Taxi-hailing firm Uber has rolled out a new rider quality system that will see it blacklist Kenyan riders who consistently receive poor evaluation from its drivers.
Uber’s new policy follows a myriad of complaints from drivers over unruly customers who make their job harder to execute.
The firm Monday sent a message to customers notifying them of this latest change while noting that, where an account is marked several times for complaints of ‘unacceptable behaviour’ and failure to adhere to Uber’s community guidelines, a rider will have restricted app access as a result.
The unruly behaviour, according to Uber, can include asking the driver to break the law by, for instance asking him or her to ignore speed limits. It also includes causing damage to the vehicle by for example vomiting due to excessive drinking or spillage of food and drinks in the car.
It also includes the use of inappropriate, abusive and disrespectful language and clashing with a driver due to bad behaviour.
This latest policy, the US-based firm said, will see badly behaved customers receive a warning and be guided on how to improve their rating.
However, if they continue to get bad feedback from drivers after warnings, the next step will be to temporarily suspend the account for one week and if there is still no improvement, face the possibility of full deactivation.
“We have recently updated our community guidelines which extends the same behavioural standards to the riders that we have for drivers and we will be notifying a small number of riders that their behaviour needs to improve or their access to the app could be removed — which is already done with drivers,” said Uber Country Manager Brian Njao.
“Fostering a community of mutual respect matters to us and this change is about shared accountability on our platform and asking everyone using Uber to be respectful of one another,” he said.
Uber, while making the announcement, said that the move was part of the firm’s efforts- geared towards improving transparency, accountability and boosting the safety of its drivers and riders.
Drivers are also rated on a range of factors including the vehicle’s cleanliness, rider experience during the journey and overall mannerism.
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