2 of 13 or 25 or 48 reasons you’ve been deactivated, or will soon be deactivated
Every day in the various Uber driver forums on Facebook, I see drivers referring to passengers as “a$$holes” and other derogatory, profane terms. Many of you have heard the phrase “say it with a smile” but have you ever considered the flip side of that age old phrase? If you say “thank you, have a nice day” not with a smile in your voice but, rather, the thought “let me see if this a$$hole gives me a tip,” do you not believe your greed will be discernible to the rider? Do you really believe you are that smart, and riders that dumb? Evidently you do. That’s the first of many reasons why you’ve been deactivated, or will soon be deactivated, your possibly immaculate car notwithstanding.
Many attendees of the Uber driver improvement class that I teach in DC arrive at the class looking unkempt and dressed as if they just rolled out of bed, wearing little more than pajamas or what they’d wear to work in their gardens, despite being advised (when they registered for the class) to dress professionally. They attempt to talk over me, constantly interrupt the class and even try to FLIRT with me. That’s the second reason why so many drivers have been deactivated or will soon be deactivated – unbelievably, jaw-droppingly unprofessional behavior, in a class that they PAID to attend! If this is how they behave in a CLASS with up to 30 other “students,” one can only imagine their behavior in their cars, alone with passengers. This second reason can be summed up, in my view, as a lack of humility.
Why are these drivers in the class in the first place? Is it not in the hope of “passing” the class by learning as much as possible, in order to be re-activated by Uber, and to bring their ratings up from below 4.6? The types of shenanigans observed in the class clearly confirm that many drivers honestly have no idea that contrary to their beliefs that they're doing "everything right,” they are, in fact, engineering and hastening their own demises in the ridesharing business.
A question frequently asked in the (4 hour) class further highlights the naïveté of about half of drivers’ – that half often asks why Uber didn’t give them this training when they first got approved/started driving. The other half vigorously shake the instructor’s hand/thank the instructor profusely on the way out at the end of the class, anxious to return to driving and to implement all they have learned, in order to be better drivers. The answer is so simple that they are often stunned into silence – Uber doesn’t train drivers because drivers are not employees! Drivers are independent contractors. Whether you believe drivers should be employees or not is irrelevant – only until and IF current law is changed, drivers are and will remain… independent contractors!
Making analogies isn’t exactly my forte but put another way, say you’re a hair stylist/cosmetologist and you go to a hair salon and apply to rent a chair and your application is, out of many applications, approved. So you bring your gear to the salon, set up your station and start making appointments/doing your clients’ hair, but at some point your customers begin complaining to the owner about you and the owner subsequently breaks the news that you have to go [due to the litany of complaints]. You held yourself out to be a cosmetologist and the owner leased the chair to you on that basis. If you did not take the time to familiarize yourself with such simple matters as the workings of the salon, the operating hours, clients’ hairstyle preferences and hair product preferences, why would you point an accusatory finger at the shop owner for not training you in cosmetology?! In my view, it is the same with deactivated drivers – there is much they might have learned about UBER, service, and the ridesharing industry itself, had they but taken the time to learn it. Before they were deactivated.
Uber on!
Copyright 2015 © Luceele Smith
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