8 ms·

Why shouldn't they have the option to reject the ride? What if they're allergic, or deathly afraid of dogs? I have a friend like that. Anything bigger than a ch

Why shouldn't they have the option to reject the ride? What if they're allergic, or deathly afraid of dogs? I have a friend like that. Anything bigger than a chihuahua and she'd probably flee the vehicle before driving it anywhere. Being able to reject work you can't handle seems like the one silver lining of being "independent contractors".

jedberg 6y ago
Then they shouldn't be in the rideshare business. Or any job that requires direct contact with customers. If you work in retail you don't have the choice to avoid someone with a service dog either. It's just easier to ask your coworker to take over for you.
- slig 6y ago
  Most people in the "rideshare business" are working there because they don't have a better alternative.
  - jedberg 6y ago
    I mean, I sympathize with them, but that's no excuse. If you can't stand blood you don't become a janitor at a hospital. If you can't stand raw meat you don't become a janitor at butcher shop. There are other ways to drive a car for money that don't involve interacting with people and their possible service animals.
  - mcguire 6y ago
    If they are physically unable to work in the "rideshare business", however....
Pfhreak 6y ago
Because service animals are protected under the ADA. If folks could unilaterally reject working around service animals, we'd put the folks most at need at a significant detriment. If you work in a customer facing capacity, you should be prepared to encounter service animals, full stop.
- treis 6y ago
  It's not that simple. Allergies are disabilities too and they shouldn't be excluded from entire industries. Employers have to provide reasonable accomodations for employees with allergies
  - Pfhreak 6y ago
    It really is that simple. If you have allergies, you can ask your employer for reasonable accommodations. But you should anticipate that you have to come into contact with a service dog periodically. Most employers understand this, and will figure out how to make it work (ensuring there is someone else available/on shift, etc.) If you are an Uber driver, Uber is not your employer (though they should be, imo). Prop 28 was about issues like this, but now we're expecting drivers to understand and comply with ADA regulations as individuals rather than at the corporate level.
  - hluska 6y ago
    It is! If you have severe enough allergies to count as a disability, you should ask your employer for reasonable accommodations, be prepared to provide medical documentation if they’re not obvious and win your own suit like this if you don’t receive those accommodations. The ADA is really quite amazing.
shagie 6y ago
That is an issue for uber to work on dealing with - it is not an issue for the person with the disability that needs the service animal. https://www.ada.gov/service_animals_2010.htm https://www.ada.gov/service_animals_2010.htm > Allergies and fear of dogs are not valid reasons for denying access or refusing service to people using service animals. When a person who is allergic to dog dander and a person who uses a service animal must spend time in the same room or facility, for example, in a school classroom or at a homeless shelter, they both should be accommodated by assigning them, if possible, to different locations within the room or different rooms in the facility. Being an "independent contractor" doesn't absolve someone from the ADA.
- aksss 6y ago
  How does the analogy of different rooms translate to vehicles? A different vehicle?
  - shagie 6y ago
    If the driver is unable to handle the service for a reason related to the disability (e.g. wheelchair, service animal), they need to make the appropriate accommodations. In this case, it would probably be to have Uber dispatch another driver who is able to provide the service. That's how it works for traditional taxi companies. Uber and Lyft, not being "traditional" taxi companies doesn't exempt them from needing to follow the same rules. https://www.thetransportationalliance.org/news/adanotice.pdf https://www.thetransportationalliance.org/news/adanotice.pdf
  - ncallaway 6y ago
    Uber could assign a different vehicle to pick up the passenger's that need to transport a service animal, so long as it doesn't significantly impact their service times. A reasonable accommodation could be that driver's with significant animal allergies don't need to pick up passenger's with dogs. If a significant portion of their driver fleet has significant animal allergies, such that it would significantly negatively impact the response time for passenger's that need dogs, Uber would need to find a different reasonable accommodation.
bonzini 6y ago
> What if they're allergic, or deathly afraid of dogs? If they're afraid of dogs they shouldn't drive unknown people for a living, just like someone who's deathly afraid of blood probably won't be a surgeon. Allergy could be handled by Uber, who should be provided by the driver with a medical certification of the allergy and shouldn't even show that car to the blind customer (if the ADA allows that). I think the driver shouldn't be able to see that the customer has a service dog, but I agree that they should get a compensation from Uber for doing that ride.
- Miner49er 6y ago
  > Allergy could be handled by Uber, who should be provided by the driver with a medical certification of the allergy and shouldn't even show that car to the blind customer. IANAL, but I don't think it is that simple. Small towns sometimes only have one driver at a time. If there's one driver, they _have_ to take a service animal, by law. Allergy or fear of dogs is not good enough. Admittedly the liability for the driver denying anyway wouldn't be on the driver, it would be on Uber, but I doubt they want to be paying $1 million every time this happens.
  - fuzzer37 6y ago
    > Allergy or fear of dogs is not good enough. I'm interested in this part. This seems to be counterintuitive. Is a waiter with a really bad peanut allergy required to serve a guest a dish with peanuts in it? Why does the clients (legitimate) health concerns override the drivers (also legitimate) health issues?
    - Miner49er 6y ago
      Well, I think the ADA only applies to businesses with more then 15 employees. The idea is that if you have a business that large, even if one person has a problem with dogs, not all 15 (or more) will, so you should be able to accommodate and provide service. So in your example, the business should have a different waiter/waitress provide service.
kube-system 6y ago
You can’t reject work for reasons that are illegal.
- Causality1 6y ago
  Don't know about the US but in the UK the Equality Act of 2010 allows drivers with documented allergies to refuse rides to service animals.
  - ehmmmmmmmm 6y ago
    This is good. PTSD should be added to that as well. Dogs send me into panic and it would be a bad idea for the law to force me to drive against it. I mean, I would because it's the law, and as a result, you would be in danger.
    - zachrip 6y ago
      Couldn't this result in anyone just abusing this system when they don't want to drive with service dogs in the car?
      - LocalH 6y ago
        IMO that's not a valid reason to ignore deep-seated fears of others.
        pessimizer 6y ago
        What if I'm afraid of homosexuals or black people?
        ehmmmmmmmm 6y ago
        I don't think that's funny or a valid comparison. Dogs aren't even the same species. It's not immoral to be afraid of them and having PTSD because of negative interactions with a particular predatory canine species is very normal. Hopefully service robots won't be very far into the future. I don't want to discriminate against blind people. But I really don't think there is a problem with not being okay around a particular set of non-human species (alligators, hornets, lions, coyotes, dogs, bears, mosquitoes, ...)
Bedon292 6y ago
Seems rather simple: Let drivers with allergies put that in their profile. Let riders put that they have a service animal in. And the system just doesn't pair them together. And now that the system knows someone has a service animal you can automatically review any cancelations by the driver and look for problems. I am actually kind of surprised that there isn't some review system already in place when a driver ends a trip early on someone. Unless the rider changes the destination, how can the driver not drop them off at the agreed upon location without getting flagged somehow? Could even in rare cases, if there are absolutely no drivers without allergies around, offer them a bonus to take the rider anyways.
- jdavis703 6y ago
  I noticed a trend where lots of Uber drivers marked themselves as deaf, but really just didn’t communicate in English fluently. I would imagine drivers would similarly claim to be allergic to get around having to transport service animals.
- dnautics 6y ago
  In big metros, Uber and Lyft could just have on-call backup drivers that are specifically employees who are there to handle this situation. If the metro is not "big enough to warrant it", then Uber and Lyft shouldn't be there.
- jonfw 6y ago
  What's the incentive for a driver not to mark that they have allergies? You're essentially just giving them a checkbox "I don't want to deal with people who have service animals"
  - Bedon292 6y ago
    As long as it is not a large enough percentage of drivers to significantly affect the service times of those riders, does it actually matter? I mean, morally I don't think they should. However, those are probably more likely to be the people who were going to cause problems like this article talks about anyways. So it would still probably result in better experience for everyone. If 99% of drivers check that box, and it affects service times, then they will have to come up with some other option to accommodate the drivers. Prove the allergies or something, since some of them are certainly lying with prevalence being 10-20% in the US. And it would have to be a best effort, the rider with a true service animal is legally protected and a driver with allergies or fear is not a legal reason to reject service altogether.
elliekelly 6y ago
For every dog lover falsely claiming their pet is an “emotional support animal” in order to get special treatment there is a dog disliker falsely claiming (or perhaps grossly exaggerating) “allergies” and the result for both is the same: no one believes someone actually has a support dog and no one believes someone actually has severe dog allergies. If everyone was truthful and didn’t seek special treatment both situations would be rare, easily handled, and a complete non-issue entirely unworthy of discussion.
Trias11 6y ago
It's part of the work. Not all customers are happy, clean 5-star big tippers. Certain percentage of customers are people with disabilities, drunk, with dogs and whatnot. That's part of a job to spend occasional extra minutes per certain percentage of customers. I agree that sometime (but not always) UBER needs to compensate driver for this and charge customer extra. You cannot be UBER driver who is allergic to slow moving or non-tipping customers and refuse your service for them.
ska 6y ago
> the one silver lining of being "independent contractors". It should be fairly obvious why employment contracts cannot be allowed to construct an end run around legislation like the ADA (or worker safety, etc.).

jedberg 6y ago

Then they shouldn't be in the rideshare business. Or any job that requires direct contact with customers. If you work in retail you don't have the choice to avoid someone with a service dog either. It's just easier to ask your coworker to take over for you.

slig 6y ago
Most people in the "rideshare business" are working there because they don't have a better alternative.
- jedberg 6y ago
  I mean, I sympathize with them, but that's no excuse. If you can't stand blood you don't become a janitor at a hospital. If you can't stand raw meat you don't become a janitor at butcher shop. There are other ways to drive a car for money that don't involve interacting with people and their possible service animals.
- mcguire 6y ago
  If they are physically unable to work in the "rideshare business", however....

Pfhreak 6y ago

Because service animals are protected under the ADA. If folks could unilaterally reject working around service animals, we'd put the folks most at need at a significant detriment. If you work in a customer facing capacity, you should be prepared to encounter service animals, full stop.

treis 6y ago
It's not that simple. Allergies are disabilities too and they shouldn't be excluded from entire industries. Employers have to provide reasonable accomodations for employees with allergies
- Pfhreak 6y ago
  It really is that simple. If you have allergies, you can ask your employer for reasonable accommodations. But you should anticipate that you have to come into contact with a service dog periodically. Most employers understand this, and will figure out how to make it work (ensuring there is someone else available/on shift, etc.) If you are an Uber driver, Uber is not your employer (though they should be, imo). Prop 28 was about issues like this, but now we're expecting drivers to understand and comply with ADA regulations as individuals rather than at the corporate level.
- hluska 6y ago
  It is! If you have severe enough allergies to count as a disability, you should ask your employer for reasonable accommodations, be prepared to provide medical documentation if they’re not obvious and win your own suit like this if you don’t receive those accommodations. The ADA is really quite amazing.

shagie 6y ago

That is an issue for uber to work on dealing with - it is not an issue for the person with the disability that needs the service animal. https://www.ada.gov/service_animals_2010.htm https://www.ada.gov/service_animals_2010.htm > Allergies and fear of dogs are not valid reasons for denying access or refusing service to people using service animals. When a person who is allergic to dog dander and a person who uses a service animal must spend time in the same room or facility, for example, in a school classroom or at a homeless shelter, they both should be accommodated by assigning them, if possible, to different locations within the room or different rooms in the facility. Being an "independent contractor" doesn't absolve someone from the ADA.

aksss 6y ago
How does the analogy of different rooms translate to vehicles? A different vehicle?
- shagie 6y ago
  If the driver is unable to handle the service for a reason related to the disability (e.g. wheelchair, service animal), they need to make the appropriate accommodations. In this case, it would probably be to have Uber dispatch another driver who is able to provide the service. That's how it works for traditional taxi companies. Uber and Lyft, not being "traditional" taxi companies doesn't exempt them from needing to follow the same rules. https://www.thetransportationalliance.org/news/adanotice.pdf https://www.thetransportationalliance.org/news/adanotice.pdf
- ncallaway 6y ago
  Uber could assign a different vehicle to pick up the passenger's that need to transport a service animal, so long as it doesn't significantly impact their service times. A reasonable accommodation could be that driver's with significant animal allergies don't need to pick up passenger's with dogs. If a significant portion of their driver fleet has significant animal allergies, such that it would significantly negatively impact the response time for passenger's that need dogs, Uber would need to find a different reasonable accommodation.

bonzini 6y ago

> What if they're allergic, or deathly afraid of dogs? If they're afraid of dogs they shouldn't drive unknown people for a living, just like someone who's deathly afraid of blood probably won't be a surgeon. Allergy could be handled by Uber, who should be provided by the driver with a medical certification of the allergy and shouldn't even show that car to the blind customer (if the ADA allows that). I think the driver shouldn't be able to see that the customer has a service dog, but I agree that they should get a compensation from Uber for doing that ride.

Miner49er 6y ago
> Allergy could be handled by Uber, who should be provided by the driver with a medical certification of the allergy and shouldn't even show that car to the blind customer. IANAL, but I don't think it is that simple. Small towns sometimes only have one driver at a time. If there's one driver, they _have_ to take a service animal, by law. Allergy or fear of dogs is not good enough. Admittedly the liability for the driver denying anyway wouldn't be on the driver, it would be on Uber, but I doubt they want to be paying $1 million every time this happens.
- fuzzer37 6y ago
  > Allergy or fear of dogs is not good enough. I'm interested in this part. This seems to be counterintuitive. Is a waiter with a really bad peanut allergy required to serve a guest a dish with peanuts in it? Why does the clients (legitimate) health concerns override the drivers (also legitimate) health issues?
  - Miner49er 6y ago
    Well, I think the ADA only applies to businesses with more then 15 employees. The idea is that if you have a business that large, even if one person has a problem with dogs, not all 15 (or more) will, so you should be able to accommodate and provide service. So in your example, the business should have a different waiter/waitress provide service.

kube-system 6y ago

You can’t reject work for reasons that are illegal.

Causality1 6y ago
Don't know about the US but in the UK the Equality Act of 2010 allows drivers with documented allergies to refuse rides to service animals.
- ehmmmmmmmm 6y ago
  This is good. PTSD should be added to that as well. Dogs send me into panic and it would be a bad idea for the law to force me to drive against it. I mean, I would because it's the law, and as a result, you would be in danger.
  - zachrip 6y ago
    Couldn't this result in anyone just abusing this system when they don't want to drive with service dogs in the car?
    - LocalH 6y ago
      IMO that's not a valid reason to ignore deep-seated fears of others.
      - pessimizer 6y ago
        What if I'm afraid of homosexuals or black people?
        ehmmmmmmmm 6y ago
        I don't think that's funny or a valid comparison. Dogs aren't even the same species. It's not immoral to be afraid of them and having PTSD because of negative interactions with a particular predatory canine species is very normal. Hopefully service robots won't be very far into the future. I don't want to discriminate against blind people. But I really don't think there is a problem with not being okay around a particular set of non-human species (alligators, hornets, lions, coyotes, dogs, bears, mosquitoes, ...)

Bedon292 6y ago

Seems rather simple: Let drivers with allergies put that in their profile. Let riders put that they have a service animal in. And the system just doesn't pair them together. And now that the system knows someone has a service animal you can automatically review any cancelations by the driver and look for problems. I am actually kind of surprised that there isn't some review system already in place when a driver ends a trip early on someone. Unless the rider changes the destination, how can the driver not drop them off at the agreed upon location without getting flagged somehow? Could even in rare cases, if there are absolutely no drivers without allergies around, offer them a bonus to take the rider anyways.

jdavis703 6y ago
I noticed a trend where lots of Uber drivers marked themselves as deaf, but really just didn’t communicate in English fluently. I would imagine drivers would similarly claim to be allergic to get around having to transport service animals.
dnautics 6y ago
In big metros, Uber and Lyft could just have on-call backup drivers that are specifically employees who are there to handle this situation. If the metro is not "big enough to warrant it", then Uber and Lyft shouldn't be there.
jonfw 6y ago
What's the incentive for a driver not to mark that they have allergies? You're essentially just giving them a checkbox "I don't want to deal with people who have service animals"
- Bedon292 6y ago
  As long as it is not a large enough percentage of drivers to significantly affect the service times of those riders, does it actually matter? I mean, morally I don't think they should. However, those are probably more likely to be the people who were going to cause problems like this article talks about anyways. So it would still probably result in better experience for everyone. If 99% of drivers check that box, and it affects service times, then they will have to come up with some other option to accommodate the drivers. Prove the allergies or something, since some of them are certainly lying with prevalence being 10-20% in the US. And it would have to be a best effort, the rider with a true service animal is legally protected and a driver with allergies or fear is not a legal reason to reject service altogether.

elliekelly 6y ago

For every dog lover falsely claiming their pet is an “emotional support animal” in order to get special treatment there is a dog disliker falsely claiming (or perhaps grossly exaggerating) “allergies” and the result for both is the same: no one believes someone actually has a support dog and no one believes someone actually has severe dog allergies. If everyone was truthful and didn’t seek special treatment both situations would be rare, easily handled, and a complete non-issue entirely unworthy of discussion.

Trias11 6y ago

It's part of the work. Not all customers are happy, clean 5-star big tippers. Certain percentage of customers are people with disabilities, drunk, with dogs and whatnot. That's part of a job to spend occasional extra minutes per certain percentage of customers. I agree that sometime (but not always) UBER needs to compensate driver for this and charge customer extra. You cannot be UBER driver who is allergic to slow moving or non-tipping customers and refuse your service for them.

ska 6y ago

> the one silver lining of being "independent contractors". It should be fairly obvious why employment contracts cannot be allowed to construct an end run around legislation like the ADA (or worker safety, etc.).