Uber will halt its ride-hailing service in most of Belgium tomorrow following a court ruling Wednesday that extends a 2015 order banning its p2p UberPop service to also cover professional drivers providing its ride-hailing service.
Uber told us that it is studying the detail of the ruling to decide whether to appeal the decision with the country’s Supreme Court.
The move also follows a temporary suspension of Uber’s service in Brussels in September — an action the tech giant called “exceptional and unprecedented”, saying it was only taking the step to protest the lack of reform of rules which prohibit drivers from using smartphones.
Uber’s country chief, Laurent Slits, once again attacked the Belgian government for not delivering a reform it’s been lobbying for, writing: “This decision was made based on outdated regulations written in a time before smartphones, which the government has promised and failed to reform for the last seven years.”
Uber’s hope here is that EU lawmakers will seek to apply rules that override city level regulations — setting a pan-EU enabling framework for ride-hailing services which would mean it could just ignore local authority demands.
