them because making even the smallest voluntary
| accommodations for people is just something that doesn't
| happen.
|
| The service animal thing is just a loophole to allow people to
| bring their pets on available-to-the-public transport the way
| car owners can. Because if you aren't in walking distance to a
| dog park and don't own a car sucks for you I guess.
|
| I don't think anyone is arguing that untrained animals should
| just be let to run wild at malls but the blanket refusals that
| happen don't even allow for the possibility of well-behaved
| animals.
|
| Like it would be an absolutely crazy world if every single
| business and all transportation refused to allow children
| unless it was deemed medically necessary for the child that
| their parent be with them at all times. Being a parent would be
| a logistics nightmare. Being a single parent with an infant
| would basically be impossible. But that's what pet owners have
| to deal with unless they have their own car or are fine
| confining their pet to their house for their entire life. If
| this wasn't already the norm it would be nuts.
| xyzzy21 wrote:
| Legally it's simple - don't drive for Uber or Lyft.
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2021-04-04 23:01 UTC)