> It rejected Uber's claim that the company itself was not liable, because, it argued, its drivers had the status of contractors rather than employees. I feel like money would be better spent raising awareness of service dogs and dealing with fraudulent (they do call it fraud, right?) service dogs than fining Uber.
Yes, makes no sense that anyone can register their pet as emotional support.
They're abusing a part of the law most people don't understand (and most companies don't want to add to the drama of even if they do). IANAL, but it was explained to me that you cannot ask basically anything about service animals, other than one thing: "What is your service animal trained to do?". Apparently, service animals are supposed to be trained to do one specific task for their owner. Otherwise, they're not actually service animals. Allowing that question allows companies to verify that the animal is actually a service animal... without offending the people who require the animal.
I was talking to a friend of mine who works for a museum of sorts. These not-service animals are causing problems for them. But they are strictly forbidden to say or do anything about any pet being claimed to be a service animal. I suspect it's because they either (a) don't understand the law, and so they're trying to avoid being liable to anything, and/or (b) they don't care enough and just want to avoid the drama the fraudsters will cause.
I've read comments from people with actual service animals saying they wish companies (airports, etc) would crack down on it though. Because these untrained animals are making their own very expensive animals look bad. AND the untrained animals will yip and snap and pester the real service animals.