Collectivization (or the Lack Thereof)

  Despite the increasing professionalization of food delivery apps, the employment of deliverers is still fragile. Even on apps with shifts, there is no consistent work or professional relationships. Due to the ‘horizontal’ nature of the profession, few deliverers come in contact with corporate employees of the food delivery apps. Deliverers are not under contract with these apps. They are in a sort of ‘intermediate stage’ between self employed and employee, mostly classified as ‘contractors’ - but a very limited form of contracted work as there are so few apps. One consequence of the lack of contract is no protection or health insurance. In France, most medical fees are covered by public insurance, but the idea of physical work and possible bike injuries becomes more problematic in countries where this is not the case. Compensation is also a contentious issue amongst delivery workers. In interviews in Lille, most deliverers thought that the apps took too much from them. The maximization of profit by platforms is further discussed in our section on the app-driver information asymmetry. 

There are many difficulties that come along with trying to organize and collectivize delivery workers to resist domination by the application. First, since this sector of the labour market is very new, there are no pre-existing unions to build off of. The organizational structure has to be totally original. Next, the lack of stable hours makes it difficult for many of the deliverers to meet up at the same time. The GPS tracking while deliverers are on the job also makes collective action harder. A final difficulty is the high turnover rates of deliverers, making those looking to professionalize and collectivize a minority. There have been some successful methods that deliverers have found to push back and work together. Shift switching has been one tactic used by Deliveroo workers to create more normal schedules for one another. Collective boycotts on picking up deliveries from certain restaurants have also been a useful tool to protest mistreatment. This strategy does not have to greatly decrease the workload of the deliverers, which is a plus because it allows them to still make money, but also decreases the effectiveness of the protest. Some deliverers have become ‘leaders’ allowing for bigger mobilizations like full night-long driver boycotts. This puts these leaders in a precarious position with the app though, as there is no official union structure. 

Image above: A deliveroo bikers' strike in Germany

Platforms have not made it easy to assess the actual work conditions of their deliverers by hiding data. It can be difficult to get real numbers about how many active workers a delivery app has (vs. Deliverers just registered but who do not sign in). Numbers like this could be used to find hourly wages, and real numbers about how many people are making food delivery apps a full time job. Otherwise, researchers and labour organizers alike have to rely on personal experience and potentially incomplete ethnographic surveys. One possibility that has arisen of working together to reduce the lack of knowledge around working conditions is crowdsourcing. FairCrowdWork.org is one such initiative focused on this issue. For the moment though, with a lack of collectivization possibilities, lobbying for regulations around food delivery apps and deliverers seems like a more promising option to influence working conditions. This returns to the idea of delivery workers being neither independent nor salaried workers. New, specific measures could be effective at improving the security of delivery workers for apps.