Lyft Class Action Claims Drivers Wrongfully Logged Off App

A Lyft driver has filed a class action lawsuit claiming that the ride-hailing company logs drivers off if they perform fewer than 180 rides in a 30 day period.

Plaintiff MD Islam says that, in the early days of Lyft, the company encouraged their drivers to work full-time hours by enticing them with higher pay if they would work 30-50 hours or more per week.

Islam claims that Lyft promised drivers a “Power Drivers Bonus” in which the company would cut its commission by 50 percent for drivers who worked 30-49 hours per week. In addition, the plaintiff claims that this fee would be lifted entirely if drivers worked more than 50 hours per week.

That said, because an increase of drivers were working more hours, the for-hire vehicle market became saturated with drivers. As a result of the saturation, app-based drivers began to work for more than one ride-hailing company, hoping that they would receive dispatches from two or more companies.

Islam says that drivers would now work 50 hours per week, but would perform less trips for each company that they worked for, because the number of rides was split between the two companies.

In the summer of 2018, due to the number of suicides in the vehicle-for-hire industry, the plaintiff claims that the New York City Council passed two laws to improve the lives of drivers.

The first bill, Local Law 147, further limited the amount of licenses that would be issued to drivers. The second law, Local Law 150, gave the Taxi and Limousine Commission (TLC) to issue rules that would govern earnings standards for those drivers who worked for companies such as Lyft and Uber.

In June 2019, the plaintiff alleges that Lyft began to limit drivers access to their app, in an attempt to avoid its obligations under the new TLC rules, which ensured that drivers earned a decent minimum wage for all of the hours they performed while working for the company.

“Such actions violate the spirit, if not the letter, of TLC regulations intended to confer basic labor protections upon some of the City’s most vulnerable low-wage workers,” the Lyft class action lawsuit says.

These forced log-outs are a material breach of the contracts that they have with their drivers, Islam says, which specifically provides that drivers would have no restrictions on where and when they access the app.

In addition, the forced log-outs “amount to nothing short of short term layoffs” for workers who have come to depend on their full-time work in order to meet expenses and support their families, the Lyft class action lawsuit maintains.

The plaintiff says that, as a Lyft driver, he supports his wife and two small children, as well as sends money back home. He claims that in 2014 he purchased a new Toyota Camry to use as his Lyft vehicle. Islam states that the car is now paid off, but he still carries an insurance policy for the vehicle which costs $308 per month.

Before Lyft started restricting access to the app, Islam claims that he worked a full-time driving schedule for the company.

For example, he alleges that during the 10 weeks from Oct. 7, 2019 to Dec. 15, 2019, he averaged 93.8 trips per week, 39.51 online hours per week and earned a net pay of $1,349.82 from Lyft each week.

During that time, Islam says that he averaged more than 180 trips over a 30 -day period and thus, Lyft did not forcibly log him off the app and he could work as much as he wanted to.

On December 2019, Islam states that he left New York to visit his mother in Bangladesh, who had become seriously ill. When he returned to New York on Jan. 19, 2020, he discovered he was no longer able to access the Lyft app and work his previous schedule. He alleges that, because he did not perform 180 trips in a span of 30 days, Lyft was limiting his access to the app.

The Lyft class action claims that, during this period, he tried to work as much as he previously had, but could only get roughly half as many online hours as he had before, the result of which he earned significantly less take-home pay.

Islam says that, during the first three complete work weeks after being forcible logged off from Lyft, he has averaged only 45.33 trips per week, 19.78 online hours per week and has taken home a net pay of $612.80 per week.

To this day, Islam says he is still subject to Lyft’s policy of logging him off as he has still not been able to log more than 180 hours in 30 days. In addition, his income has declined more due to the COVID-19 pandemic, he argues.

Are you a Lyft driver with a similar experience? Leave a message in the comments section below.

The plaintiff is represented by Zubin Soleimany of New York Taxi Workers Alliance and Jeanne Mirer and Ria Julien of Mirer Mazzocchi & Julien PLLC.

The Lyft Driver Class Action Lawsuit is Islam v. Lyft Inc., Case No. 1:20-cv-03004, in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.

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