Uber accused of running afoul of transgender rights

Adrian Escobedo signed up to drive for Uber Eats to help support his family after his fiancee lost her job. The couple and their 4-yearold son had just moved to Bakersfield. Money was tight.

But after a lunch break on his first day, Escobedo found himself locked out of the app; his documentation had not been approved. Escobedo tried at least 20 times to resubmit the records, which included a photo of his face, copies of his ID and proof of car insurance, he said. Each time, they were denied.

“I was very confused as to what was wrong,” Escobedo said. “I thought I was being messed with.”

Then, looking over his documents, Escobedo figured it out: He is a transgender man, and his appearance in his older driver’s license photo does not match the current photos he submitted, showing his wispy mustache and goatee.

Uber at times has blocked transgender and nonbinary people from driver and delivery jobs by treating their documents as fraudulent, suspending their accounts and failing to rectify the situation, according to interviews with half a dozen drivers and documentation provided by the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California, which petitioned the company to restore Escobedo’s account.

Drivers have had their accounts permanently banned, according to documentation of written communications with the company shared by five workers. None managed to get their accounts reactivated through Uber’s appeals process — one did with the aid of lawyers.

One driver had been working for Uber Eats for more than a year without issue. Prompted by the company’s marketing of a new option allowing transgender drivers to update their names and profile pictures, she resubmitted her documents in late August. Her profile photo was rejected as fraudulent, her account was shut down and she was permanently removed from the platform.

Blocked applicants said they spent hours messaging and calling the support desk, often to no end. Some haggled with Uber for days to get their true name displayed instead of their “deadname” from before they transitioned.

At a time when a worker shortage has emerged as a key problem for Uber, the company’s approach pushed all of these drivers to other app-based services, including Lyft and DoorDash, which for years have had policies accommodating name changes for transgender drivers.

The missteps have also undermined Uber’s stated commitment to more inclusive and equitable practices, and highlight the paucity of protections for independent contractors who face discrimination.

Uber spokesman Zahid Arab said that matching profile photos to government IDs is a fraud prevention measure the company undertakes as part of its safety protocols. Arab said in an email that “on occasion, requests can be misrouted and result in a regrettable customer experience which we are working to address.”

“Uber and our partners make every effort to remedy situations like this in a timely manner,” Arab said. “We continue to work on improving internal processes and working with our third party background check providers to help ensure the background check process runs as expected for transgender and nonbinary users.”