UberEats could be underpaying delivery drivers on 21% of trips • Hacker News Board

Re: UberEats could be underpaying delivery drivers on 21% of trips

#21

Post by artoonie » Mon, Aug 24, 2020, 4:34 PM UTC

dheera wrote: post #18

On a related note, I don't understand the point of tips on UberEats. (a) I thought the whole point of these apps was to simplify things for the user. I just want to know how much I pay in total, upfront, as I'm selecting food. Include taxes and delivery fees in a big fat "this is what you will pay" display on the screen and I'll be a 10X happier user. Delivery apps were a great opportunity to axe the complexities of…

(b) you can change your tip afterward if your service was not as expected.

Just like in a restaurant: maybe your default tip is 25%, but great service bumps that up, and bad service bumps it down. You go in expecting to pay 25%.

Re: UberEats could be underpaying delivery drivers on 21% of trips

#22

Post by dannyr » Mon, Aug 24, 2020, 4:35 PM UTC

nlosti wrote: post #16

Why do these articles always reach the front page? Does hackernews hate Uber that badly? Or perhaps its profitable for news articles to always rag on them? Why is it profitable? Does everyone want to see them fail? They're no worse than your run of the mill tech company, so I suspect something odd is going on. I dislike corporations in general and want to see them play fair, but Uber changed the way I live life, and…

"They're no worse than your run of the mill tech company"

So media should stop reporting on possible bad actions by Uber?

Excess coverage or not, the media exposed discrimination and harassments at Uber that led to the company changing for the better.

Re: UberEats could be underpaying delivery drivers on 21% of trips

#23

Post by ruined » Mon, Aug 24, 2020, 4:35 PM UTC

The salon source linked in the article has a bit more (and slightly different?) detailed information, including a link to the tool developed to track mileage

https://www.salon.com/2020/08/20/programmers-say-uber-eats-i...

https://chrome.google.com/webstore/detail/ubercheats/pkdblhe...

Re: UberEats could be underpaying delivery drivers on 21% of trips

#24

Post by nlosti » Mon, Aug 24, 2020, 4:36 PM UTC

dheera wrote: post #18

On a related note, I don't understand the point of tips on UberEats. (a) I thought the whole point of these apps was to simplify things for the user. I just want to know how much I pay in total, upfront, as I'm selecting food. Include taxes and delivery fees in a big fat "this is what you will pay" display on the screen and I'll be a 10X happier user. Delivery apps were a great opportunity to axe the complexities of…

Just like in the restaurant industry, it's a way to offload costs onto the customer. Luckily in UberEats you don't have to confront someone if you don't tip them and aren't at risk of getting the side-eye which happens a lot, particularly in America.

Re: UberEats could be underpaying delivery drivers on 21% of trips

#25

Post by freeone3000 » Mon, Aug 24, 2020, 4:36 PM UTC

nlosti wrote: post #16

Why do these articles always reach the front page? Does hackernews hate Uber that badly? Or perhaps its profitable for news articles to always rag on them? Why is it profitable? Does everyone want to see them fail? They're no worse than your run of the mill tech company, so I suspect something odd is going on. I dislike corporations in general and want to see them play fair, but Uber changed the way I live life, and…

They're a nightmarish zombie product of venture capital. They have never made a profit, and have lost more money in the past three months than most businesses will ever achieve ($5! BILLION!) with nothing to show for it, but they continue to exist as a testament to silicon valley hubris. They operate by ignoring laws, and pulling out once enforcement becomes effective. They have launched tracking programs specifically to lie to regulators. Their employees frequently do not make minimum wage, and there's no plan on even tracking this - attempts to force them to do so cause operational cessations.

In short, they are all of the evils of a short-sighted "tech" company in one package.

Re: UberEats could be underpaying delivery drivers on 21% of trips

#26

Post by prh8 » Mon, Aug 24, 2020, 4:36 PM UTC

nlosti wrote: post #16

Why do these articles always reach the front page? Does hackernews hate Uber that badly? Or perhaps its profitable for news articles to always rag on them? Why is it profitable? Does everyone want to see them fail? They're no worse than your run of the mill tech company, so I suspect something odd is going on. I dislike corporations in general and want to see them play fair, but Uber changed the way I live life, and…

Uber has changed your life for the better, by taking advantage of thousands of other people. Worrying about going back to the taxi Stone Age is actually worry about making things fair for those people.

Re: UberEats could be underpaying delivery drivers on 21% of trips

#27

Post by jariel » Mon, Aug 24, 2020, 4:37 PM UTC

tossaway842 wrote: post #2

What matters is the aggregate amount over multiple trips. If you underpay on some trips and overpay on others and it is a net wash, then it doesn't really matter for the couriers if the payment algorithm is on the low side on some trips so long as it is on the high side on other trips. Under or overpaying on trips is more of an interest to those engineers trying to optimize marketplace efficiency. Meal delivery busin…

If they are running a business, especially something at scale, and they are properly funded - they should be 'paying the right amount', there's really no excuses.

If they can snare people into driving for them, there are material switching costs for workers, and 'underpaying' on some level is actually something they can get away with.

At the 'low end of labour' workers generally have zero power, much less during covid, so it's not a 'marketplace' in the more broad sense. If it was, we wouldn't even need minimum wage laws, or Medicare for employed people etc..

If the technical challenge is 'insurmountable' then they need to figure something out: minimum guarnatees etc. , even over the aggregate, as you say.

Re: UberEats could be underpaying delivery drivers on 21% of trips

#28

Post by nlosti » Mon, Aug 24, 2020, 4:37 PM UTC

dannyr wrote: post #22

nlosti wrote: post #16

Why do these articles always reach the front page? Does hackernews hate Uber that badly? Or perhaps its profitable for news articles to always rag on them? Why is it profitable? Does everyone want to see them fail? They're no worse than your run of the mill tech company, so I suspect something odd is going on. I dislike corporations in general and want to see them play fair, but Uber changed the way I live life, and…

"They're no worse than your run of the mill tech company" So media should stop reporting on possible bad actions by Uber? Excess coverage or not, the media exposed discrimination and harassments at Uber that led to the company changing for the better.

It is disproportionately against Uber especially on HN. I haven't seen an article here about child labour in hardware companies in forever, but I definitely don't see them daily like Uber seems to have.

Re: UberEats could be underpaying delivery drivers on 21% of trips

#29

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Aug 24, 2020, 4:39 PM UTC

prh8 wrote: post #26

nlosti wrote: post #16

Why do these articles always reach the front page? Does hackernews hate Uber that badly? Or perhaps its profitable for news articles to always rag on them? Why is it profitable? Does everyone want to see them fail? They're no worse than your run of the mill tech company, so I suspect something odd is going on. I dislike corporations in general and want to see them play fair, but Uber changed the way I live life, and…

Uber has changed your life for the better, by taking advantage of thousands of other people. Worrying about going back to the taxi Stone Age is actually worry about making things fair for those people.

[deleted]

Re: UberEats could be underpaying delivery drivers on 21% of trips

#30

Post by [deleted] » Mon, Aug 24, 2020, 4:39 PM UTC

nlosti wrote: post #16

Why do these articles always reach the front page? Does hackernews hate Uber that badly? Or perhaps its profitable for news articles to always rag on them? Why is it profitable? Does everyone want to see them fail? They're no worse than your run of the mill tech company, so I suspect something odd is going on. I dislike corporations in general and want to see them play fair, but Uber changed the way I live life, and…

[deleted]