Uber eventually apologized to the Australian woman and reinstated her account.
A woman has been banned from using Uber’s ride-sharing and food delivery service after her name was flagged as offensive.according to new york postAustralian woman Swastika Chandra explained that her name means “good luck” in Sanskrit and was a common name in Fiji, where she grew up.
The incident occurred in October last year when Ms Chandra attempted to order food from Uber Eats. During the payment stage, she received a notice that her name was in violation of the company’s terms.
“One afternoon I was ordering food and then I got to the payment stage and a pop-up appeared saying: ‘Your name is in violation, you need to change your name on the app,'” the 35-year-old told current events.
It is worth noting that in a Western context the term is primarily associated with the German Nazi Party. It took five months before her account was reinstated, following intervention by the Hindu Council of Australia and the New South Wales Attorney-General.
“They don’t know that Hindus had been using it for thousands of years before Hitler used it in the wrong way. It’s a very common name. I know four or five girls with the same name. In school we had two more Three girls with the same name – it means good luck and it means good things to me. I’m very proud of my name and I believe in the benefits it brings and I wouldn’t change it for anyone,” she said. added.
The Jewish House of Representatives also supports Ms. Chandra’s fight and says Current events: “There is a difference between Ms. Chandra using her name innocently and using an evil symbol.”
Uber also apologized and issued a statement to Ms. Chandra. “Uber is committed to creating a safe and welcoming environment for all of our users. Therefore, Uber has a global policy restricting access to users whose names contain potentially offensive terms when they are entered into the Uber app.
We know there are cultural differences in names, so our team handles matters like this on a case-by-case basis to ensure we evaluate each account fairly. In this case, after reviewing MS. Per Chandra’s request, we restored her access to the application. We have apologized for the inconvenience this matter has caused to Ms. Chandra and thank her for her patience while we reviewed this matter, which took longer than we would have liked,” the statement read.
