Following taxi drivers rioting in France and the arrest of key executives, the company has suspended UberPOP in the country until further notice. “This option disappears from your Uber application”, the company said on its website. Uber stresses that the suspension of UberPop is predicated on keeping its drivers safe, rather than a response to the ongoing legal dispute.
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Uber has suspended its UberPOP taxi-ordering app in France, according to newspaper Le Monde. It’s a tremendously sad day for our 500 000 French uberPOP passengers, as well as the drivers who used the platform.
It has revolutionised the way many people book a taxi.
Until then, Uber said that UberPop drivers can apply for a taxi licence and drive for the company’s licensed UberX service – which is also offered in the United Kingdom – but that the licensing process was “too much of an obstacle course”. Thibaud Simphal, manager of Uber France, and Pierre-Dimitri Gore-Coty, general manager for western Europe were held by police on June 29 as part of France’s investigation into Uber. Still, lawmakers appear hell-bent on keeping Uber off their roads, following intense pressure from taxi drivers’ unions. It restricts the use of software to find passengers and bans unlicensed services, plus a host of other measures that would make uberPOP illegal. That is when the French Constitutional court will rule on whether a call to ban the service was legal. They will have their day in court in September.
There were reports of suspected Uber drivers being “hunted down” by groups of taxi drivers at Charles de Gaulle and Roissy Airports.
French government ordered police to crack down on Uber in Paris after the demonstrations turned violent.
Taxi drivers in France pay revenue tax and welfare expenses and, relying on their location, typically need to pay tons of of hundreds of euros for an working license. French President Francois Hollande said at the time that UberPop “must be dismantled and made illegal”. “The vehicles of UberPOP drivers should be systematically impounded when they are openly breaking the law”, he said.
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Born out of the frustration of two Silicon Valley entrepreneurs making an attempt to catch a cab in Paris, Uber’s providers have mushroomed since being launched in 2010 and are provided in nearly 270 cities worldwide.
