‘Partners’ in precarious working conditions
At times they are a blessing, delivering food, and offering convenience to many people at this age of physical distancing. At other times they bring inconvenience, particularly to in-person restaurant customers who now have to endure a longer wait time as food delivery apps compete for queue priority. They are our food delivery app riders.
I’ve experienced both such convenience and inconvenience recently as I slowly gained confidence in attending in-person activities. But I try not to mind the inconvenience of a long waiting time because of the food delivery app riders who are also in the queue. I think about the job that they have to take in today’s uncertain and difficult economy.
The food delivery industry in the country has grown tremendously in the last two years due in large part to the pandemic. Grab and Foodpanda are the two leading food delivery app companies in the Philippines based on the size of their market share.
The protest on Thursday by the United Delivery Riders of the Philippines (RIDERS) and the Kapatiran ng Dalawang Gulong (KAGULONG), however, showed the precarious situation that the literal movers of the industry are in. I used the word “precarious” because that is exactly the term used in a published study done by Parwez and Ranjan (2021) in India where the food delivery platform industry has also emerged as a sector offering new work opportunities.
The other day, food delivery app riders held a “Unity Ride and Protest” at downtown Cebu City to air their grievances regarding their reduced pay and benefits, among others. In a report by The FREEMAN, Jefren Abalo, convenor of RIDERS, was quoted as saying that the income of Grab delivery riders has been severely affected by high inflation and rising cost of fuel.
The riders demanded for fair fare matrix, reasonable pay for batching, reinstatement of their incentives, abolition of the delivery permit, and for their company to shoulder the costs of protecting their health and ensuring their safety.
For its part, Grab Philippines said that times are hard for everyone, and called for patience and understanding. Grab highlighted the fact that food delivery app riders are earning higher than minimum wage and are getting a bigger take-home pay compared to their peers in the transport sector.
A closer look into the industry, however, shows that reduced pay and benefits as well as health and safety concerns are just a symptom of a deeper cause ailing the platform economy sector. The terms of service of most of these companies all over the world show that they treat themselves as technology companies.
That means that they want to be regarded as mere platform providers for consumers to procure goods and services. In this set-up, the delivery riders are treated as “partners” or “independent contractors” together with the food providers (restaurants, food shops). These so-called platforms don’t consider themselves responsible for the acts or omissions of their partners who, by the way, are not to be treated as their employees, staff, or agents.
While the food delivery app service may have emerged as a sector offering new work opportunities, it is of late troubled by allegations of low wages and benefits and lack of social justice measures, thus “contributing to the process of precarisation.”
The situation clearly calls for regulators and policy makers, including legislators, to look more closely into those issued raised. In today’s technology-driven economics, it is the law that usually falls far behind rapidly-advancing technology.
Because of the nature of people, including many capitalists who can only sniff profits and short-term gains and could not look beyond the tip of their nose, a free market system is never perfect. It should not be overregulated but without regulation also, it can breed discontent and instability in society. Regulation serves to put humanity back into the system.
There is no simple way of moving forward with these developments, that’s for sure. But it will make a difference if we take pains to examine the issues emerging from the technology platform economy sector and the so-called gig economy.
We can start by being honest with our definitions. Workers and entrepreneurs need each other. But to regard food delivery workers using e-commerce platforms as “co-entrepreneurs” or “partners” is mental dishonesty. As recent studies show about the e-commerce platform industry, “precarity for the food delivery workers is strongly linked to contractual work arrangements and the absence of social protection.”
- Latest
