HIGHLIGHTS
Uber and Lyft are accused of abruptly halting operations in the city.
law calls for agencies to present 60 days word before “mass layoff.”
both Uber and Lyft declined to remark.
Former Uber technology Inc and Lyft Inc drivers in Austin, Texas, on Thursday accused the experience-hailing organizations of breaking a federal regulation through suddenly halting operations in the city afterelectorate backed a degree requiring them to fingerprint drivers.
The complaints filed in federal court in San Francisco, where the agencies are based totally, said Uber and Lyft violated a regulation that calls for corporations to give 60 days be aware to personnel before a “mass layoff.”
Uber spokesman Matt Kallman declined to comment. Lyft did now not reply to a request for remark.
The organizations suspended offerings in Austin on may nine, two days after residents voted to maintainthe metropolis‘s law requiring Uber and Lyft, just like taxi groups, to conduct fingerprint-based totallyheritage checks of their drivers. about 10,000 Uber and Lyft drivers lost their jobs, Uber said at the time.
The companies consider drivers to be independent contractors, and Thursday’s proceedings are the latestto say they are surely employees below numerous federal and kingdom legal guidelines due to thediploma of manipulate Uber and Lyft exert.
They appeared to be the primary cases in opposition to the agencies introduced under the 1988employee Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) Act, which turned into designed to presentworkers time to alter to the lack of employment.
organizations that violate the law, which includes an exception for “unforeseeable commercial enterprisesituations,” are at the hook for wages and advantages employees could have earned for the duration ofthe 60-day be aware duration.
The proceedings stated the named plaintiffs, who are searching for to represent classes of Uber and Lyft drivers from Austin, were unable to make up for the lack of income.
Drivers around the u . s . a . have sued Uber and Lyft claiming the companies misclassified them asunbiased contractors and deprived them of time beyond regulation pay, pointers, reimbursements andpositive employment protections.
In April, Uber agreed to pay as much as $one hundred million to 350,000 drivers in California and Massachusetts to settle claims that it owed them compensation for fuel and mileage and withheld hints.
Lyft has proposed a $27 million settlement of a comparable case involving California drivers. Federal judges in San Francisco final week held hearings to consider both settlements.
The instances in US District court docket for the Northern District of California are Johnston v. Ubertechnologies Inc, No. three:16-cv-03134, and Thornton v. Lyft Inc, No. three:sixteen-cv-03135.
© Thomson Reuters 2016
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