IDG Campaigns
Permanently End the Uber & Lyft Lockouts
Uber and Lyft have been locking New York City rideshare drivers out of their driver apps in periods of high demand, blocking tens of thousands of city drivers from working, their livelihoods. The rideshare driver lockouts are devastating for the 80,000 New Yorkers who drive for these apps for a living. As drivers licensed to operate in New York City, we pay thousands of dollars annually for licensing and insurance. Many of us have invested our savings and taken out loans to join this industry. It’s completely unfair for an app company to be able to disrupt our livelihoods at a moment’s notice.
Independent Drivers Guild members have been fighting around the clock to end the app lockouts imposed by Uber and Lyft. We lobbied legislators and city officials, caravanned in protest, and made sure rideshare companies heard our voices. Recently, Mayor Adams and Commissioner Do attended our annual driver appreciation and family day and pledged to stand with drivers and end the lockouts. We launched an email campaign thanking them for listening to drivers and urging action. Then on July 31s Mayor Adams announced a commitment to significantly reduce these unfair lockouts. We thank Mayor Adams and Commissioner Do for standing with drivers and taking action against these unfair lockouts as we continue the fight to protect fair pay for drivers and permanently end lockouts.
Video Here: Video Link
Cap The Commission! App Companies: Give Drivers and Delivery Workers Our 'Fare' Share!
Cap the Commission-JFAW Petition
Hundreds of Drivers Joined Us at the Justice for App Workers Caravan!
Thank you to the New York-area members who took time off from earning to join the recent Justice for App Workers caravan and be part of the IDG contingent! Together, we called on the app companies to cap ride commissions at 10% so our take-home pay is enough to cover increasing gas prices and car expenses. We are proud to be part of this incredible coalition that continues to build power for drivers and delivery workers!
So what’s our next step after the caravan? We are joining Justice for App Workers in petitioning Uber and Lyft to demand a 10% cap on company commissions per ride, allowing us to take more money home to cover our bills, pay for rising gas prices, and take care of our families. Send your letter now!
Drivers Deserve the Right to Own Their Own Vehicles
Tens of thousands of New York’s Taxi and Limousine Commission drivers are stuck renting or leasing their work vehicles from large, exploitative fleet companies as a result of the city’s for-hire vehicle cap. We urge the Taxi and Limousine Commission to stop licensing vehicles to big fleet owners and instead give individual drivers a right to own.
Drivers deserve the right to own their own vehicle, including electric and wheelchair accessible vehicles. All TLC drivers who have been driving for at least two years should be exempt from the pause on licensing for-hire vehicles.
Renting or leasing a for-hire vehicle costs more than $20,000 per year. It is much more costly than owning. For low income for-hire vehicle drivers who are already struggling to make ends meet and support their families, that is a heavy cost. We are demanding a right to own our own vehicles.
New York leaders say they stand with workers, they stand with immigrants, yet they have allowed this policy to keep thousands of low income, largely immigrant workers beholden to large fleet owners with exploitative practices. If you stand with workers and immigrants, then you must give us a right to own.
Complete this form to tell TLC you deserve the right to own your vehicle.
Support the PRO Act
Workers across the country are speaking out to demand living wages and safer working conditions. Right now, the laws give too much power to corporations and not enough to us. We’re standing up to change that.
Momentum is building for the Protecting the Right to Organize Act, known as the PRO Act, so we can ensure that all workers can join together and take collective action for a better life.
Take action:
Tell Congress to pass the PRO Act now!
Demand an End to the Carjackings
Today, we demand that ride-hailing and delivery app providers work with us to address the recent increase in carjackings and other criminal incidents. Dozens of rideshare drivers and delivery workers have been targeted as victims of carjackings in Chicago in the last few months alone.
These common-sense improvements will protect both drivers and their passengers from ensuring safe transit during the COVID-19 pandemic:
- Passenger verification
- Mandatory passenger profile photos
- Mandatory mask-wearing selfie when ordering a ride
- Credit card fraud verification
- Stolen account warning
- Police zone warnings in-app
- Passenger background check
- Panic button
- Special crime victim insurance
- Increased penalties for assaults
- In-vehicle cameras
- Safety violation charges
Every rideshare and delivery driver and passenger in Chicago needs to know that we are specifically being targeted for these crimes. As such, we ask for your help and solidarity in fostering a safer industry. Sign our petition here.
Drivers' Bill of Rights Petition
Call To Action! To End the war on New York City For-Hire Vehicle TLC Drivers.
Sign our petition to put a stop to this unfair treatment of app-based companies.
App-based companies plan to follow Lyft’s lead in locking drivers out of its app at times and places with low demand. Starting Tuesday, September 17th, 2019, Uber will lock drivers out of its platform at times and locations that few riders are requesting trips.
Sign our petition to put a stop to this unfair treatment of app-based companies.
Demand Lower TLC Insurance Policies
Target: American Transit Insurance Co. ; Hereford insurance Co; Maya insurance Co. & All other NYC TLC Insurance Companies
We are demanding the following:
- Provide prorated refunds based on FHV miles driven until business returns to last year’s level
- Lower deposit amount
- Lower insurance premium cost
- Eliminate monthly installment surcharge
- Give us the option to buy into lower premium without losing our TLC plates
- Allow us to apply the typical last two “free” months whenever we feel the need
Click here to sign the petition
Let the TLC know the LOCK-OUT is hurting you !
Drivers Deserve Right to Own Their Vehicle
Tens of thousands of New York’s Taxi and Limousine Commission drivers are stuck renting or leasing their work vehicles from large, exploitative fleet companies as a result of the city’s for-hire vehicle cap. We urge the Taxi and Limousine Commission to stop licensing vehicles to big fleet owners and instead give individual drivers a right to own.
Drivers deserve the right to own their own vehicle, including electric and wheelchair accessible vehicles. All TLC drivers who have been driving for at least two years should be exempt from the pause on licensing for-hire vehicles.
Renting or leasing a for-hire vehicle costs more than $20,000 per year. It is much more costly than owning. For low income for-hire vehicle drivers who are already struggling to make ends meet and support their families, that is a heavy cost. We are demanding a right to own our own vehicles.
New York leaders say they stand with workers, they stand with immigrants, yet they have allowed this policy to keep thousands of low income, largely immigrant workers beholden to large fleet owners with exploitative practices. If you stand with workers and immigrants, then you must give us a right to own.
Complete this form to tell TLC you deserve the right to own your vehicle.
Tell the TLC: Delay the Cruise Cap Vote
Target: The New York City Taxi and Limousine Commission
The New York City Taxi and Limousine Commission’s proposed policies would hurt the entire for-hire vehicle industry. Its vehicle cap forces drivers to spend thousands of dollars on renting vehicles and prevents them from building equity in a purchased vehicle. The cruise cap limiting FHVs in Manhattan could harm our ability to make a living. Its policy of allowing unlimited drivers empowers companies to treat their employees as disposable. We need to demand a change.
The TLC must wait to vote on these proposed rules until after a new commissioner is confirmed by the City Council, and until we see the impact of the utilization rate policies that begin in February. To vote before then would be to intentionally ignore the drivers in our industry and would be acting without a full understanding of the impacts on New York workers.
Tell the TLC that it must not vote on the proposed cruise cap and vehicle cap until a new commissioner is confirmed and the utilization rate policies that began in February are studied.
Tell the Port Authority: No Airport Tax
Target: New York & New Jersey Port Authorities
The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey just announced that it wants to tax app-based trips an extra $4 for every drop-off and every pick-up at an airport. This is on top of the $10 plus already taxed on a typical app-based trip to JFK. This targeted tax will hurt drivers and riders alike.
As part of the gig economy, for-hire drivers work long hours and fight constant regulatory battles to simply make a living wage and provide a service to their customers. They need support—not more taxes.
The airport tax is the latest in a series of moves that directly target app-based drivers, who have the same qualifications as traditional taxi drivers but continue to face additional regulatory and tax burdens. These new taxes would mean a typical Uber or Lyft ride to the airport will now be taxed upwards of $14. Meanwhile, traditional taxi trips, which are already exempt from sales tax, will be taxed only for pick-ups at around $3.30.
Tell the Port Authority we cannot afford this unfair airport tax.
For-Hire Zero Violence
Target: New York City Council, TLC, Uber, Lyft, Via
Equal Access to Relief Stands for FHVs
Target: New York City Council
Despite an ever-growing number of FHVs on the streets of New York, currently, our drivers can only use 33 of the 74 relief stands across New York City. This is wrong.
Ride-share drivers deserve the same access to relief as taxis.
Tell Lyft to follow the rules and raise driver pay.
Target: Lyft CEOs
After years of fighting for a living minimum wage, IDG drivers won a nearly $10,000 annual raise. The TLC agreed these companies can’t continue to get richer while drivers struggle to get by. But just two days before our long overdue pay raise, Lyft sued to say they just can’t afford it.
This attack on working New Yorkers is unacceptable. Together, we will fight this injustice and expose your greed and malicious indifference to the needs of those who make your company a success. Stop this lawsuit, implement the pay raise, and respect the drivers who are making you rich.
*Uber, Juno, and Via have been removed from this petition as they committed to comply with the law.
Demand Fair Leasing Prices
Target: New York City Council
The New York City Council has not listened to our demands to regulate and implement a leasing cap before capping vehicles. The bill to regulate leasing companies was written by the app-based companies.
The data that the City Council is using to regulate leases is BAD and not accurate. The recent Taxi and Limousine Commission study states that monthly vehicle leasing averages $635 per MONTH. All drivers know the lowest price you can get for an old Toyota Camry is $350 per WEEK. The numbers don’t add up and they’re about to get worse because of the vehicle cap.
We cannot allow leasing companies to exploit the vehicle cap to take advantage of our fellow drivers. We demand a fair limit to leasing prices. Sign this petition to demand a fair limit to leasing prices.
Drivers Demand: a Minimum Pay Raise, a Maximum Commission, and Deadhead Pay
Target: Taxi and Limousine Commission
Workers win when we unite and fight. Last year, IDG members organized and won a New York City law and a Taxi and Limousine Commission rule which forced Uber and Via to add a tipping option to their apps, resulting in another $10-$50 in drivers pockets per week. Now we must come together to win a For-Hire Vehicle-specific minimum wage that’s high enough to provide for our families.
The Pay Organizing Committee—the group of workers organizing to win fair pay—approved a proposal to ensure workers can provide for our families. These are our key demands of the proposal:
- The IDG demands a minimum pay raise to driver pay—what drivers are paid per trip, per minute and per mile after fees and surcharges—by 37% across all platforms including Uber, Lyft, Juno, and Via.
- The IDG demands a maximum commission. We must prevent Uber from charging our passengers more than double what a worker is paid. We demand that Uber and other companies must not charge our passengers over 20% what a worker is paid.
- The IDG demands workers receive deadhead pay—getting paid for our trip back to New York City while no passenger is in the car.
If you support our demands, sign our petition, join the Pay Organizing Committee, and tell your fellow drivers.
FHV Drivers Need A Bathroom at JFK
Target: Port Authority
There’s a problem that For Hire Vehicle drivers have been trying to address for years – there’s no place for drivers to use the bathroom at JFK.
Add your name to my petition telling the Port Authority that Drivers like me need a safe place to use the bathroom!
The lack of clean, accessible bathrooms is a problem throughout the city. Drivers have been bringing this up with rideshare companies and the Port Authority for years. It seems that there is finally some movement on this issue , but we need your help to get this done. The powers that be need to hear from you!
Sign the petition: add a bathroom to the JFK cell phone lot.
As FHV drivers, we are proud of the work we do and the professional service we provide to our customers. Yet this is a daily indignity that the drivers who service JFK have to endure. An indignity that we can change if we stand together.
Tell Uber: add an easy option for tips
Target: Uber management
Uber has been stubbornly unwilling to give our riders an easy option to tip. As a result, New York’s working drivers are losing thousands of dollars we need for vehicle upkeep and supporting our families in one of the most expensive cities in America. Uber makes the problem worse by misleading riders by telling them that “tips are not expected.”
To make this clear: tips are not included in the fare.
It’s clear to us that passengers and drivers alike must mobilize to win this basic right for service economy workers–and get Uber to add an easy tipping option.
Emergency Relief: Uber & Lyft Drivers in the Coronavirus Crisis
Target: NYC Taxi and Limousine Commission, The City of New York, New York State, the US Federal Government, and For-Hire Vehicle Industry
New York City’s 91%-immigrant workforce of 85,000 For-Hire Vehicle drivers are on the front lines of the COVID-19 crisis. Our work requires that we interact closely with strangers every day. Not only our physical health is at risk– as people stay inside to mitigate the spread of the virus, we are suddenly facing unemployment. Unfortunately, as independent contractors, we are excluded from unemployment benefits.
We are ready to do our part in the war against this public health crisis, but we can’t do it alone. We demand the following:
- Emergency Funds for drivers to cover household bills from the City of New York, State of New York, and Federal Government and payment for drivers to make home deliveries to the home-bound using sanitized vehicles during the crisis.
- 60-day postponement of all TLC fees and licensing requirements.
- 60-day forbearance from rental companies, auto financing companies, and TLC insurance companies (American Transit, Hereford, and others) with no late fees.
- Moratorium on deactivation of drivers by Uber and Lyft in this crisis.
Together we will defend our communities and defeat the Coronavirus. We are ready to do our part. We call on the government and private sector entities to join us in meeting the crisis.
Sign the petition calling on Congress to extend unemployment compensation during COVID-19.
We have some bad news: As it stands, the $600/week Pandemic Unemployment Compensation (PUC) benefits are set to expire on July 26. This will leave thousands of drivers without the relief needed to cover monthly expenses.
Join us in demanding that Congress extend Pandemic Unemployment Compensation beyond July 26, ensuring that NY Drivers have adequate relief to cover expenses through the COVID-19 pandemic.
Currently, the vast majority of drivers are only receiving $200/week in Unemployment Assistance, covering less than half of their usual earnings. Without the $600 PUC relief payments, most drivers will not have enough to cover NYC rent, food, car insurance, and all other monthly costs.
We must call on Congress to take action immediately to extend PUC benefits. Drivers across NY are juggling car insurance, car payments, plus rent and groceries, all without their usual, full paychecks. To avoid further the health financial crisis for more than 100,000 New York City drivers, we are advocating Congress continue critical relief until regular business can resume.
As always, we will keep you updated as we receive more information.
Thank you and stay safe,
Independent Drivers Guild
