NYC agency plans to tighten rules around driver lockouts on Uber and Lyft, report says

The agency that regulates New York City’s ride-hailing industry is working on a new set of rideshare driver pay rules to fight driver lockouts imposed by Uber and Lyft that are lowering wages, according to a Bloomberg report.

The Taxi and Limousine Commission (TLC) expects to unveil the new rules in the next couple of months, the report said. The commission has also been discussing with the gig companies whether or not it can address the lockouts without a rule change, Commissioner David Do told Bloomberg.

“We want to say that the regulator is here, that we are on the side of drivers and that we will impose new rules and new restrictions on the high-volume companies if we need to ensure that they’re playing fair,” Do said in the Bloomberg interview.

New York requires rideshare companies, like Uber and Lyft, to pay drivers for their idle time between rides in addition to their active driving time. (Pay is determined via a formula that calculates non-passenger time as an industry average.) But a spike in applications from rideshare drivers, thanks to the TLC lifting a cap on new permits, has led to a much higher number of drivers—and for companies, that means more people to pay.

Over the last few months, Uber and Lyft began limiting how much idle time drivers are able to log, essentially locking them out of the app and restricting how much non-passenger time they can log. Drivers now say they have to work longer to earn the same as before, and have less control over their schedules. Per Bloomberg, some drivers’ take-home pay has since dropped by as much as 50%.

Uber and Lyft have told drivers that the lockouts are essentially the commission’s and their competitors’ faults, since the pay rule takes into account statistics from all ridesharing companies. Uber said it warned the regulator that it would begin locking out drivers much earlier than it went into effect. Lyft has also been advocating for TLC rule changes.