San Francisco-based ride-sharing company Uber, which is operating in Dhaka without government licence, is rife with allegations of malpractices including tax evasion. Industry insiders have also said the ride-sharing, whose 2015 revenue was 1.5 billion US dollars, has deviated from the very principle of ride-sharing in Dhaka. Most of Uber’s drivers are just ‘rent- a-car’ drivers, whose cars are owned by other ‘investors’. It is a legal obligation for any public transport services provider like ‘rent-a-car’ in Bangladesh to receive permission from Bangladesh Road Transport Authority (BRTA). The app-based vehicle service provider, which is available in over 74 countries and 450 cities worldwide, is yet to come up with plausible clarifications in its defence to roll out the service without the regulatory consents.
The ride-sharing company, which employs over 6,000 people worldwide, is yet to get registered with Bangladesh Investment Development Authority to run business in the country even after one year into its operation.
Uber, however, is only registered with Joint Stock Companies and Firms as Uber Bangladesh Limited.
According to a report of private Independent Television, as many as 50 employees are working with the ride-share service, Uber, but they are yet to file their income tax returns.
NBR (National Board of Revenue) officials said Uber employees are working over one year in seven offices including Uttara, Banani in Dhaka, but they are yet to submit their tax files.
The company itself is yet to submit any tax file. Economist Dr Jamal Uddin said Uber
should not be allowed to remit the earnings out of Bangladesh through official channels. Public transport expert Dr Shamsul Haque told Independent Television the government should formulate policies on ride-sharing services in the country without any delay to streamline the services.
As technology-based services can improve overall public transport system, the government should give legal support to this new companies, Haque added. Uber, which had suffered a massive data breach last year that exposed the personal data of 57 million of its customers and drivers worldwide, celebrated its first anniversary in Dhaka early this month. Officials of Uber, which always evades media queries, did not take any questions from media in the press briefing.