Mobile-Based Transportation Companies, Mandatory Arbitration, and the Americans with ‎Disabilities Act ‎

Abstract

Uber, Lyft, DoorDash and similar mobile-based transportation network companies (TNCs) have ‎been involved in numerous legal battles in multiple jurisdictions. One contested issue concerns ‎TNCs’ use of mandatory (pre-dispute) arbitration clauses in their standard form service ‎agreements with both drivers and passengers. These arbitration clauses purport to obligate such ‎future plaintiffs to resolve any dispute with the defendant TNC outside of court and, typically, ‎on an individual rather than a class basis. In particular, TNCs have been increasingly litigating ‎disability-based discrimination claims brought against them and/or their drivers pursuant to the ‎Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). These claims have largely arisen in two situations, ‎examined in this article. ‎ The first situation is where the plaintiffs have not downloaded or used the defendant TNC’s ‎mobile application due to the absence of accessible vehicles. These “potential passengers” have ‎brought discrimination claims against the defendant TNC in court for its failure to provide ‎accessible vehicles that they could use. TNCs in such cases have raised two main lines of ‎arguments: an ADA-based argument and an arbitration-based argument. The TNCs’ ADA-based ‎argument posits that the plaintiffs do not have standing to bring the discrimination claims under ‎the ADA since they had not in fact used the TNC’s mobile application and therefore have not ‎suffered the required “injury” to have standing under the Act. Where the plaintiff potential ‎passengers have been found to have such standing nonetheless, the TNCs have put forward an ‎alternative arbitration-based argument — that the plaintiffs should be bound by the arbitration ‎clause contained in the service agreement, which they did not sign, and that their claims should ‎therefore be referred to arbitration. ‎ The second situation in which disability-based discrimination claims under the ADA have been ‎brought against TNCs is where the plaintiffs downloaded the mobile application, agreed to the ‎terms of service, and used the ride-share services. These plaintiff passengers are then typically ‎obligated to argue their discrimination claims in arbitration in light of the arbitration clause ‎contained in the TNCs service agreement. Indeed, TNCs seem to prefer arbitration to litigation ‎in court, a preference that some have criticized as a strategy designed to prevent plaintiffs from ‎vindicating their legal rights. However, a recent arbitration decision rendered against Uber in an ‎ADA discrimination case discussed in this article illustrates that arbitration is able to provide ‎the same legal protection to plaintiffs’ rights as a court. ‎