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Uber Loses London Licence

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22 September 2017

By Alex Khalil

Uber, under Transport for London’s decision, will not be getting a new private hire licence. TfL has said the app is not fit nor proper to hold a London private hire operator licence. The decision was made due to concerns about ‘public safety and security implications’.

Uber has said it will appeal against this decision, saying that this move was ‘far from being open’ and that ‘London is closed to innovative companies’. An estimated 3.5 million people use Uber, with 40,000 drivers signed up to the service.

Uber said that Transport for London had ‘caved into a small number of people who want to restrict consumer choice’. The general manager of Uber in London Tom Elvidge said:

“To defend the livelihoods of all those drivers, and the consumer choice of millions of Londoners who use our app, we intend to immediately challenge this in the courts.”

I can’t believe I’m saying this, but it would be quicker to get the Tube.

However, while this is a full-time job for some, we’ve all heard of plenty of horror stories from Uber, about drivers taking advantage of their customers, or deliberately driving a certain route to make more money. The company has become notorious when dealing with complaints, as there is no direct way to penalise drivers. You can only leave bad reviews.

There have also been arguments made that the number of Uber cars contributes to London’s traffic problems and does not do enough to regulate its drivers.

Uber was created in 2010 in San Francisco and was then granted a five-year private hire licence to operate in London, but there are currently talks of banning the app altogether.

The future of the service is unsure.

 

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