- While Uber employees in the US heard on Monday about the second major round of job cuts at the company, those in Europe are still waiting.
- Because of the complexities of government regulation around pandemic-related permanent layoffs, Uber was not able to tell all impacted employees about the cuts on Monday, the company said in an email.
- According to one source, these folks may not have long to wait. They may hear about their layoffs on Tuesday.
- But the official word from Uber: telling them to hang tight.
- “Employees in Europe still don’t know if we are getting fired or not. And we don’t know when we’ll have an idea,” one frustrated Uber employee in Europe told Business Insider.
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On Monday, Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi announced to his worldwide workforce another large round of layoffs, cutting 3,000 jobs, in addition to the 3,700 it cut two weeks ago.
All told, the company is cutting about 25% of its global workforce, Uber says. While the company didn’t release updated total headcount numbers, Uber employed 28,600 global employees — 16,200 outside the United States — as of March 31, it said in an its last quarterly report filed to the SEC on May 8.
While many US and Latin America employees heard about the cuts on Monday, most employees in Uber’s European countries, as well as in certain parts of Latin America, Africa, Asia, and other international regions, still don’t know if or when they would lose their jobs, or how many people would be affected by the layoffs.
“Employees in Europe still don’t know if we are getting fired or not. And we don’t know when we’ll have an idea,” an Uber employee in Europe told Business Insider.
People still waiting to hear about layoffs includes employees in the UK, Ireland, France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, and Slovakia. Other countries where at least some layoff news is on hold include Argentina, Portugal, China, India, Kenya, Pakistan, Poland, South Africa, Spain, and Turkey, according to the email Khosrowshahi sent to staff.
“In some countries, we will start a consultation process. In others, there are restrictions on making changes during the COVID lockdown,” Uber told employees in the corporate-wide email sent on Monday. “If you are in one of these countries, you will get an email from Nikki describing next steps for your location,” that email said.
But when employees got that email, sent by Uber’s HR head, Nikki Krishnamurthy, and seen by Business Insider, many were simply told to hang tight. Uber hasn’t worked through all the government regulations to tell them about layoffs yet.
“We’re working to provide you individual clarity as quickly as possible, while following the steps we should follow on a country-by-country basis,” Krishnamurthy said in that email.
European countries have enacted a range of rules regarding permanent layoffs because of the COVID-19 crises, with many of them mandating two-week notice periods or using other methods to encourage employers into doing temporary layoffs instead of permanent ones, according to employment lawyers at the firm Orrick.
And while not knowing is painful, perhaps it will be a short-lived wait. European and APAC region employees may learn about their layoffs on Tuesday, according to one person who shared some posts with Business Insider on anonymous chat app Blind.
Are you an Uber insider with insight to share? Contact Julie Bort via email at jbort@businessinsider.com or on encrypted chat app Signal at (970) 430-6112 (no PR inquiries, please). Open DMs on Twitter @Julie188.