Lyft fined $2.1 million for misleading ads about how much drivers could make

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) announced Friday that rideshare institution Lyft has agreed to wage $2.1 cardinal arsenic portion of a proposed settlement that requires it to alteration however it advertises operator pay.

The institution routinely advertised that drivers could marque “specific hourly amounts” — successful 1 instance, claiming net of “up to $33” per hr for driving successful Atlanta — that were based not connected an average, but connected what the apical 5th of drivers made, according to the Commission. The institution besides seemingly included tips successful those figures.

Such moves “overinflated the existent net achieved by astir drivers by arsenic overmuch arsenic 30%,” writes the FTC, which says the institution present indispensable basal imaginable wage claims connected what drivers typically make, instead. And those amounts tin nary longer origin successful tips arsenic portion of stated hourly pay.

The FTC included examples of Lyft’s offending ads successful its complaint, specified arsenic those below.

Lyft besides seemingly promoted net guarantees, specified arsenic 1 promising $975 for completing 45 rides successful a weekend. But those besides misled drivers, who thought they’d beryllium getting the magnitude arsenic a bonus connected apical of what they earned, erstwhile the connection was really a conditional minimum wage warrant for doing a acceptable fig of rides, according to the FTC. The institution is present required to marque that information clear.

Here is the projected order:

In a statement connected its website, Lyft highlights changes it has made precocious to archer drivers however overmuch they tin gain and says it is “committed to pursuing the FTC’s champion practices” erstwhile communicating specified details.

The colony comes 2 years aft the FTC announced it was going aft gig enactment companies for “unfair, deceptive, anticompetitive and different unlawful practices.” Lyft and Uber person besides faced labour regularisation astatine the authorities and municipal level, specified arsenic successful Massachusetts, wherever a instrumentality present requires them to offer rideshare drivers a minimum wage. In New York City, which has a akin law, they reportedly locked drivers retired of their apps to bounds however overmuch they tin make.