A new ballot measure backed by Uber, the Protecting Automobile Accident Victims from Attorney Self-Dealing Act, is being circulated for signatures in California ahead of the November 2026 election.
This ballot measure, if passed by voters, would:
- Significantly cap attorney fees in car accident cases
- Limit the rights of people injured in car accidents
The Uber ballot measure, along with California’s new rideshare insurance law, is part of an organized campaign by Uber to attack the rights of injury victims from all angles to minimize the money the company has to pay them.
Call our experienced car accident lawyers today for a FREE consultation at (800) 718-4658 or contact us if you or a loved one was injured or killed in an automobile accident.
Our personal injury attorneys can help you recover financial compensation for medical expenses, lost wages, loss of earning capacity, property damage, pain, suffering, wrongful death and more.
We won’t charge you any fee until we win your case. Call us today.
What Is California’s New Uber-Backed Ballot Measure?
The Protecting Automobile Accident Victims from Attorney Self-Dealing Act is a transparent attempt by Uber to limit its own liability in cases involving car accidents caused by its drivers.
The ballot initiative tells California voters that it seeks to protect injury victims by:
- Protecting accident victims from excessive attorney fees
- Limiting attorneys’ ability to inflate accident victims’ medical costs
- Banning financial arrangements between healthcare providers and attorneys which involve accident victims
- Protecting whistleblowers who report on financial arrangements between healthcare providers and attorneys
However, the ballot measure would not protect injury victims. It would, instead, protect Uber by making it much harder for injury victims to obtain legal representation.
In addition, it would hurt injury victims by making it much harder for them to obtain medical treatment after an accident.
How Would the Measure Impact Car Accident Victims?
The ballot measure would:
- Make it more difficult for accident victims to obtain legal representation
- Reduce accident victims’ recoveries
- Make it more difficult for accident victims to obtain medical treatment
- Make it more difficult for accident victims to pay for medical treatment
Contingency Fee Representation
Contingency fee representation is what allows people of all income levels to obtain quality legal representation after a car accident.
Contingency fee lawyers take a percentage of any money recovered for the client as their only fee. No fee is charged when they don’t recover any money for the client.
In other words, contingency fee representation allows even the poorest Californians to have a lawyer represent them after an accident, since they will never owe the lawyer a penny out of their own pocket.
Ballot Measure Would Cap Contingency Fees
The ballot measure seeks to reduce the contingency fee that a California attorney can charge in an automobile accident case to 25 percent of the total amount recovered.
Supporters of the ballot measure claim this protects accident victims from excessive attorney fees.
However, Section 6147 of the California Business and Professions Code already requires that attorneys advise clients in writing that minimum fees are not established by California law, and that clients and attorneys may negotiate contingency fees. Contingency fee arrangements need to be in writing.
In addition, Rule 1.5 of the State Bar of California, already bans “unconscionable” fees.
California ethics rules, when it comes to determining if fees are “unconscionable,” consider factors like:
- Attorneys’ skill and experience
- Prior attorney-client relationships
- Case complexity
- Client and lawyer level of sophistication
In other words, Californians are already protected from excessive contingency fees.
How the Contingency Fee Cap Would Hurt Accident Victims
In short, the proposed contingency fee cap would make it harder or impossible for many accident victims to obtain legal representation, and would reduce the amount of compensation accident victims would receive after accidents.
A 2025 Stanford Law School paper found that contingency fee caps would reduce accident victims’ access to justice and distort attorney incentives.
A 2004 study by the Rand Corp. found that contingency fee caps in medical malpractice cases led to plaintiffs receiving around 15 percent lower net recoveries, with the median reduction in the recoveries of the most severely injured patients being over $1 million.
A 2009 paper by the American Bar Foundation found that children, the elderly and women are disproportionately affected by contingency fee caps.
Attorney Costs
Currently, contingency fee lawyers typically charge 33 to 40 percent of the total recovery as their contingency fee.
There is a reason for this standard: it is expensive to litigate auto accident cases. A 33 to 40 percent fee allows attorneys to make a small profit off cases and ensure that their costs are covered.
Attorneys, when handling auto accident cases, advance the costs for things like:
- Court filing fees
- Medical reports and records
- Expert witness fees
- Deposition expenses
- Investigation costs
- Process server fees
In addition, when handling accident cases involving the most catastrophic injuries, attorneys advance the costs for things like:
- Lifecare planners
- Top medical experts
- Vocational rehabilitation experts
- Economists
- Accident reconstruction specialists
In addition, medical liens need to be paid out of the recovery at the end of the case.
As a result, contingency fee attorneys already turn down over half of clients seeking representation, according to a 2025 Rand Corp. essay.
In addition, according to the California Bar, 20 percent of people who seek an attorney are told their claims are meritorious but the lawyers can’t take them because the numbers don’t add up.
Those clients are turned down because the lawyers don’t think they can make a profit off those cases with a 33 to 40 percent contingency fee.
In other words, the lawyers don’t think that the contingency fee will cover the costs and medical liens.
So, what happens if Uber’s ballot measure passes and that 33 to 40 percent contingency fee is reduced to 25 percent? Far more accident victims will see lawyers tell them they can’t represent them.
A Contingency Fee Cap Would Make It Harder or Impossible for Many Accident Victims to Hire a Lawyer
Many accident cases that are currently profitable for lawyers would become impossible for lawyers to accept if Uber’s ballot measure passes. Lawyers would lose money on these cases with a 25 percent contingency fee cap. 25 percent of the total recovery would not even cover the attorneys’ costs and the medical liens.
This is exactly what Uber wants. Less lawyers willing to take cases involving Uber accidents means less competition among lawyers. Less competition means Uber doesn’t face as much pressure to pay out fair settlements. This leads to victims settling quickly for low ball amounts, allowing Uber to substantially reduce its litigation and insurance costs.
A contingency fee cap would lead to lawyers avoiding:
- Complex cases which involve disputed liability
- Moderate-value cases
- Cases which involve catastrophic injuries and thus require substantial investment of resources
- Cases which require substantial expert testimony
This would lead to only low-litigation, high-volume firms accepting Uber cases, leaving accident victims with weaker representation if they can find it at all.
Perhaps worst of all, the most catastrophically injured accident victims may find it the hardest to find lawyers willing to take their cases, since their cases require the most investment from law firms.
In addition, not only would a 25 percent contingency fee lead to lawyers rejecting more accident cases, it would likely lead to personal injury law firms who specialize in auto accidents either going out of business entirely or transitioning into other practice areas.
In other words, a contingency fee cap would make it harder for accident victims to obtain legal representation by reducing the number of available attorneys and reducing the number of attorneys willing to take their cases.
This would be a huge problem for accident victims, as it is extremely unlikely that accident victims will be able to recover fair settlements without lawyers representing them.
A Contingency Fee Cap Would Lead to Accident Victims Having Weaker Representation and Recovering Less Money
Attorneys would be less willing to expend significant resources when handling accident cases if contingency fees were reduced to 25 percent.
Uber, and auto insurance companies in general, utilizes aggressive tactics in order to minimize their payouts, tactics like:
- Blaming victims
- Delaying claims
- Quickly offering lowball settlements
- Pressuring victims to accept settlements before they fully understand their injuries’ extent
- Disputing medical treatment
It costs law firms money to counter these tactics. Law firms being more reluctant to invest money into cases would mean that Uber would be able to settle more claims cheaply, as lawyers wouldn’t be able to counter these tactics as effectively.
In the end, Uber would win and accident victims would lose.
Ballot Measure Would Restrict Healthcare Options and Payouts
Uber’s ballot measure seeks to place limitations on the amount of money that accident victims can recover for medical treatment.
The ballot measure seeks to restrict the payouts that accident victims can receive to cover medical treatment, restricting them using standards based on health insurance, Medi-Cal and Medicare databases.
The ballot measure also seeks to restrict accident victims’ healthcare options.
The measure seeks to impose a higher standard of necessity for healthcare which isn’t covered by insurance, and seeks to limit the ability of lawyers to refer accident victims to healthcare providers who will treat them without charging them until their case is over.
How Restricting Payouts for Medical Treatment Would Hurt Accident Victims
Caps on medical payouts would leave accident victims with medical debt.
Regarding future or unpaid treatment, recoveries in accident cases would be tied to Medi-Cal/Medicare rates, which are often quite far below the actual bills.
This would mean that even after winning cases, accident victims would still owe large amounts of money for medical care. Excess costs would be shifted to patients and taxpayers.
This extra amount of money owed to healthcare providers would wipe out any extra profit that accident victims would make due to the contingency fee being 25 percent instead of 33 or 40 percent.
How Imposing a Higher Standard of Necessity for Healthcare Would Hurt Accident Victims
Uber’s ballot measure seeks to make it harder for accident victims to prove that their healthcare is necessary.
This would make it harder for accident victims to have their medical costs paid.
It would make it much easier for insurance companies to deny legitimate claims for treatment which is absolutely necessary.
Referrals and Liens
Personal injury attorneys in California refer clients to physicians and deal with healthcare providers to facilitate medical treatment.
When this happens, attorneys agree that providers can have liens against settlements or recoveries for treatments.
This allows clients who lack health insurance to obtain medical treatment and not be charged for it until their case is over.
Almost two million people in California lack health insurance and thus benefit strongly from this arrangement.
In addition, even accident victims with insurance face delays in medical treatment due to insurers delaying payments. Lien arrangements allow accident victims to get the treatment they need, when they need it, instead of having to wait for insurance payments to be approved.
How Restricting Referrals and Liens Would Hurt Accident Victims
Restricting referrals and liens would lead to accident victims having less access to care following accidents.
The ballot measure would prohibit many arrangements where doctors treat patients on liens.
This would lead to many accident victims not getting the medical care they need up front, particularly if they lack savings or health insurance.
What Happens If the Uber Ballot Measure Passes?
The ballot measure will be put on the November 2026 ballot if enough signatures are gathered.
The measure benefits corporate interests while making it harder for everyday people to find legal help and recover financial compensation after being injured in accidents.
The consequences for accident victims will be clear if the ballot measure is passed:
- They may lose the rights to secure fair compensation for injuries and hire attorneys on a contingency fee basis.
- It will be harder to find a lawyer after an accident because more lawyers will reject accident cases and fewer lawyers will be available to even consider accepting accident cases.
- Victims of catastrophic injuries will get hit the hardest, as it will be the hardest for them to find lawyers willing to invest money into their cases.
- Low-income communities will be harmed disproportionately, as they are more likely to use ridesharing services and less likely to be able to afford non-contingency-fee lawyers.
- Insurance companies will offer less money to accident victims, knowing that accident victims have reduced access to attorneys, and knowing that they will receive lower quality representation if they do find an attorney.
- Medical providers will end up demanding payments up front, leaving accident victims without timely, needed treatment for injuries.
- Accident victims will become financially devastated, losing homes, suffering bankruptcies, being unable to afford medical treatment, requiring government assistance for life, and experiencing indefinite financial instability.
FAQs
Does the Uber Ballot Measure Ban Contingency Fees?
No.
However, the ballot measure seeks to limit contingency fees in auto accident cases to 25 percent, rather than the current industry standard of 33 to 40 percent.
The end result of this would be:
- Accident victims would find it harder to find lawyers willing to take their cases.
- Accident victims who do get lawyers to take their cases would receive inferior legal representation since lawyers would be less willing to invest significant resources into representing them and investigating their cases.
- Accident victims would recover less money in the end due to receiving inferior legal representation.
Would This Law Only Affect Uber Cases?
No.
The changes sought by the ballot measure would affect all auto accident cases in California.
When Would the Measure Take Effect?
It is not yet clear when the measure would take effect if passed, as Uber is still in the process of gathering signatures.
When Should You Speak With an Uber Accident Lawyer?
Call us today for a FREE consultation at (800) 718-4658 or contact us if you or a loved one was injured or killed in an automobile accident.
Why Rideshare Accident Victims Choose Nadrich Accident Injury Lawyers
- We have been handling rideshare accident and auto accident cases since 1990.
- Our team provides responsive service, frequent case updates, reliable communication and 24/7 availability.
- We provide free consultations.
- Our contingency fee lawyers don’t charge any upfront or out-of-pocket fees and don’t charge any fee until we win the case.
- We aren’t afraid to go to trial, so we won’t ever settle for less from the insurance companies.
With decades of experience and a client-first approach, we are committed to helping injured rideshare accident victims pursue justice. Contact us today if you or a loved one was injured or killed in a car accident.
