Of the thousands of Uber drivers who work in the District, more than a third live east of the Anacostia River. But since Uber began operating in the city five years ago, those drivers haven’t had a central hub to meet face-to-face with employees of the ride-hailing giant — to ask questions or share their experiences among others in their position.
If they’ve needed in-person support — to set up their accounts, correct a mistake on their trip log, or learn about how to manage their finances, for example — they’ve had a few options: a “Greenlight Hub” in Forestville, Md., and smaller, pop-up support centers in Tysons, Va., and Takoma Park, Md.
That’s changing. By spring, D.C. and Uber officials announced Thursday, drivers in and around the District will have a new venue to find answers and meet fellow drivers who can share their stories and experiences on the app. It comes amid a push by the embattled ride-hailing company to improve relations with its workforce.
The new Uber “Greenlight Hub” will be in the East River Park shopping center in Ward 7’s Benning neighborhood. The 8,200-square-foot facility, among Uber’s flagships in the country, will host 25 full-time employees and serve as a new meeting point for drivers, the company said. Uber said it expects to serve thousands of drivers from the new hub weekly — and significantly more than the 1,500 or more who visit Forestville every week.
“One-third of the drivers for Uber live in the east part of our city, so it only makes sense that they’re going to be serviced, they can come here and answer their questions, they can have a state-of-the-art facility — a landing pad — right here in Ward 7,” D.C. Mayor Muriel E. Bowser (D) said at a news conference attended by officials, including Ward 7 council member Vincent Gray (D). “And it is also a place for networking among drivers and UberEats couriers.”
Uber says it expects to invest millions of dollars in the facility, slated to be operating by late spring. Further, the company said it will exclusively solicit contracting bids from District-based small business enterprise firms for its construction.
“This is more than just a place where we do business. This is a home to all of us,” Arathi Mehrotra, general manager for Uber’s southeast region, said at the news conference. “That’s why we are so excited to announce a new chapter in our story, with a new investment in this community and a recommitment to working harder than ever to bring the drivers who partner with us the tools and the support that they need.”
Statistics illustrate how Uber’s local workforce has outgrown its current facilities. The company has 42,000 active drivers in the Washington region, thousands of whom require in-person support on a weekly basis.
Uber has been criticized for its relationship with its drivers, independent contractors who have said declining fares and the company’s longtime hesitance to allow tipping limit their earning potential on the app. The relationship also has been strained by revelations that the company, for example, collected tens of millions of dollars more from New York City drivers than it should have because of an apparent financial oversight. Uber pledged to repay the drivers, who were shortchanged an average of $900. This summer, the company rolled out in-app tipping as part of a driver-outreach initiative called “180 Days of Change.” The company also started round-the-clock phone support for drivers.
In a series of interviews this summer, locally-based Uber drivers described multiple barriers to addressing concerns about the company or individual passengers. The Forestville Greenlight hub, for example, was too far for many to go for help, but they had limited options beyond it.
Drivers complained about Uber’s in-app texting service, which they are encouraged to use to ask questions or to dispute complaints from passengers. They said that each time they sent a complaint or question via text, a different Uber representative responded, stalling progress and hindering any means of getting substantial help on any particular issue.
“The only thing you have is your word,” driver Candace Escobar said. “There’s no communication with the company.”
During a summer interview, Joshua Lapidus said riders often complain about their trips to receive reimbursements and ride free. He said that if a driver wanted to challenge the penalty, he or she did not have a phone number to call besides an emergency hotline. This could be especially worrisome if a driver depended on Uber for primary income and was suddenly deactivated.
“There’s no easy place to call to say, ‘this is a mistake,’ ” he said at the time.
D.C. officials said the new hub and its Northeast Washington location resulted from ongoing dialogue between the city and the ride-hailing firm, after Uber’s decision to locate its East Coast headquarters in the District in 2015.
The mayor’s announcement came amid the District’s push to land retail giant Amazon’s second headquarters, which is expected to bring as many as 50,000 jobs to its eventual landing spot. Despite its limited footprint — 25 employees — District officials see developments like Uber’s brick-and-mortar hub as evidence of D.C.’s emerging tech scene.
“We have been talking all week about how the tech sector is growing in Washington, D.C.,” Bowser said, referring to her office’s #ObviouslyDC effort, aimed at luring Amazon to the city. “And that’s why many people are calling us in the top 2 or 3 contenders to attract another big tech company you might have heard of: Amazon.com. . . . That’s because we are, in our city, just really attracting folks who want to be innovators and creators.”
Uber spokesman Bill Gibbons said the company looks forward to establishing its new hub in Northeast.
“We’re really, really excited to put [an] actual footprint here in Ward 7,” Gibbons said. “It means a lot to us, and hopefully it [serves] a bunch of people.”
(Washington Post owner Jeffrey P. Bezos is an Uber investor, and he is the founder and chief executive of Amazon.com.)