Lyft has agreed to a $272.5 million settlement of a California lawsuit over allegations that the rideshare company misclassified drivers as independent contractors, according to Fox Business News. The agreement still requires court approval and does not constitute an admission of wrongdoing by Lyft, which maintains it did not violate the law.
California Attorney General Rob Bonta and city attorneys from Los Angeles, San Diego and San Francisco filed the suit in 2020. It alleged that drivers were misclassified between 2016 and 2020 and, as a result, received less than the state minimum wage and missed workplace protections required by California law.
About $237 million of the proposed settlement is set aside for a third-party fund to compensate eligible drivers. The amount an individual driver may receive will depend on hours worked and miles driven from April 2016 through December 2020. Drivers are expected to receive information from the fund’s administrator about submitting details for compensation after the court approves the deal and payments begin.
Bonta called the agreement a major win for workers. Los Angeles City Attorney Hydee Feldstein Soto said the settlement underscores companies’ obligations to follow state law. Those statements describe the officials’ views; the allegations were not established by a court judgment in the reported settlement.
The case concerns past conduct and a proposed settlement, not a new court ruling. Fox Business reported that it had contacted Lyft for comment.
