Transport for London refused to hand Uber a new licence to operate in London in September, and the company is now\u00a0appealing the decision in court.<\/p>\n
The company has millions of riders in London, but it has come under fire for the ways its business has been run. Uber is now hoping that it’s made enough changes to get a new licence.<\/p>\n
Uber is appealing a September decision by London\u2019s transport regulator Transport for London. The regulator declined to issue a new private hire operator licence to Uber, which is the crucial licence that the company needs to operate in London.<\/p>\n
Uber has appealed TfL\u2019s decision, which has kickstarted a legal process. The appeal will be held in Westminster Magistrates Court, and a judge will rule on whether Uber is currently fit and proper to be given a new \u00a0private hire operator licence.<\/p>\n
TfL announced its decision not to renew Uber\u2019s licence in September. Now that Uber has started a legal appeals process, TfL will let the judge decide whether Uber should get a new licence. TfL will follow the judge\u2019s decision and grant or decline to give a licence accordingly.<\/p>\n
TfL said in September that it thought that \u201cUber’s approach and conduct demonstrate a lack of corporate responsibility in relation to a number of issues which have potential public safety and security implications.\u201d<\/p>\n
The regulator went on to list several issues that it had with Uber\u2019s business. It said that it was unhappy with the companies that Uber used to conduct background and medical checks.<\/p>\n
It also took issue with Uber\u2019s approach to reporting crimes that happen to its customers and drivers. At the time, Uber relied on passengers and riders to report crimes, and didn\u2019t take a proactive approach to reporting them itself.<\/p>\n
Finally, TfL criticised Uber\u2019s alleged use of its \u201cGreyball\u201d software, which allowed the company to show different versions of its app to different users. The New York Times reported that Uber had used the software in some cities around the world to change which cars were shown to users who were suspected of working for regulators.<\/p>\n
Uber has made a series of changes to its business in the UK following TfL\u2019s decision in September.<\/p>\n
The company has changed its background and medical checking suppliers to use companies that TfL is happy with. The company has also started proactively reporting crimes itself to The Metropolitan Police.<\/p>\n
Uber\u2019s European head sent an email to staff in September which denied that the Greyball tool had been used to dupe regulators in the UK. The company has admitted that the software is used for feature testing, though.<\/p>\n
And Uber has also appointed three independent non-executive directors to its board in the UK, which it hopes will help to stop worries over the company\u2019s corporate responsibility.<\/p>\n
As well as directly responding to TfL\u2019s concerns, Uber has also started paying UK drivers sick pay and parental leave. It\u2019s also launched a special telephone helpline for passenger and its drivers.<\/p>\n
Uber wants a new private hire operator licence which will allow it to operate in London. The company has said in written evidence that an 18 month licence would be appropriate.<\/p>\n
I<\/span>f the judge rules that Uber is fit and proper to hold a private hire operator licence then TfL is expected to grant the company a licence, and it will continue to operate as normal.<\/p>\n And if Uber loses, then there won\u2019t be a sudden removal of its service in London. The company intends to work through the appeals process, meaning that if the Magistrates Court doesn\u2019t rule in its favour, then it can continue appealing through to the Supreme Court.<\/p>\n London mayor Sadiq Khan has said that the full appeals process could take years, and Uber is able to continue to operate until it exhausts all avenues of appeal.<\/p>\n –<\/p>\n Telegraph<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Transport for London refused to hand Uber a new licence to operate in London in September, and the company is now\u00a0appealing the decision in court. The company has millions of riders in London, but it has come under fire for the ways its business has been run. Uber is now hoping that it’s made enough …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2269,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2268","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","","category-tech"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uaebarq.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2268","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uaebarq.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uaebarq.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uaebarq.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uaebarq.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2268"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.uaebarq.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2268\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2270,"href":"https:\/\/www.uaebarq.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2268\/revisions\/2270"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uaebarq.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2269"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uaebarq.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2268"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uaebarq.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2268"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uaebarq.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2268"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}What about if Uber loses?<\/h3>\n