Nashville man claims Lyft driver illegally refused to allow his service dog in the car, then took advantage of a loophole to avoid repercussions

A Nashville man has accused a Lyft driver of breaking the law by refusing to accept his service guide dog as a passenger. The man claimed that the driver had been informed that he had a service dog when he accepted the ride but still refused to allow the canine into his car; a clear violation of the ADA.

TikToker James Rath is a blind content creator who has spoken about his disability in his videos. In a recent video, Rath recorded an allegedly unprofessional Lyft driver who, he claimed, denied him entry into his car because he had a service dog.

In the video, Rath was heard explaining to the driver that his account said he had a service dog, claiming that the driver had been notified by Lyft and that his dog was protected by the ADA. “It’s also a law to take a service dog,” he said, also telling the driver, “You can’t do that; I just walked all the way over here for this.” 

Despite this, the driver still refused to take the passenger and his dog, with James telling him, “I’ll let you cancel [the ride], and you tell Lyft.” The driver then drove away and left James in the airport car park alone.

The Lyft driver doesn’t cancel the ride

James said the Lyft driver refused to cancel the ride, despite driving off and leaving him stranded at the airport, as Lyft only allows for one ride to be ordered at a time: “If there’s already an active ride, I couldn’t order a new one.”

However, the problem that James faced was that if he canceled, there wouldn’t be “a paper trail” of the illegal denial of his service dog, as he put it. He claimed it would make it harder for him to “report and share the incident with Lyft,” and he said that “the driver knew this.”

According to James, the driver was refusing to cancel and was instead waiting for him to be “desperate enough to cancel the ride.” If he did, the driver would have an easier time avoiding repercussions for violating ADA rules. There’s also the chance of a cancelation fee.

James said that the driver continued to drive in the opposite direction for 10 minutes. Meanwhile, he messaged the driver, telling him to cancel the ride so he could get home. “He knows that by canceling and denying a service dog, it can penalize his account and also potentially deactivate his ability to drive for Lyft.”

The TikToker claimed that he had noticed more drivers taking advantage of this apparent loophole lately, waiting out the passengers so that they can get away allegedly with things such as denying service dogs in their cars. 

Lyft claims to have trained its drivers on ADA and the law surrounding service dogs. It also apparently does investigate cases of denied service. However, James couldn’t help but ask, if that is really the case, “why does this keep happening?”