Uber Will Pay $10M to Settle Gender, Race Pay Inequality Class Action

UPDATE: The TCA Gender Pay Gap and Equal Pay Lawsuit Investigation is now open! If you’re a female employee making less than your male workplace counterpart, submit your information here.

Uber will pay $10 million to settle a class action lawsuit claiming that the company pays software engineers unequally based on gender and race.

On Monday, Uber agreed to settle the class action lawsuit brought forward in November 2017 by plaintiffs Ingrid Avandaño, Roxana del Toro Lopez and Ana Medina, software engineers at Uber.

The three woman allege that Uber violated the California Equal Pay Act and Private Attorneys General Act, and participated in unfair business practices by paying female software engineers and software engineers of color less than their counterparts for equal or superior work.

If the settlement is approved, each of the roughly 420 affected engineers would receive about $23,800 to compensate for wages lost as a result of Uber’s allegedly discriminatory pay practices.

Avandaño, del Toro Lopez, and Medina claim that the alleged pay inequality stems from a couple of practices in the company. One practice that the women claim contributes to discrimination is the company’s performance evaluation system, in which supervisors rank employees against one another.

The women also state that at Uber, salary negotiations in hiring, raises, and promotions, are based on an employee’s previous salaries, thereby further widening the pay gap between employees, as women and employees of color are allegedly paid less on average.

According to the Uber discriminatory pay class action lawsuit, “in this system, female employees and employees of color are systematically devalued compared to their male and white or Asian American peers because female employees and employees of color receive, on average, lower rankings despite equal or better performance.” Allegedly, such discrimination in the supposedly right-leaning company was the result of an “unchecked hyper-alpha culture,” a climate called out by ex-engineer Susan Fowler in a blog post.

On Monday, the same day that Uber agreed to settle, del Toro Lopez amended her complaint to separate the class action lawsuit into two Classes — one for Uber engineers across the country, and one for only California employees.

In the settlement, Uber will not be required to admit to wrongdoing. Rather, the company will be required to implement a new employee evaluation system, and conduct three years of internally monitoring salary consistencies across employees, and tracking company practices that may put women and employees of color at a disadvantage when negotiating pay in promotions, hiring, and bonuses.

In addition, the settlement will require Uber executives and leaderships to “participate in a twice-annual business review with Uber’s CEO relating to the organization’s diversity representation, pipeline, diversity growth process, and actions taken to increase the representation of women and persons of color.”

Uber claims that this settlement will build on changes that the company has already started to implement to decrease alleged discrimination within the company. The company alleges that they have implemented new salary and equity structures, and changed their performance review process.

Top Class Actions will post updates to this class action settlement as they become available. For the latest updates, keep checking TopClassActions.com or sign up for our free newsletter. You can also receive notifications when this article is updated by using your free Top Class Actions account and clicking the “Follow Article” button at the top of the post.

Avandaño, del Toro Lopez, and Medina are represented by Jahan C. Sagafi of Outten & Golden LLP.

The Uber Pay Gap Class Action Lawsuit is del Toro Lopez v. Uber Technologies Inc., Case No. 4:17-cv-06255, in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California.

UPDATE: On Aug. 20, 2018, two plaintiffs in a class action lawsuit accusing Uber Technologies Inc. of unlawful discrimination and harassment on the basis of gender, race and national origin have asked a California federal judge to grant final approval to a $10 million class action settlement.