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Uber arbitration award over Emily Normandin-Parker’s death
- enahs-sf 12d agoSo Uber ToS requires you to accept arbitration, then, when they are found responsible for damages, they still don’t want to pay. Seems pretty shitty for the consumer.
- waiwai933 12d agoI don't think there's anything to suggest Uber refused to pay the arbitration award? They just stated that they disagreed with the outcome. (Which is not to say there's not plenty to dislike about this whole case, including the fact it's forced arbitration...)
- nutjob2 12d agoIn that case why is there a "settlement agreement" mentioned that has a $10M penalty for disparagement? Not sure what that refers to exactly but how can Uber (try to) dictate terms in the settlement? It does seem they're trying to get out of it somehow.
- asdfaoeu 12d agoIt sounds like they didn't agree to that but anyone can propose a settlement.
- nutjob2 12d agoReally? Isn't the arbitration binding and therefore the end of the matter?
- waiwai933 12d agoLooking at a filing by Uber (https://www.panish.law/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/Uber-Technologies-Motion-for-Protective-Order.pdf https://www.panish.law/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/Uber-Techn...), and in particular Exhibit 8, the ADR award is confirmed by a settlement agreement (and if no agreement is come to, then a civil action would confirm the terms of the award). There was a dispute about whether the amount awarded was confidential or not (Uber contended it was; plaintiff contended it wasn't), but on the face of it, had plaintiff agreed to the confidentiality and non-disparagement clauses, Uber would have paid up. I suppose it could be argued that Uber were trying to write in clauses they knew plaintiff wouldn't agree to, but it's not obvious to me that a different plaintiff wouldn't have agreed to confidentiality and non-disparagement. (FWIW, it's not clear to me whether Uber have now in fact paid up; they made a statement to the Guardian that _suggests_ they have, but the fact that they didn't explicitly say so means I wouldn't want to draw that inference)
- TZubiri 12d agoI mean both are right, they made a bullshit filing about something being confidential, in order to negotiate a confidentiality settlement against it. It's minor, but they are not accepting the award as-is, they are still trying to negotiating, albeit in a minor way, not by contesting the amount, but a confidentiality clause. They love to negotiate confidentiality clauses, there's few cases without it, including a case by Mike Rafi's personal injury firm which resulted from an omission by Uber (and later Uber being much more anal about confidentiality). I think it's a strategy to avoid case law catching on.
- onlypassingthru 12d agoIt's a strategy to prevent other arbitrators from recognizing what a death is worth. Now everybody can google the case and adjust payouts accordingly.
- deleted 12d ago[deleted]
- enahs-sf 12d agoMoreso it’s them whining about losing when and trying to add a non-disparagement clause at $10m per event to the settlement for even factual information relating to the case. Uber were the ones who forced arbitration ostensibly because it often lowers their overall legal and damages bills.
- itopaloglu83 12d agoForced arbitration is creating a parallel legal system where certain companies are excluded from the consequences of their own actions. One might even say they’re becoming a protected class even.
- mchusma 12d agoI have been on both sides of arbitration, winning and losing. It’s much better. Basically legislation done right (for civil matters). The only people who really win from traditional legislation are lawyers (and plaintiffs counsel who use the long expensive process to blackmail people - which is 90% of civil cases)
- z3ugma 12d agoDid you mean "litigation" rather than "legislation" ?
- eru 12d agoI thought legislation made a lot of sense: If you had better laws, arbitration wouldn't be as necessary.
- bickfordb 12d agoArbitration can be more efficient, but both parties should have an option to choose it, a direct settlement or public court. The average consumer is denied the choice by using these everyday services that have non-negotiable contracts.
- PunchyHamster 12d agoNone of the parties should have option to choose it, it should be within govt. justice system, just have arbitration court
- nickff 12d ago
- traceroute66 12d ago> Uber ToS requires you to accept arbitration First to be clear, I am speaking in general terms. I know nothing about this case, I don't want to know anything about this case, but I have just scrolled through people's thoughts on arbitration here and thought I should offer a general alternative perspective. To be clear I'm not interested in blindly defending Uber either. So here goes... Arbitration clauses will be found pretty much everywhere. They come under the auspice of Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) of which the top-three ways are: mediation, arbitration and ombudsmen. The whole point of ADR is that: 1. there are only so many courts in a given jurisdiction and there are only so many judges in any jurisdiction, and both courts and judges tend to have large backlogs. 2. added to which going to court is expensive and time consuming. And if the other side has deep pockets and you loose, you end up paying the hourly rates of very expensive lawyers in smart shoes that the opposition employed because 600+/hour/person is peanuts to them. So that's where ADR comes in. Its more informal, its cheaper to do and the costs side if you loose are kept under control. Because ADR is an informal environment, this can also work in your favour. The timetable and parameters are flexible and the final agreement reached can easily be better than whatever a judge might have handed down after listening to both side's lawyers bicker. Of course, in most jurisdictions nothing stops you from going to court first if you like. But most modern-thinking judges tend to take a dim view if you turn up in front of them without having given some sort of ADR a go first. Is it perfect, of course not. But neither are the courts. Your outcome in court is effectively dependent on both side's lawyers and what judge you get, so you having a better outcome in court is not necessarily guaranteed !
- malfist 12d agoWe all know the talking points from big corporations about why they force everyone into arbitration out of the goodness of their hearts. We don't need it regurgitated as if it's the truth.
- traceroute66 12d ago> big corporations about why they force everyone into arbitration out of the goodness of their hearts. We don't need it regurgitated as if it's the truth. Its not a regurgitation. Its the facts. It applies to small businesses too. A mom and pop shop will (or should !) also have ADR clauses in its contracts. And the court will certainly take a very dim view if you try to sue a mom and pop shop without having tried ADR.
- dataflow 12d agoVideo from Louis Rossmann: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2B3uBQuGnU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2B3uBQuGnU
- lysace 12d agoNo. Just no. We don't need monetized influencers pontificating and building fandoms on this. That is gross.
- cube00 12d agoLouis founded the Consumer Rights wiki and also wrote the article that's the subject of this NH thread.
- ixwt 12d agoLouis Rossman does not take sponsorships, and turns off ads for his videos as much as YouTube allows. His videos are for his opinions, not making money.
- Hugsbox 12d agoMr Rossman will literally tell you to use an ad-blocker to watch his videos and refuses to take sponsorships, actively does not want money from making YouTube videos and just wants to get the word out. I'd agree with you if it was literally any other creator.
- kskdkwkdkkd 12d agoTwo things can be true at once, especially when talking about people’s behaviour. I don’t know this guy from atom, but if he’s a YouTuber then my instinct is to not trust him.
- dataflow 12d agoYour instinct is, believe it or not, imperfect.
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- oceansky 12d agoGood outcome, but forced arbitration should still be illegal.
- mchusma 12d agoIf you have been through both processes, you would more likely say the traditional civil process should be illegal.
- hilariously 12d agoNo, you would say it needs to be reformed and funded, we have an extremely legalistic society that allows endless delaying and does not fund its core services very well.
- anonymars 12d ago> extremely legalistic society Food for thought (not specifically relevant to this case): I wonder how much would go away if the US had universal healthcare, or to put it another way, how much of its legal system is spent figuring out who pays for medical treatment
- TZubiri 12d agoWhat's the line? If 2 brothers sign a contract, can't they decide their father will be the judge if disputes arise? If there's a sports match, shouldn't the sports arbiter be able to decide whether some team scored a goal or not? These are all valid civil contracts. It only affects the civil claims, never criminal, and the venue for disputing the arbitration clause (if you believe arbitration wasn't legal to begin with) are the public courts anyways, who will delegate or not to the private court. Almost all countries recognize it and it has a quite defensible theory.
- morder 12d agoi think the keyword is "forced". there's very little now that the consumer can do because it seems everything requires arbitration now and people still have to operate in society.
- ChrisArchitect 12d ago[dupe] Discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49761654 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49761654
- deleted 12d ago[deleted]
- jacquesm 12d agoAll these companies are universally sleazy and refuse to take responsibility, no matter what. It's pretty much par for the course: deny you are responsible, try to control the court case in such a way that you inflict even more suffering on the victims and their families and ultimately, even if you're found to be in the wrong do everything to stall payment until each and every legal avenue to do so is exhausted.
- deleted 12d ago[deleted]
- calibas 12d ago> Stone rejected Uber's argument that it is "merely a technology company" connecting riders with drivers, finding that Uber provides transportation services to the public through its app, sets prices and controls key aspects of the rider experience. > The arbitrator also rejected Uber's argument that Proposition 22 -- a California ballot measure approved by voters in 2020 that allows companies to classify app-based drivers as independent contractors instead of employees -- prevented the company from being held liable for Tran's conduct. The dream of every major tech company, making ridiculous profits while taking zero legal responsibility for what you create...
- xhkkffbf 12d agoThe bad guy here is the driver. Could Uber have done more? That's what the arbitrators concluded. But the reality is that this is a victory for the driverless cars (Waymo, Tesla, etc.). If you want to force Uber to take responsibility for the driver, the simplest thing is to get rid of the driver.
- applfanboysbgon 12d agoDo you expect that Waymo will not take responsibility for the driverless car?
- pixl97 12d agoThere was no world in which driverless cars weren't the eventual outcome anyway. And, it's not exactly taking responsibility for the driver. It's taking responsibility for the safety of the passenger using their service. This is a different thing. Driverless cars still can't allow their passengers to get injured and killed which is going to present a lot of technical and social challenges for these companies. They all thought that playing a word game would get them out of the difficult problems all transportation companies have to solve and be liable for.
- jlongr 12d agoThere's this prevailing narrative that someday self-driving cars will eliminate all human-controlled driving and that these types of stories are like milestones in the path to that future utopia. But I don't think that's the case anymore than the narrative that LLMs will eventually displace all software engineers.
- cmiles8 12d agoSo Uber took this into forced arbitration to avoid the courts and then the arbitration blew up in their face. Sorry, but there’s some strong schadenfreude there.
- throwaway85825 12d agoThey'll select a more favorable arbitrator next time.
- Glyptodon 12d agoArbitration has no particular basis in law so much as agreeing that a third party reaches some conclusion to resolve a civil dispute, though the law may be used to justify the conclusion, the conclusion is binding regardless, so as to make it so there's no appeals, etc., right? So by participating in the arbitration it means there's only the conclusion and no basis to object or appeal, right?
- advisedwang 12d agoFederal law [1] and at least one state [2] provide routes for appeal to real courts. [1] https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/9/16 https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/9/16 [2] https://app.leg.wa.gov/RCW/default.aspx?cite=7.06.050 https://app.leg.wa.gov/RCW/default.aspx?cite=7.06.050
- cube00 12d agoAnother frustrating aspect of forced arbitration is Uber can now avoid ever using that arbitrator ever again.
- kridsdale1 12d agoPeople do that with judges too. It’s why all mp3 sharing lawsuits were in the same district of Texas.
- tzs 12d agoThe MP3 lawsuits were filed in the districts in which the defendants resided. Almost all of the 94 districts had MP3 sharing lawsuits. You are probably thinking of patents. For a long time the Eastern District of Texas (EDTX) was by far the most popular choice for patent lawsuits by far, especially against big tech companies. Then there was a Supreme Court decision (TC Heartland LLC v. Kraft Foods Group Brands LLC, 581 U.S. 258 (2017)) [1]. It made it so corporations can only be sued for patent infringement in the state where they are incorporated or a district where they have both infringed and have a regular and established place of business. EDTX is largely a rural district with no really major cities. Most big tech companies have no physical offices there. Many of those cases moved to the Western District of Texas (WDTX). WDTX includes Austin, and a whole lot of big tech has offices there. There was one judge in Waco whose court was particularly attractive to patent lawsuits, due to having plaintiff-friendly procedures and a rapid trial schedule. 100% of patent cases filed in Waco went to him. In a few years his court was handling 20% of all patents cases in the entire country. The Supreme Court and Congress did not like so many patent cases being handled by a single judge, and the WDTX Chief Judge making it so patent cases filed in WDTX are random distributed among its 13 judges. Cases against big tech companies mostly moved to Delaware (where many big tech companies are incorporated) or Northern California. EDTX regained the number one spot for patent cases after that, although not from big tech cases. Delaware and Northern California remain the big places for those. EDTX is #1 because even though it is rural and has almost no big tech presence, it still has major retailers, grocery chains, distribution centers, and communication hubs. For patent suits not against big tech it still works fine. Also, Heartland did not apply to international defendants. They can still be sued in any district in the US. The biggest reason EDTX is a popular choice if you can pick it is not plaintiffs do particularly well there. It depends on when you look because it has varied quite a bit, but there are often other districts where plaintiffs win more. The big reasons are: • Patent litigation is complex, both for the court and the attorneys. Regardless of which side of the case is on you want a court with experience. If the court is inexperienced the case can drag on which is expensive, burning up lots of billable hours of the expensive patent litigation firm you are using. EDTX has many patent experienced judges, and has developed rules and procedures to move cases along. • In addition to cases moving along efficiently once they get going, the get going faster in EDTX. Patent suits are civil cases. They take a back seat to criminal cases. EDTX simply does not have much federal crime (or state crime that ends up in federal district courts). [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TC_Heartland_LLC_v._Kraft_Foods_Group_Brands_LLC https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TC_Heartland_LLC_v._Kraft_Food...
- excerionsforte 12d agoImagine how this could've gone if Uber had used its tracking and vast knowledge of roadways to know to follow up with riders on a cancelled ride on the highway or even deny drivers the right to cancel the trip on the highway because that is unsafe. Could've prevented all this, have they learned from this case to prevent future incidents?
- cube00 12d agoIf the driver wants you out, being unable to cancel the trip on the app won't stop them throwing you out.
- MrWiffles 12d agoSo wait. There’s a literal DEATH involved here and it still went to arbitration?!
- randyrand 12d agoThe driver that actually killed them wasn't part of this arbitration. This is arbitrating the lead up.
- kibwen 12d agoPreviously: "Disney says man can't sue over wife's death because he agreed to Disney+ terms of service" https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/disney-says-man-cant-sue-wifes-death-agreed-disney-terms-service-rcna166594 https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/disney-says-man-cant-su...
- lacoolj 12d agoThis is what happens when every single company we have an app for forces us to re-agree to new TOC (most this year, but last year too). Go check your e-mail - look at all the TOC agreements you had to make recently. How many added a new (or amended an existing) arbitration clause? Too many. And consumers are stuck either agreeing blindly/under duress, or uninstalling the app? These are apps we use and rely on, and don't have enough competition to refuse. Lyft and Uber. Name one other competitor in the app space. Without googling it Rant over (it wasn't even a rant at the beginning but couldn't help myself)
- randyrand 12d agoESH. Everyone sucks here. The person that hit them. The driver that dropped them off. The girls drinking to the point of stupor. Uber for not training drivers enough.
- randyrand 12d agoAn important detail, according to the driver he didn't force her out. The girl got out after he pulled over to argue about / inspect the vomit and assess the situation. "Tran argued that he responded reasonably to a perceived sudden emergency caused by the passengers' prior excessive drinking, of which he said he was unaware, & that he could not anticipate that Normandin-Parker would leave his vehicle and wander into traffic."
- fckgw 12d agoHe created an unsafe situation by stopping at a gore point instead of driving a couple hundred feet down the offramp onto a surface street.
- deleted 12d ago[deleted]