Thousands of families are facing financial disaster after Transport for London made the shock announcement the company’s minicab operating licence will end in just over a week, unless it appeals.
A few voiced satisfaction that a company which they claim had flooded the market with cheap labour, driving earnings below the level of the national minimum wage, could be forced out of the capital. But most were anxious about how they would feed their families and service thousands of pounds of debt racked up to buy cars.
“This is a very terrible thing,” said Syed Khalil, 39, a father of four from Dagenham who has been an Uber driver since 2013. “I am so worried. I have a £360 a month car hire agreement. I really don’t know whether I will be able to keep the car.”
Khalil said he was only earning around £5 per hour after paying his expenses, below the national minimum wage, but he said he had no idea how he would earn any money to feed his family if Uber stopped operating. His children are aged between two and eight. Within an hour of hearing the Friday’s announcement he cashed out his Uber account in case there were problems receiving payment in the coming days.
“I am very sad and I just hope TfL is going to do something about the drivers,” he said. “TfL should have revoked Uber’s licence a long time ago before it monopolised London. So many of the other minicab firms have gone bust now.”
He estimated that half of Uber’s drivers own their cars on hire purchase agreements. He acquired his own E-class Mercedes because at the time he joined Uber, it required drivers to use vehicles under three years old, he said.
Abdur Razzak Hadi, 40, a father of four who has driven for Uber for three years, said: “People have spent so much money on these vehicles, what are they going to do now?”
“There are a lot of people who have bought these new cars on hire purchase. These people will be in massive debt and there will be a lot of struggle. Also, what happens to the customers who rely on it daily to get to school and work and the disabled people who rely on it?”
However he believes that the decision not to renew the licence could be political and an attempt by TfL to “look tough”. He said he did not believe TfL would want to lose the estimated £3m licence fee that Uber was expected to be charged. Uber is set to appeal the TfL’s decision not to renew the licence.
Unions are also deeply concerned. The GMB said the decision was “disruption to the disrupters” but was “not a sweet win”.
“Uber had a chance to play right and every chance they have had they have obfuscated,” said Steve Garelick, secretary for the union’s professional drivers branch. “It shouldn’t have come to this. They shouldn’t have taken on the amount of people who will now face difficulty. They interfered with a fragile ecosystem in London and thought ‘hang the consequences, we are disruptive’.”
James Farrar, a former Uber driver who chairs the private hire branch of the Independent Workers’ Union of Great Britain, described it as “a devastating blow for 30,000 Londoners who now face losing their job and being saddled with unmanageable vehicle related debt”.
He said: “To strip Uber of its licence after five years of laissez-faire regulation is a testament to a systemic failure at TfL. Rather than banish Uber, TfL should have strengthened its regulatory oversight, curbed runaway licensing and protected the worker rights of drivers.”
But Khurram Shahzad, 43, a father of two from east London, was one driver who felt pleased at the news. He said he was forced to close his own minicab business incurring a £50,000 loss when most of his 40 or so drivers switched to Uber which undercut his fares.
“Uber has made us like slaves and I am happy if they are gone,” he said. “Now at least if Uber is not in the market then prices will stabilise. Uber has put too many drivers on the road. Uber has made me like a beggar.”