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UberEats could be underpaying delivery drivers on 21% of trips

businessinsider.com

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

#141

Post by curryst »

jawns wrote: post #92
cactus2093 wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just 17% of Uber and Lyft drivers surveyed want to remain full-time employees [0]. How does this not stop this whole conversation in its tracks immediately? There's so much grandstanding about this, you and every other politician or upper middle class tech worker has their takes on how these poor drivers are being tricked into bad deals they can't understand and need the protection of full-time employment. But it's n…

It's not surprising that only a minority would want to be full-time employees. But that's the wrong question. The better question is: What percentage would want to be either full-time or part-time employees? I would imagine the percentage would be much higher. When classified as part-time employees, they'd have much of the same flexibility they currently enjoy, but they would at least be covered under minimum-wage la…

Does being an employee change their liability at all? In CA they seem to be willing to meet some pay and health insurance demands, so I wonder what part of the employee relationship they're opposed to. Is it firing and unemployment?

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

#142

Post by ithinkinstereo »

rrrrrrrrrrrryan wrote: post #111
zepearl wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's not hard to imagine them choosing to pursue Amazon-style vertical integration where they own the "restaurants" themselves. I always wondered something about those meals that are available on airplanes: in the past I liked quite a lot most of them (e.g. a small piece of meat/fish/other, some vegetables and/or rice, a slice of bread, a small dessert) => wouldn't it be quite profitable to have a similar delivery…

Switzerland is strange because restaurant food is so tremendously expensive there compared to the rest of the world. In most cities in America, for $5 you can get a half-decent meal that's quite a bit more palatable than airline food, and for $10 you can get something from (mostly immigrant-run) restaurants that's somewhat nutritious as well. There are meal-delivery services here that are basically what you describe,…

It's getting harder and harder these days to get a good meal in the US for under $10 all-in w/ tax outside of rural super low COL areas.

In any of the major urban areas in the states, a $5 budget would limit you to various street foods (a couple of tacos, a banh mi, maybe a slice of pizza) or a couple of items from the dollar menu at the various fast food chains. Frankly, your typical airline meal is more filling and nutritious (but not as tasty, unless you're flying a middle eastern or flagship asian airline, of course).

A decent McDonald's meal for example, would blow up your $5 budget pretty easily.

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

#143

Post by ithinkinstereo »

barkingcat wrote: post #106
vkou wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because any food business already has insanely tight margins, and operates incredibly efficiently. The scenario proposed by the grandparent poster adds so much waste and slack and overhead in the system that the family-owned-and-operated Thai kitchen on Main St. will eat Uber's lunch, and the Dominos franchise two doors down from it will pick through its bones.

the family operated kitchen on Main St. has rent, fire codes, safety equipment needs, some form of sanitation code/inspection to pass with the city. Uber Chef ignores all of that and bypasses all overhead - you don't need a restaurant or even the physical location of a building to employ chefs to cook food. No need for health inspections or expensive fire suppression equipment. (you use people who want to rent their…

I recall some East-Bay based startup a few years ago that basically tried this model.

They allowed individuals to sell food / operate as a pop-up restaurant.

IIRC, it got closed down because of health and food-safety related regulations.

A more sustainable version of this business model is basically a food truck / cart.

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

#144

Post by zepearl »

rrrrrrrrrrrryan wrote: post #124
zepearl wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thanks for the reply - I agree & disagree with you. On one hand you are absolutely correct stating that swiss restaurants are in general more expensive than anywhere (subjective - e.g. a 30$ small menu might be ok here, but we do have as well a higher income and going to the restaurant is not something that people do often), but on the other hand I did like airline food (which you basically describe as being "the wor…

I can expand upon the $5 - $10 meal by example. I'm from southern California. I worked in Wellington, New Zealand for a stint, and I found that restaurants were priced about the same as back home. That is to say, an average sit-down restaurant meal of equivalent quality was roughly the same price in USD. However, in America, there's an entirely different class of much cheaper food (takeout food), and younger people i…

Interesting! Thank you :)

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

#145

Post by zepearl »

curryst wrote: post #140
zepearl wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's not hard to imagine them choosing to pursue Amazon-style vertical integration where they own the "restaurants" themselves. I always wondered something about those meals that are available on airplanes: in the past I liked quite a lot most of them (e.g. a small piece of meat/fish/other, some vegetables and/or rice, a slice of bread, a small dessert) => wouldn't it be quite profitable to have a similar delivery…

I use a company called Snap Kitchen for that (no affiliation). They have a menu, I pick what meals and how many I want. Twice a week they cook the food, package it up, and deliver it to my door. Let's you pick how many calories per day you're aiming for, and if you're on one of a couple dozen diets they support they'll limit the auto-suggested meals for you. The food tastes pretty good. It's better than frozen food,…

Yes, eating only this way would end up becoming expensive - but I would do it as well ~2-3 times per week, at least to have a break from cooking and to eat something different.

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

#146

Post by Psyonic »

barkingcat wrote: post #106
vkou wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because any food business already has insanely tight margins, and operates incredibly efficiently. The scenario proposed by the grandparent poster adds so much waste and slack and overhead in the system that the family-owned-and-operated Thai kitchen on Main St. will eat Uber's lunch, and the Dominos franchise two doors down from it will pick through its bones.

the family operated kitchen on Main St. has rent, fire codes, safety equipment needs, some form of sanitation code/inspection to pass with the city. Uber Chef ignores all of that and bypasses all overhead - you don't need a restaurant or even the physical location of a building to employ chefs to cook food. No need for health inspections or expensive fire suppression equipment. (you use people who want to rent their…

If you use your home kitchen commercially, you'll still need to get health inspections, etc. Even camp kitchens at Burning Man (https://burningman.org/event/preparation/health-safety/permi...) get visits from health inspectors.

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

#147

Post by sneak »

cortesoft wrote: post #82
iso1631 wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only reason I could think of to use something like ubereats, deliveroo, justeat, etc would be if I wanted a non-pizza delivered while I was staying in a hotel in a strange city somewhere. If I'm at home I'll look at the menu of my favourite indian/chineese/whatever place, phone them up, and they deliver it as they have done for decades. I've spent two nights in a hotel since March, normally it's 70 a year. One ni…

I get so frustrated when people act like these food delivery services aren’t a WAY better user experience than the old version of having to call for delivery. So many times, I will be super busy with the kids, or work, or housework, and I will just pull up DoorDash with one hand (while the other is feeding a hangry 1 year old) and hit ‘reorder’ on one of my past meals. Literally 15 seconds and food is on the way. Com…

I wonder if there's a business in building apps specifically for individual restaurants (chains or even local ones, using cookie-cutter apps) that integrates card processing and such; white label doordash. The business would pay a flat monthly fee for the service and would have to have their own delivery people. Apple Pay et c make the payment side of things painless and prevents people having to re-enter details in each app.

Why isn't this a thing? Is it that few/no restaurants have delivery drivers?

I can't imagine many restaurants benefit that much from the discovery features in UE/DD/etc.

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

#148

Post by cortesoft »

sneak wrote: post #147
cortesoft wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I get so frustrated when people act like these food delivery services aren’t a WAY better user experience than the old version of having to call for delivery. So many times, I will be super busy with the kids, or work, or housework, and I will just pull up DoorDash with one hand (while the other is feeding a hangry 1 year old) and hit ‘reorder’ on one of my past meals. Literally 15 seconds and food is on the way. Com…

I wonder if there's a business in building apps specifically for individual restaurants (chains or even local ones, using cookie-cutter apps) that integrates card processing and such; white label doordash. The business would pay a flat monthly fee for the service and would have to have their own delivery people. Apple Pay et c make the payment side of things painless and prevents people having to re-enter details in…

This loses such a big advantage that the current services have... only entering your information once and being able to order from any restaurant in a single portal.

As for discovery, I don’t have data, but I know personally that about half of my regular order spots are places I found by scrolling through door dash.

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

#149

Post by iso1631 »

iso1631 wrote: post #62
ab_testing wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

COVID-19 is like the golden age of food delivery. If these food delivery apps are not profitable now, they will probably never be profitable. When the severity of COVID subsides in a few years, people will like to go out to eat again rather than have it delivered.

The only reason I could think of to use something like ubereats, deliveroo, justeat, etc would be if I wanted a non-pizza delivered while I was staying in a hotel in a strange city somewhere. If I'm at home I'll look at the menu of my favourite indian/chineese/whatever place, phone them up, and they deliver it as they have done for decades. I've spent two nights in a hotel since March, normally it's 70 a year. One ni…

> but I don't see it for takeaways

.... from somewhere new

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

#150

Post by novok »

cortesoft wrote: post #148
sneak wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder if there's a business in building apps specifically for individual restaurants (chains or even local ones, using cookie-cutter apps) that integrates card processing and such; white label doordash. The business would pay a flat monthly fee for the service and would have to have their own delivery people. Apple Pay et c make the payment side of things painless and prevents people having to re-enter details in…

This loses such a big advantage that the current services have... only entering your information once and being able to order from any restaurant in a single portal. As for discovery, I don’t have data, but I know personally that about half of my regular order spots are places I found by scrolling through door dash.

Shopify for restaurants, with shopify pay?
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