Uber Suspends Services In France To Protest Against Government Decisions

Uber disregards the decision of French government as decides to protest by suspending services.

Uber has found a method to battle with its rivals in Europe. As cabbies protest in France, Uber is not providing its services in the state for four hours on February 9, 2016 to launch a protest against recently taken decisions of the government.

Uber technologies has taken a leap from cabs and has turned to strike to make a point after the French government promised to impose stricter controls through controlling on chauffeured vehicles. Consumers would not be provided an opportunity to hire vehicles through Uber mobile app from 11 am to 3 pm, a spokesman of the company emailed.

Staff of the transporter will participate with drivers who are planning to organize a demonstration at Place de la Nation in the capital of France. The protest is the most recent round in a battle that is pitting the highly regulated French cab industry against startups like Uber and its drivers, who work as independent contractors.

The government is trying to walk a line of providing support to the growth of new app-based company while not making traditional taxi drivers angry. After the messy strike in January, cab drivers clogged traffic and burnt tires. Prime Minister of France, Manuel Valls, had a meeting with cab drivers and promised that a special police division nicknamed ‘the Boers’ will implement strict enforcement against chauffeured cars.

Recently, cabbies in France are pointing their criticism on cab drivers licensed specifically for providing collective transportation, like driving vans for visitors, whom they have alleged instead providing transportation to individuals using platforms such as Uber.

In the past few days, drivers of chauffeured-vehicle services are launching protests in Paris leading to some sluggish traffic during rush hour, the police informed. The group of drivers launching the strikes asked Uber to participate in the movement.

Uber faced regulatory problems in various cities from Munich to San Francisco. Officials of its unit in France need to present themselves before the court soon in a most recent episode of legal war that resulted in the detention of Uber’s head of the operations in France, Thibaud Simphal, and its general manager for Western Europe, Pierre-Dimitri Gore-Coty, by police.

In other news, Andrew Crow who is heading Uber’s design announced that he is quitting the company soon. Since joining the company in 2014, he contributed to the growth of the design team of the transporter to approximately 200 from just 30, whereas heading “all aspects of design," as revealed by his profile on LinkedIn.