TRANSCRIPT
Anyone who delivers for UberEats knows that tone.
It's what drivers hear when the Uber app offers them a delivery to take on.
With the cost of living rising across Australia, more and more people are coming to know that tone, as they sign-up to become UberEats delivery drivers, or drivers for others like Menulog and Doordash.
How hard can it be to deliver food in a timely manner and for it to at least be warm?
All that should be involved is a driver picking up the food and delivering it.
But it's not that simple.
Roman is the manager of cafe and restaurant Wooden Mill in Mt Colah in Sydney's North Shore.
"Today, we had a situation and the driver came and everything was ready. It was ready to be picked up. So he picked it up. So he goes out, today. He goes out and he comes back in five minutes and says he's new in UberEats and he's confused about what the app is saying like, the address is too far away. And he was a bit lost. He had no idea and it was tough for him. He had no idea. It's always hard. I felt sorry for him, I don't know what happened, how that happened. Because he did pick it up. I don't know."
While this incident appears to be an honest mistake by an inexperienced driver, in other cases, it appears that food is going missing.
Mohammed owns Akawi Lebanese Cuisine and Seafood in Lakemba.
Once or twice a week on average, he faces issues with delivery drivers.
"We have so many problems with them. Some of them, we get the order, say two bags or three bags of food. Sometimes they deliver one and they take two. The customer calls us and they say we only received one part of the order, and all the other two bags disappeared. And sometimes the order didn't reach the customers. The customer calls and asks where's the order."
So what do you do? I mean, do you make the order again? Do you talk to Uber?
"We call Uber, or whatever the company is, and we just tell them what happened with the delivery driver, and we complain so many times about them. And they refund the money to the customer. Of course. It's up to the customer, sometimes they call back and order it again. Or sometimes they don't."
Mohammed adds that some drivers accept the delivery offer from the company they deliver for, go near the restaurant and indicate in the courier app that they have picked up the food.
A short time later they confirm in the app that they delivered the food, but the food was never picked up for delivery from the restaurant.
This means the driver gets paid for a delivery that never happened, thereby scamming the delivery service provider, and ultimately affecting the customer.
Just as those who order a delivery can see the status of the order in their app, restaurants have a tablet provided by the delivery service provider that informs them of the status of the delivery.
"Like I have order for Uber, Menulog or Deliveroo or whatever; The map on my tablet, the order has been delivered but I still have the order here, so the driver doesn't want to do his job, maybe he's got better job, he marks it as delivered. So he marks 'picked-up'? Yeah, he marks it as picked up and delivered. After five, 10 minutes, I receive a call from the customer, where's my food? Wow, that's embarrassing. I say the food is here, still here. The driver just marked it as picked up."
Mohammed has complained several times about certain drivers who he has come to know as being problematic.
He says little if anything is being done by delivery service providers.
"They say they try to fix it, to find another driver to pick up the food, or to find out who is the driver so they can call him and tell him what the situation is. At the end they say don't worry about it, we will refund the money to the customer, and that's it. But the same drivers keep coming back you say? Yes the same drivers. Same drivers."
There is something in the food delivery industry called multi-apping, where a driver who works with more than one delivery service provider, is accepting orders from all companies at the same time.
That is permitted by Uber, MenuLog and Doordash according to their driver agreement.
According to the agreement food delivery service providers enter into with drivers - drivers retain the complete right to simultaneously use other food delivery apps.
Hussein Faraj owns three restaurants and says most of the drivers he sees are multi-apping.
"They're all the same, all the same. Listen, it's the same drivers same drivers, Uber, Menulog, every driver is crossing platforms. So we get the same drivers. Drivers on MenuLog will also pick up an Uber, Uber order then pick up another order.
All at the same time?
Yeah, there is a shortage of drivers. When there's a shortage of drivers, there's a way for these guys to pick them up."
Hussein has all but stopped using delivery service providers for his restaurants as his businesses were receiving bad reviews due to drivers multi-apping and orders arriving cold or with missing items - if they arrived at all.
He says instead of blaming the delivery service, customers give his restaurants bad reviews on Google.
"The one thing that destroyed most people's business is the delivery apps. So either Uber or Menulog or Deliveroo. All of these have actually ruined everything to do with our businesses. First and foremost, we lost a lot of customers based on ratings, but it was their lack of proficiency and their lack of delivering on time. So they would pick up orders, they wouldn't get to people for half an hour, 40 minutes after they pick it up. Or they will take the order, they will say they're waiting for the order at the business, when they wouldn't be there at all. They will pick it up 15 minutes, 20 minutes later. The food goes very cold. By the time they get it to the customer, we get bad reviews. Really, I can guarantee you we lost so much customers because of Uber."
He says he has lost thousands of dollars and encourages other businesses to stop using delivery service apps.
"We've actually lost more than $7,000, because we had the apps always on, so about 10K in deliveries. And now literally, if we turn the machines on, we turn them on only when it's quiet. And only when we have no choice. Uber, itself as a concept, has destroyed businesses. The fact that it takes so much money, we lose money, because food doesn't have much profit anymore, remember that. So with Uber's share right now you're making no money on these delivery apps, barely. Everyone's too scared to stop them because they think it's better to have some kind of turnover that no turnover."
By accepting deliveries from different apps, drivers have less downtime between orders, and therefore earn more.
This driver who chose not to give his name has completed more than 7,000 deliveries for UberEats.
He says multi-apping can occur without causing issues, if drivers accept only one delivery at a time.
He also blames restaurants for printing out dockets that indicate to the delivery service provider that the order is ready, when it is not.
He says this leads leading to drivers having to wait for an excessively long time and cancelling the delivery.
"All the platform is very very synchronised very. If you do other app they'll know about it. Uber or DoorDash will not punish them unless they're doing it the wrong way, they'll punish. And the restaurant chains also sometimes like, you go there, the food is not ready. They print the docket out. You know what I mean? They're also very dodgy. Especially some of the restaurants which are not franchised restaurants, they do that. The food is not ready they print out the docket already. We stay there an extra 15-20 minutes, Okay. We're not gonna get that extra pay because they already print out the docket."
The reality for some, especially those on electric scooters and bicycles, is that they make less than minimum wage.
In early November, 2023 Utsav Bhattarai shared his experience with a Senate Inquiry on Industrial Relations.
"I work 40 to 60 hours every week and sometimes even 80 hours to make the basic survival payments to pay my bills yet, if I speak to someone they asked me if you're getting paid $15 - $20 An hour, why do you work for them? And they don't ask them why are they paying me $15 $20 I started because I thought it's going to be flexible. Yes, it is flexible to sign in and sign out. But rest, it is not I do not have any flexibility in terms of accepting orders. Do not have any flexibility in terms of where I want to go and where I do not want to go. ... It's paying me $20 and even less than that an hour without super without any personal leave. Without any sick leave. Nothing we just want our basic basic minimum wage is $26 per hour. That's it that's all I want."
SBS reached out to Uber for this story but the company declined to comment.
