French taxis who attacked Uber for unfair competition were dismissed Thursday by the Paris commercial court, but they intend to appeal.
Since its establishment in France more than ten years ago, the American company has been targeted by numerous legal proceedings, but this one was unprecedented in terms of the number of taxis – 2,480 drivers and nine associations – as well as the amount of compensation claimed — approximately 455 million euros for economic damage alone.
This time, the taxis had sued Uber based on a decision of the Court of Cassation, which considered the independent status of an Uber driver to be fictitious.
The commercial court rejected all their requests on Thursday and found that Uber had committed “no act of unfair competition”, according to extracts of the decision communicated by the American giant.
For Cédric Dubucq, one of the taxi lawyers, this decision is “scandalous from a legal point of view” and “extremely poorly motivated”. It “does not respond to all of the arguments raised by taxis,” he told AFP. The lawyer plans to appeal.
“Calm down relationships”
For the Uber spokesperson, this decision of the commercial court “will continue to calm relations between taxis and Uber which have evolved very positively in recent years”.
While more than 2,500 taxis already use the Uber application for their trips, the platform called on Thursday the entire sector to “leave aside special interests” and “mobilize” to “respond to transport challenges, particularly in the context of the 2024 Olympic and Paralympic Games.”
The taxis had sued Uber France and Uber BV, its Dutch subsidiary, in February 2021, based on a decision by the Court of Cassation. It ruled on March 4, 2020 that the independent status of a former driver of the platform was “fictitious” and that he should be considered an employee.
Beyond the requests for compensation and the reparation of economic damage estimated at more than 9,300 euros on average per driver and per year of practice, the taxi councils had asked the court to sanction the “Uber model”, and its “violation of French labor law”.
“The most appropriate measure to put an end to the commercial disruption resulting from this act of unfair competition” is “to order Uber to pay all its VTC drivers”, with a daily penalty of 1.7 million euros in the event of non-execution of the decision, argued another taxi lawyer, Étienne Feildel, during the hearing on October 13.
“There is no law in France that imposes generalized employment,” retorted Uber’s lawyer, Yoann Boubacir, tackling a “request for an injunction to employ 30,000 people that even the industrial tribunal would refuse “.
“The objective of this action is just to obtain the eviction of Uber from the market,” lamented Me Boubacir.
In a separate case, the platform was ordered on October 4 by the Paris Court of Appeal to compensate 149 taxi drivers due to unfair competition linked to the activity of its former UberPop service, closed in 2015.
In January, the Lyon industrial tribunal ordered Uber to pay some 17 million euros to 139 drivers and to reclassify the relationship between them and the platform as an employment contract.