The drivers won payouts after the high court in February last year upheld a landmark employment tribunal ruling that Uber drivers should be classed as workers with access to the minimum wage and paid holidays. Uber launched an online portal in March 2021 through which it said drivers could claim compensation for holiday pay directly “without lengthy court processes”. It is understood that 54,000 claimants – around 80% of all eligible Uber drivers – have so far received payments through the portal, averaging £2,700. The portal, which was open until July 2021, promised compensation for “historic journeys” to drivers it deemed eligible, and those who applied directly also had the benefit of being offered cash within weeks. Meanwhile, at least 15,000 chose to settle through lawyers and had to wait around a year for payments to be agreed and awarded. Now that the majority of drivers are aware of their payments, comparisons can be made. It has emerged that those who settled through their solicitors received many times more – in some cases more than 10 times the average for those who used the portal. The Guardian has seen details of a legal settlement payment that totaled more than £45,000 – after more than £10,000 in legal fees. One driver appears to have decided to reject an offer of around £3,000 via the Uber portal and continued with his legal claim, which saw him receive around £30,000. The negotiations were conducted by law firms Leigh Day and Keller Lenkner, with a number of other firms participating in the litigation. The US tech giant is facing unprecedented international scrutiny this week following the publication of the Uber files, a cache of thousands of confidential documents leaked to the Guardian. News of the settlements emerged separately and is not part of the leak. Drivers fear they won’t be able to challenge the deals they received, as anyone who accepted Uber’s immediate offer had to sign documents pledging not to take further legal action over the matter. One driver who received just under £4,000 last year, having worked around 60 hours a week for Uber for more than seven years he has been a regular on the app, said: “Everyone feels very angry about it. “It was during the pandemic. I had no money and thought this is the best we’ll get. They misled us and told us this was the best we would get and it was calculated correctly and talking to a solicitor would make no difference other than they would deduct a commission. “Drivers are out of date. They didn’t know and Uber took advantage of Uber drivers because they didn’t know [understand] the law. Everyone gets angry.” Another driver who had worked for Uber for more than eight years said he had received just over £4,000 in compensation after applying directly through the company’s portal, but spoke to a colleague who had worked for fewer years but averaged similar hours who received more than £35,000 , after fees as a result of joining one of the legal actions. The driver said he decided to leave Uber after discovering how little compensation he had received in comparison. “We are the people who are loyal and this is how we are treated after so many years of hard work. “[The payout] it could have been a significant amount, a life-changing amount for me. If the difference was only £1,000 or £3,000 then I’d say let’s not even talk about it, but it’s a big amount and a big difference.” It is understood that the difference between compensation agreed through the portal and that agreed through statutory settlements is based on how leave pay is calculated – largely the grace period for late payments but also the level of expenses allowed for each driver and the working time was calculated. The Uber deal went back just two years, while some legal settlements are understood to have covered much longer periods. It is understood that Uber limited the payouts to two years due to an employment regulation introduced in 2015 to limit the impact of large retrospective claims on businesses. However, the law on this point is unclear and lawyers for Uber drivers are understood to have argued that the decision did not necessarily apply, allowing the claims to be backdated further. Subscribe to the Business Today daily email or follow Guardian Business on Twitter @BusinessDesk Uber declined to comment on the level of compensation per driver, but it is understood that each payment depended on the driver’s particular circumstances. The compensation was calculated looking at the two years prior to March 2021 and based on 12.07% of their weekly earnings. Net earnings were calculated before expenses using the HMRC mileage allowance of 45p. per mile for the first 10,000 miles driven each year and 25 p.m. per mile for all subsequent miles each year. Separately, if a driver received less than the national minimum wage during any working week, their compensation was topped up to ensure they were paid at least that amount.
