LTFRB Discovers: Uber Continues to Accept Drivers Despite Halt Order

The Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board (LTFRB) met with Uber officials yesterday, August 2, at the House Committee on Transportation hearing to discuss why the ride-sharing app continued to approve new driver applications despite a July 26 order requiring all transportation network companies (TNCs) to stop new driver accreditation and activation. During the hearing, LTFRB chairman obligated members of the Uber legal team to explain within five days why the ride-sharing app continues to accredit new drivers. “We need to put a stop to the false expectations of the public that they can still get themselves accredited, or worse, get activated so they can be booked as TNVS,” Mr. Delgra said at the meeting.

No official reply from Uber

Attorney and Uber representative Joseph Castillo admitted to the LTFRB that the company has indeed been accepting applications, but professed that they have not processed or activated them. LTFRB spokesperson Aileen Lizada  countered that the LTFRB personnel submitted an application into Uber’s system, and minutes later, the application got activated. "We were able to activate three of our vehicles in your platform... We now have LTFRB cars active in your system," Lizada told Uber’s legal team during the meeting. Castillo did not provide an official reply to Lizada’s statement. Instead, the Uber lawyer asked to be furnished a document detailing the supposed activation before giving a comment. Aside from the mandated explanation for the activation, chairman Delgra also compelled Uber to submit a new master list of its active drivers, including the new activations. Uber submitted a previous master list last July 29.

Delgra shocked

At the hearing, Delgra divulged that Uber had 66,000 registered transport network vehicles (TNVs), while fellow ride-sharing app Grab had 52,398. Delgra expressed his shock at these numbers, considering that both TNCs admitted to having only around 28,000 each during a July 11 LTFRB hearing. Yves Gonzalez, head of policy at Uber Philippines, said that only 2,500 accredited drivers out of the 66,000 on the list have certificates of public convenience (CPCs) or provisional authorities (PAs). Brian Cu, country head at Grab Philippines, estimated that only around 3,000 to 4,000 of the reported 52,398 have CPCs or PAs.