Uber Must Hand Over Training, Terminating Docs to Drivers

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A California federal judge told Uber Technologies Inc. that it must submit documents concerning the training and termination of drivers who alleged in a class action lawsuit that they were not given the 20 percent gratuity paid by customers, which they believed was tips for the drivers.

U.S. District Judge Donna M. Ryu said in her Nov. 6 decision that Uber could not escape providing information to the court about deactivated drivers and training materials that were given to California drivers and that the company could not prevent access to these documents based on an earlier discovery motion.

Uber and the plaintiffs in the gratuity charge class action lawsuit are in the process of preparing motions for summary judgement to decide whether or not the Uber drivers are considered Uber employees or independent contractors, according to California law.

Judge Ryu says that Uber must give plaintiffs information about 100 fired drivers to help them figure out the amount of control Uber exerted over its drivers by having the ability to deactivate them.

“According to Uber, there are tens of thousands of drivers who use the Uber app in California; therefore, production of documents regarding a limited, random sample of deactivated drivers is not unduly burdensome,” Judge Ryu wrote.

Uber had until Nov. 10 to provide “all responsive documents regarding those drivers’ deactivations, including communications with the drivers and any internal communications about those specific deactivations.”

In addition, Judge Ryu said that Uber needs to turn over training manuals, which the class representatives had requested, even though Uber had resisted the request, saying that it had not given manuals to all drivers because it runs a “decentralized” operation.

“Uber is not required to produce every responsive communication sent to each driver . . . . However, Uber shall employ its significant resources to conduct a thorough and comprehensive search for responsive documents, including retrieving documents that may not have been systematically retained by the company,” Judge Ryu said.

Uber also needs to give the plaintiffs information on drivers who chose not to sign Uber’s arbitration policy, but it does not have to supply information about the company’s tipping policy, saying it can be brought up later, if needed.

Both parties must give information about named plaintiff Matthew Manahan about whether or not he had a trip log from Lyft Inc. and Sidecar Technologies Inc., which are Uber competitors.

Uber is a mobile app, in which users may contact a driver of a taxi or a private car within minutes. The Uber class action lawsuit was filed in 2013 by the drivers who said that while Uber says on its website and elsewhere that customers don’t have to tip drivers because gratuity is included, that they were never paid that gratuity.

Uber tried to have the class action lawsuit dismissed, but U.S. District Judge Edward Chen denied the motion to dismiss in a December 2013 decision because at the time he had said that it was okay for out-of-state drivers to join the class action lawsuit because Uber states in its licensing agreement that any disputes would be addressed under California law.

Uber had filed another motion to dismiss with Judge Chen in late August, in which the company argued against the specific allegations which included tortious interference with prospective economic advantage, breach of implied-in-fact contract, and unlawful and fraudulent business practices.

The named plaintiffs in this Uber class action lawsuit are Douglas O’Connor, Thomas Colopy, Matthew Manahan, Wilson Rolle Jr. and William Anderson.

The named plaintiffs are represented by Shannon Liss-Riordan and Benjamin J. Weber of Lichten & Liss-Riordan PC and by Monique Olivier of Duckworth Peters Lebowitz Olivier LLP.

Uber is represented by Robert Jon Hendricks, Stephen L. Taeusch and Caitlin V. May of Morgan Lewis & Bockius LLP.

The Uber Drivers Class Action Lawsuit is O’Connor et al. v. Uber Technologies Inc. et al., Case No. 3:13-cv-03826, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California.