–Staff tells passenger ‘to approach police instead of seeking redressal’
LAHORE: Popular ride-hailing service, Uber Pakistan, on Thursday refused to compensate its customer who was robbed of his luggage by an Uber autorickshaw driver on May 17, Pakistan Today has learnt.
The customer, Hassan Butt, told this correspondent that he approached the company’s office in Model Town several times but to no avail. “I have been asked by Uber staff to approach the police station concerned for they said that the rickshaw driver has been off the grid since the incident and they could not do anything in this regard considering his mobile phone was switched off,” Butt said.
He lamented that the staff was highly uncooperative and was not even willing to share their contact information. “The staff is also not sharing the data of the rickshaw driver. They say that they would only share it with the police,” he said.
“Uber is also not responding to my complaints through email. At least they should have addressed my complaint on moral grounds,” he said and added that the police were not responding to his complaint either.
According to a complaint registered with the Ghalib Market Police Station, Hassan Butt was deprived of his mobile phone and other baggage while he withdrew cash from the ATM of a private bank located in the Gulberg II area of the provincial capital on May 7.
Hassan, who hails from Gujranwala and is a student at Forman Christian College (FCC), had earlier told Pakistan Today that the incident occurred when he hailed an Uber auto to leave for Gulberg III.
He had said that he immediately lodged a complaint with the police against Uber driver Abdul and a separate one with the company’s complaint cell via email and added that Uber’s complaint cell had told him through a system generated mail that the issue would be resolved within the next 12 hours, however, he had informed that later he received another email seeking further details and stating that the issue would be resolved within the next 24 to 48 hours.
When contacted, Uber Pakistan Spokesperson Haider Bilgrami said the company was looking into the matter and would respond to Pakistan Today in writing.
Meanwhile, Ghalib Market Police Station sub-inspector and investigation officer of the case Altaf could not be contacted despite repeated attempts by this scribe. Earlier, he had said that he was on leave and was not aware of the incident.
