LONDON (AP) – Uber is giving its UK drivers the minimum wage, pensions and holiday pay, following a recent court ruling saying they should be classified as workers and entitled to such benefits.
The giant’s announcement comes on Tuesday after he lost an appeal to the British Supreme Court last year after a long-running court battle. The court’s ruling has wider implications for the country’s gig economy.
Uber said it would immediately extend the benefits to its more than 70,000 drivers in the UK. Managers will earn at least the minimum wage, which is currently $ 12.12 (£ 8.12), after accepting a travel request and expenses, and will still be able to earn more.
Managers also receive holiday pay equal to about 12% of their earnings, which is paid every two weeks. And they will be enrolled for a pension plan to which they as well as the company will pay.
“This is an important day for drivers in the UK,” Jamie Heywood, Uber’s local general manager for Northern and Eastern Europe, told the SEC in a statement.. He noted that managers will still be able to work on a flexible basis. “Uber is just one part of a larger private rental industry, and we hope that all other entrepreneurs will improve the quality of work for these important workers who are an essential part of our daily lives.”
The executives who filed the case welcomed the news, but said it was not enough.
Uber “came to the table with this offer a day late and a dollar too short, literally,” James Farrar and Yaseen Aslam of the App Drivers And Couriers Union said in a statement. They said the changes stopped without the Supreme Court ruling that the payment should be calculated from the drivers who sign in to the app until they sign out. And they said the company could not itself decide the cost base for calculating the minimum wage, which should be based on a collective agreement.
Farrar and Aslam took their case to a labor court, which ruled that managers are not independent contractors, but that they must be workers, which according to British law means that their working conditions are more comfortable than employees, but still have benefits. Uber lost two rounds of appeal before the Supreme Court ruling.
Providing more benefits for its drivers is likely to increase costs for Uber in San Francisco, which has struggled to make a profit and has previously experienced problems in London, where authorities wanted to revoke its license. However, he said he would not adjust his profit forecast for the year.
The move in the UK contrasts with the result of a November vote in California, where voters adopted an initiative that would release the app-based ride and service delivery services to classify their managers as employees instead of contractors.
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