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I nearly fell off my chair reading that agreement. The scope is unreal. Especially considering the settlement amount is a mere $100. For example, the non-dis

I nearly fell off my chair reading that agreement. The scope is unreal. Especially considering the settlement amount is a mere $100. For example, the non-disparagement clause isn't limited to the incident. You'd have keep any negative opinions about Uber to yourself for the rest of eternity. I thought it was odd that only you were a party to the agreement and not your fiance and then I got to paragraph 5 and realized their request is even crazier... they want you to indemnify, defend, and hold them harmless from any other liabilities that might arise from the incident. If it turned out your fiance contracted a deadly illness from her contact with human waste and she sued Uber (or worse, her insurance company sued Uber for reimbursement) not only would you be on the hook for the damages, you would have to pay all of their legal fees during the process. For a $100 settlement. I have to imagine you are in the small minority of people who even reads these contracts of adhesion so I'd bet most people who sign these have no idea what they're giving up. That is truly unconscionable.

nabla9 8y ago
I suspect that agreements like this don't actually hold in court. They are made just in attempt to intimidate.
- mindslight 8y ago
  In a way this is even worse as it further disenfranchises individuals from the legal system. What's really needed is legislation that assigns direct punitive liability to drafters/pushers of contracts that continue to include outright nonsensical terms. Failing that it would be interesting if someone tried going after the practice as improperly providing incorrect legal advice - its basic goal is to mislead the opposing party into not knowing their own rights.
  - the_watcher 8y ago
    Unfortunately this puts a huge burden on small businesses and individuals, as it requires them to know precisely what is and isn't enforceable in a contract, as they'd no longer be able to rely on templates. For example, the vast majority of leases are templates, and almost all include unenforceable terms. Further, contract law is primarily based in common law, which means a lot of terms that are inserted aren't definitively legal or illegal and it comes down to whether or not they are "reasonable". In this example, almost all of the demands from Uber could be reasonable in an NDA, but are pretty clearly not reasonable in this case. However, when and where terms are reasonable isn't exactly codified anywhere. It's absolutely a problem, but punitive liability on the drafters on contracts just creates a power imbalance somewhere else.
    - mindslight 8y ago
      I do understand how we got to this present condition, but it still does not justify the ongoing harm from the practice. I'm not talking about terms that merely could be at odds or attempt to carve out a narrow exception from prevailing law, but rather wholesale contradiction. Templates aren't a problem, but rather the solution. Landlords are some of the worst offenders, actually. How many tenants have a dispute, read over their lease, and incorrectly think they have no options but to submit? http://www.law.harvard.edu/programs/olin_center/fellows_papers/pdf/Furth_61_revision.pdf http://www.law.harvard.edu/programs/olin_center/fellows_pape...
      - the_watcher 8y ago
        Landlords can suck, but most leases are templates, and are not actually written by the landlord. Putting liability on them means that landlords suddenly are required to have a legal understanding of contract law (which, as I mentioned, is riddled with concepts like "ordinary wear and tear" and "reasonable accommodations" that aren't cut and dried). What that will do is disincentive individuals from going into the rental market, and consolidate the industry further towards those who have the resources to employ lawyers to draft said contracts and take disputes to court.
        mindslight 8y ago
        I've personally seen two terrible ones in recent history, and they were terrible precisely because they weren't standard templates. One was a long-winded attorney-crafted legalese designed to mislead tenants. The other was basically a DIY anti-precedent screed against tenant's rights, that loved to use that word indemnify. I was starting to wonder if that landlord had forgone buying property insurance or what. A "template" supplied by an attorney, Nolo, or Staples is not going to create liability for a landlord. That's a complete red herring. Read the pdf I linked for a classification methodology to grade just how brazenly in conflict some clauses can be.
        samatman 8y ago
        Nonsense, it simply means they switch to templates which don't contain abusive, unenforceable clauses. Lawyers would of course have to draft those templates. But they would rapidly end up being offered for $199 on document-prep websites which sell them already, along with divorce papers and bankruptcy filings.
- wahern 8y ago
  Such an indemnity clause is nearly universal and as a general rule enforceable. Otherwise, what are they paying you $100 for? The person in the best position to know what the damages are is you. Uber doesn't want to pay you $100 just so you can come back later and take another bite at the apple. Imagine if you walked out of a store having paid $10 for some merchandise, only to have the merchant come knocking at your door two weeks later saying that you need to pay another $10. One of the principle purposes of all contracts, and the law generally, is to provide finality. In the case of a settlement, there's little if any finality for the defendant if you don't agree to indemnify. If $100 isn't enough to cover your future risk, then propose amendments (e.g. larger payment, a more explicitly circumscribed indemnity, etc) and if necessary take them to small claims court where you can recover for the immediate harm while preserving your future options. There are general limitations on such clauses, accumulated over hundreds of years of legal evolution which bends, ever so slightly, toward fair outcomes. There's also supplementing legislative protections, typically stylized "consumer protections" when involving the hoi polloi. I wouldn't venture to say whether the indemnity clause would protect Uber if the claimant came down with an STD; it might or it might not, depending on the state, the context, and possibly even the sentiments of a jury. (In the case that it would protect Uber, consider that it's unlikely Uber who smeared the feces, so it's hardly that unfair from a moral standpoint unless there was gross negligence involved, such as the driver knowing the feces was there or Uber knowing that a driver was regularly in such incidents.) What makes arbitration clauses problematic, as opposed to indemnification, is that the Federal Arbitration Act has been reinterpreted (beginning ~75 years after the fact) by a conservative court to foreclose state-based protections regarding fair enforcement of such clauses, and there are few if any federal-based limitations.

nabla9 8y ago

I suspect that agreements like this don't actually hold in court. They are made just in attempt to intimidate.

mindslight 8y ago
In a way this is even worse as it further disenfranchises individuals from the legal system. What's really needed is legislation that assigns direct punitive liability to drafters/pushers of contracts that continue to include outright nonsensical terms. Failing that it would be interesting if someone tried going after the practice as improperly providing incorrect legal advice - its basic goal is to mislead the opposing party into not knowing their own rights.
- the_watcher 8y ago
  Unfortunately this puts a huge burden on small businesses and individuals, as it requires them to know precisely what is and isn't enforceable in a contract, as they'd no longer be able to rely on templates. For example, the vast majority of leases are templates, and almost all include unenforceable terms. Further, contract law is primarily based in common law, which means a lot of terms that are inserted aren't definitively legal or illegal and it comes down to whether or not they are "reasonable". In this example, almost all of the demands from Uber could be reasonable in an NDA, but are pretty clearly not reasonable in this case. However, when and where terms are reasonable isn't exactly codified anywhere. It's absolutely a problem, but punitive liability on the drafters on contracts just creates a power imbalance somewhere else.
  - mindslight 8y ago
    I do understand how we got to this present condition, but it still does not justify the ongoing harm from the practice. I'm not talking about terms that merely could be at odds or attempt to carve out a narrow exception from prevailing law, but rather wholesale contradiction. Templates aren't a problem, but rather the solution. Landlords are some of the worst offenders, actually. How many tenants have a dispute, read over their lease, and incorrectly think they have no options but to submit? http://www.law.harvard.edu/programs/olin_center/fellows_papers/pdf/Furth_61_revision.pdf http://www.law.harvard.edu/programs/olin_center/fellows_pape...
    - the_watcher 8y ago
      Landlords can suck, but most leases are templates, and are not actually written by the landlord. Putting liability on them means that landlords suddenly are required to have a legal understanding of contract law (which, as I mentioned, is riddled with concepts like "ordinary wear and tear" and "reasonable accommodations" that aren't cut and dried). What that will do is disincentive individuals from going into the rental market, and consolidate the industry further towards those who have the resources to employ lawyers to draft said contracts and take disputes to court.
      - mindslight 8y ago
        I've personally seen two terrible ones in recent history, and they were terrible precisely because they weren't standard templates. One was a long-winded attorney-crafted legalese designed to mislead tenants. The other was basically a DIY anti-precedent screed against tenant's rights, that loved to use that word indemnify. I was starting to wonder if that landlord had forgone buying property insurance or what. A "template" supplied by an attorney, Nolo, or Staples is not going to create liability for a landlord. That's a complete red herring. Read the pdf I linked for a classification methodology to grade just how brazenly in conflict some clauses can be.
      - samatman 8y ago
        Nonsense, it simply means they switch to templates which don't contain abusive, unenforceable clauses. Lawyers would of course have to draft those templates. But they would rapidly end up being offered for $199 on document-prep websites which sell them already, along with divorce papers and bankruptcy filings.
wahern 8y ago
Such an indemnity clause is nearly universal and as a general rule enforceable. Otherwise, what are they paying you $100 for? The person in the best position to know what the damages are is you. Uber doesn't want to pay you $100 just so you can come back later and take another bite at the apple. Imagine if you walked out of a store having paid $10 for some merchandise, only to have the merchant come knocking at your door two weeks later saying that you need to pay another $10. One of the principle purposes of all contracts, and the law generally, is to provide finality. In the case of a settlement, there's little if any finality for the defendant if you don't agree to indemnify. If $100 isn't enough to cover your future risk, then propose amendments (e.g. larger payment, a more explicitly circumscribed indemnity, etc) and if necessary take them to small claims court where you can recover for the immediate harm while preserving your future options. There are general limitations on such clauses, accumulated over hundreds of years of legal evolution which bends, ever so slightly, toward fair outcomes. There's also supplementing legislative protections, typically stylized "consumer protections" when involving the hoi polloi. I wouldn't venture to say whether the indemnity clause would protect Uber if the claimant came down with an STD; it might or it might not, depending on the state, the context, and possibly even the sentiments of a jury. (In the case that it would protect Uber, consider that it's unlikely Uber who smeared the feces, so it's hardly that unfair from a moral standpoint unless there was gross negligence involved, such as the driver knowing the feces was there or Uber knowing that a driver was regularly in such incidents.) What makes arbitration clauses problematic, as opposed to indemnification, is that the Federal Arbitration Act has been reinterpreted (beginning ~75 years after the fact) by a conservative court to foreclose state-based protections regarding fair enforcement of such clauses, and there are few if any federal-based limitations.