[avalaunch]

They were booking rides without the intent of actually taking or paying for those rides. How is that not fraud? The fact that they were doing it to mine for phone numbers doesn't make it less fraudulent. That'd be like saying it's ok to order a bunch of pizzas from Pizza Hut without the intent of paying for them because you were simply trying to figure out who the drivers are.

[eridius]

They're paying cancellation fees. If I order a bunch of pizzas from Pizza Hut in order to find out who the drivers were, and paid for them, then there's no issue. Even though I don't intend on eating the pizzas, I still paid for the service. In this case, Uber is paying the cancellation fees for the privilege of booking, then cancelling, a Gett ride.

[avalaunch]

If you order pizzas and pay for them, you're completely the transaction as expected. If you order a car from a car service and then cancel it, you're not. The fact that a cancellation fee exists doesn't give you the right to use the system in such an unintended manner.

A better analogy than the pizza analogy might be a "customer" repeatedly buying clothes with the intent to wear and then return them. Despite the fact that there is a return policy in place, the fact that the customer never intended on keeping any of the clothes makes his behavior fraudulent.

[eridius]

There is nothing illegal about repeatedly buying clothes, then returning. If I do that enough the store may bar me from the premises for being exceedingly annoying, but they certainly can't charge me with anything.

[yapcguy]

Another example is a cafe.

Get a bunch of people to repeatedly queue up but when they get to the counter decide they don't want to order anything.

Just the sight of a long queue outside the door is going to put off legit customers

Clearly Uber are engaging in activities to disrupt and cause harm to the business of their competitor.

[avalaunch]

I said it was fraudulent, which it definitely is. Whether or not it fits the legal definition of fraud is debatable.

[aidenn0]

Some localities do have laws forbidding buying something with the intent to return it.

[goldenkey]

With the intent to disrupt business. They can be easily sued for this practice. This isn't a consumer doing so, this is a company having their employees vehemently attack a competitor.

[yapcguy]

Exactly.

Legit customers can't book cars because they're busy and when they do the drivers might bail because they think its yet another fake order.

Screw Uber. Theyre not a tech start-up, they're an illegal car service masquerading as a tech company.

[brianmcdonough]

Thank you for making it clear why this practice is bad corporate practice for those who are not as moral in their perspective. Uber seems hell bent on becoming the only game in town and then raping their customers during peak periods.

[Dylan16807]

It's not fraud to order a bunch of pizzas and then cancel the order 30 seconds later before they even put anything on the first piece of dough.

It's dickish, but no actual harm is done.

And if it cost $1 per cancelled pizza they would actually profit off of it.

[hangonhn]

"It's dickish, but no actual harm is done."

In the case of a real restaurant, yes there is harm done. The cost of taking an order is not zero for people: it cost people time and real customers may not be served in time. Maybe not for this particular case with Gett since they're automated.

[Dylan16807]

It's still not fraud to call someone and waste their time for a while. See also: telemarketers

[hangonhn]

Fraud is only one type of harm. The bigger question is whether there is harm, regardless of type. In the restaurant case, there is harm even though it's not fraud. In Gett's case it's not really fraud either but one can argue there was harm done as well. Information can confer competitive advantage. The question that remains is who's fault it is. It's kind of dumb on Gett's part to leave themselves wide open. I'm not experienced enough in jurisprudence to really determine that.

[kd0amg]

Wasting their time via deception might be though.

[avalaunch]

What you describe is a hoax, contrasted to fraud in that there was no intent of gain on the perpetrator's part and that no harm was caused (debatable in your example). What Uber did, and in my example, there was both intent of gain and harm.

You could argue that there was no harm to Gett because of the cancellation fees, but that's only true if the cancellation fees are greater than the cost they incurred which may or may not be true.

[Dylan16807]

It hinges on whether there was harm done. I strongly doubt there was harm.

Or at least intentional harm. Such as if they meant to cancel immediately but didn't.

[6d0debc071]

> It hinges on whether there was harm done.

Are you a lawyer familiar with fraud related laws in New York?

IANAL. However, in the UK I suspect it would hinge on whether you gained or whether there was harm. Fraud by false representation is - IRC - defined in those sorts of terms in the Fraud Act 2006.

Point being this stuff varies and doesn't necessarily align with what we might intuit it does.