London Court Throws Out Black-Cab Claims Against Uber on Limitation Grounds
London's High Court on October 19 dismissed two linked lawsuits against Uber with a combined value of around 340 million pounds, or about 453 million dollars, according to Reuters and the BBC. The claimants were around 13,000 London black-cab drivers and a claimant acting for two now-closed private-hire firms, Kabbee and Iride. Filed in 2024, the actions alleged that Uber obtained its London private-hire operator licence in 2012 by giving misleading and inaccurate information to Transport for London, then used that licence to take work from established taxi operators.
Uber denied the allegations throughout and argued that the cases were out of time. In statements reported by Reuters and CityAM, the company said it was pleased that the court had dismissed all of the claims entirely at the earliest opportunity and that the ruling put these legacy matters firmly in the past. Uber added that it works with thousands of private-hire and black-cab drivers serving millions of passengers across London. The court did not decide whether the accusations about the 2012 licence were true.
The turning point was limitation. The claims were subject to a six-year limitation period. Judge Simon Birt held in a written ruling that the claimants could have discovered the alleged deception before 2018, so proceedings issued in 2024 were too late. Bloomberg, as summarised by Quartz, reported that by February 2018 the drivers already had access to the public material needed to bring the case, more than six years before the first claim form. One finance outlet dated those claim forms to May and June 2024 and noted the rejection of reliance on delayed discovery. The actions were therefore dismissed as time-barred, with no findings on conspiracy, licensing or loss.
The immediate losers are the driver group and the assignee of the failed minicab firms. The drivers sought nearly 200 million pounds between them, while the separate claimant for Kabbee and Iride sought around 140 million pounds, Reuters reported. A claims-management firm acting for the drivers had said at filing that each driver might receive up to 25,000 pounds for lost earnings, according to regional business coverage. The drivers' case covered alleged undercutting from 2012 until March 14, 2018, when Uber changed its London operating model, a period identified in technology-press coverage of an earlier 2025 ruling on the litigation.
The ruling leaves one route open. Coverage by The Next Web noted that the substance of the allegations will not be examined unless the claimants win an appeal. For Uber, attention now shifts quickly. Reuters reported that next week the company faces the British tax authority in London in a dispute worth more than 1 billion pounds. The taxi case is only the latest London battle for the company. Quartz recalled that Uber twice challenged Transport for London decisions not to renew its licence, in 2017 and 2019, and later had to adjust its model after Britain's Supreme Court ruled its drivers must be treated as workers.