This is the harshest clause in the document. You promise to defend and pay for every claim, loss and legal fee arising from your use of the app, not just from your misconduct. Mere use is enough to trigger it, no fault required. The list of people you must protect is long, covering Uber, its affiliates, directors, officers, employees, attorneys, representatives, licensors and even other users. There is no cap, no reasonableness limit on legal fees, no carve out for claims caused by Uber's own negligence, and no matching promise from Uber to you.
Uber can amend or replace these terms at its own discretion at any time, simply by posting a notice, sending an in app message or emailing you. There is no advance notice window, no definition of what counts as a material change, no version archive and no right to reject a change other than to stop using the service. Uber can also restrict or shut down features without any announcement and without liability. The one meaningful safeguard is that Uber commits to following Article 548-4 of the Japanese Civil Code, which limits unilateral changes to standard terms to those that benefit you or are reasonable, and requires notice before they take effect.
The terms themselves say very little about your data and push almost everything to a separate privacy notice, which for Japan is linked only in Japanese. What the terms do confirm is significant: registration requires your phone number and credit card, your GPS location is captured and sent to drivers, and Uber shares data with partners such as Lime. There are no retention limits, no security promises, no breach notification commitment and no user controls described anywhere in this document. Anything you post is treated as non confidential by default.
Uber can cut off your account immediately, at any time, with no advance warning, if it decides you breached any provision or are simply using the service improperly. There is no appeal process, no cure period, no graduated warning system and no mention of exporting your ride history or receipts before you lose access. Uber also reserves the right to refuse you service without giving any reason at all. The only real protection you get is that you can close your own account whenever you want.
You are bound simply by using the app, with no separate click to agree and no plain language summary of what you are signing up for. The scope is at least honestly drawn: the document names Uber Japan as your counterparty, sets an adult age floor with a separate teen account route, and clearly excludes Uber Eats. The weak point is the pile of documents pulled in by reference, including a Japanese only Travel Agent Contract PDF and community guidelines Uber can change alone, plus supplemental terms that override the main terms and that you accept just by continuing to use the service.
There are no subscriptions or auto renewals here, which removes the usual trap, but the pricing terms lean heavily Uber's way. Uber can set, remove and revise fares at any time, and it tells you outright that the final charge may differ from the upfront estimate. Every amount is due immediately, and if your main card fails Uber can silently charge a backup card on file. The document contains no refund policy at all, and the cancellation fee rules live on an external help page Uber can amend whenever it likes. On the positive side, you get upfront estimates, in app fare display, emailed receipts and no obligation to tip.
Uber caps what it can ever owe you at roughly 2,000 USD for taxi and Lime services and at just 500 Euros for ridesharing, and only for ordinary, direct damages you can actually prove. For a service that puts you in a moving vehicle, those figures are very low. Uber also disclaims responsibility for the ride itself and tells you to take complaints to the driver instead. Two things soften this: the cap does not apply to Uber's willful conduct or gross negligence, and Japanese travel agency rules impose separate compensation duties on packaged tours.
The license you grant over your ratings, reviews and other posts is broad in reach but narrower than many platforms use. Uber gets a worldwide, royalty free right to use, reproduce, distribute and disclose your content to third parties, with no attribution to you and no payment. On the plus side, it does not claim ownership of your content, does not list modification, derivative works or sublicensing rights, and is capped by whatever applicable law allows. The sharper edge is elsewhere: any idea, suggestion or feedback you send Uber becomes Uber's property outright, and Uber can delete your content at its sole discretion.
This is the strongest section for you. Unlike Uber's terms in many other countries, there is no forced arbitration, no class action waiver, no jury trial waiver, no shortened deadline for bringing claims and no loser pays fee shifting. Japanese law governs, which keeps mandatory Japanese consumer protections in play. The drawback is the venue: every dispute must go to the Tokyo District Court as the exclusive first instance court, which is a real burden if you live far from Tokyo, and no small claims carve out is offered.