Drivers protesting against UBER’s “abusive practices”
Hundreds of TVDE drivers (unmarked passenger vehicles) are staging a staggered strike today in protest against what they call “the abusive practices” of UBER – perhaps the most ‘famous’ ride-hailing platform.
Between 7am and 10am, and 5pm and 8pm, they will simply be ‘turning off the UBER app’ and continue working only on Bolt (the secondary platform operating in this country).
It follows that Bolt will ‘get all the business’ – and unles UBER comes to the table, the Portuguese end of this global operation could come crashing down.
It all boils down to a tariff, imposed by UBER. The platform is described as “charged commissions above those permitted by Law No. 45/2018”, and as a result “financially suffocating thousands of drivers in Portugal.
“This strike is to enforce the law in Portugal. Right now we are working with very low fares in which UBER takes more than half of the value of our work”, explains Tiago Sousa, leader of the movement promoting the strike.
The Portuguese Association of Transporters in Unmarked Vehicles (APTAD) has already conceded that “this strike is a form of protest against the extremely low income that the UBER platform continues to impose on drivers”.
“At the beginning of 2025, APTAD sent the electronic platforms and the Mobility and Transport Authority (AMT) the real cost values per kilometer and per minute of TVDE operators, arguing that they should be implemented as a minimum sustainability reference. The platforms completely ignored these values, continuing to operate with prices well below the real operating costs”, added APTAD in a statement.
The association also adds that it “supports and will always support all initiatives that bring visibility and public pressure to the real structural problem of the sector: the miserable rates charged by TVDE platforms, which undermine any prospect of fair profitability for drivers and operating companies”.
Source: Lusa
