Woman banned from Uber over ‘offensive’ first name

A woman has been banned from using any Uber services as her first name is ‘Swastika,’ according to multiple media reports from the last week.

The woman, whose full name 'Swastika Chandra' translates to ‘good luck’ in Sanskrit, reportedly grew up in Fiji where the name is common.

Swastika told the site that she was trying to order food in October last year but the app banned her because she had used a “potentially offensive” word.

“I was putting in an order for food one afternoon and went to the payment stage and this pop-up came up saying, ‘Your first name is in violation and you need to change your name on the app,’” she told A Current Affair (ACA).

Speaking on ACA, Swastika said that she understood her name was associated with Adolf Hitler, the Nazi Party and the Holocaust but that she would not change it as she was proud of it.

“They don’t know that the Hindus used it for thousands of years before Hitler used it in the wrong way,” she said.

After a long five month wait, and intervention from The Hindu Council and NSW Attorney-General, Swastika was allowed to return to Uber where she could continue enjoying takeaways. 

The NSW Jewish Board of Deputies also backed Chandra.

 Uber's response to the incident

In a statement to news.com.au, Uber said it had apologized to Chandra and acknowledged its review of the matter took longer than it wanted.

“Uber is committed to facilitating a safe and welcoming environment for all users,” the company said.

“For that reason, Uber has a global policy of restricting access to users whose names entered into the Uber app contain potentially offensive words.

“We understand that there are different cultural nuances to names, and therefore our teams address incidents like this on a case-by-case basis to ensure we evaluate each account fairly.

“In this case, after reviewing MS. Chandra’s request, we reinstated her access to the app.

“We have apologized to Ms Chandra for the inconvenience this caused her, and we appreciate her patience as we reviewed the matter, which took longer than we hoped it would.”