The epidemic has led to an increase in the demand for food delivery, but the labor protection of food delivery workers has been criticized.
After Uber Eats announced that it would end its operations at the end of this month, two food delivery platforms, foodpanda and Deliveroo, will remain dominant in the market. Whether the treatment of delivery staff can be improved has become a topic of public concern.
Foodpanda food delivery workers broke out two industrial actions this year, and last month’s strike action, the labor side was more successful in forcing the employers to come to the negotiating table to reach a consensus. It was a labor movement that ignited the dawn of the "post-union era" after the dissolution of a large number of labor groups.
Among them, the newly established concern group "Abandon the Big Taiwan" is in the middle, uniting local and South Asian takeaways to fight for rights and interests. However, the union officials involved in the negotiations are not optimistic about the follow-up work and criticize the employers for using "big data". "Fighting", using a bunch of numbers to stifle humanized management. There are also workers in the labor union who are arguing for work-related injury cases, hoping to establish a successful case of litigation to establish an employment relationship that employers have been unwilling to recognize, and try to break the "fake self-employment" of the Internet economy. "The dilemma.
A weak-looking and childish 24-year-old girl Jiayong, the deliveryman of foodpanda, a food delivery platform, announced the launch of the two-day "Online Rejection" industrial operation on the 13th of last month. Three days ago, he was a deliveryman at Pandamart, San Po Kong. Distribute leaflets, calling on employees to respond.
Until the labor and management reached 15 agreements, Jiayong will still take a day to show up every week. The delivery staff understand the follow-up situation of the system throughout the day. Whether local or South Asian riders or infantry, they are willing to stop and talk with Jiayong. "Previous local drivers Don’t care about labor rights. My family is willing to be with you. I feel trustworthy.”
Be an ``infantry'' experience platform labor system
Jia Yong, who has a master's degree in gender studies at CUHK, did not have any elective subjects related to labor rights. When he joined the NGO Christian Industry Council in July last year, he focused on mental health issues. He never thought about contacting the food delivery industry. Until April of this year, she saw the food delivery platform becoming more and more popular under the epidemic. She registered as an "infantry soldier" and personally understood the status of the industry. As a result, she stepped into the "digital prisoner" dilemma.
"As a newcomer, I found myself well-behaved. I listened to system instructions and orders. I didn’t dare to kick orders or missed changes. As a member of the labor organization, I should know my work safety well, but I wanted to make up for it. Slowly, I risked a red light."
Experience the feeling of powerlessness that everyone talks about in the online system... Many game rules are not clear, you can only listen to the system instructions, there are many unsatisfactory working processes, but you have to listen well to the channel, completely surrender to the system, and accept It's hard labor.
Jia Yong, member of the Takeaway Rights Concern Group
The delivery time is not as expected and is warned or the account is frozen
She tried because of the difference between the estimated distance and the actual delivery time, the original scheduled time was 8 minutes from the Lok Fu subway station to Meidong Village, 1 km away. She had to spend a lot of effort on the slope and finally reached her destination after half an hour. , And because the delivery time was not as expected, she was warned by the system that her account had been frozen for repeated offenders, which made her reflect on the series of injustices faced by the delivery staff.
"In the online system, you can experience the feeling of powerlessness that everyone talks about... Many game rules are not clear. You can only listen to the system's instructions. There are many unsatisfactory work processes, but you have to listen to the channels and completely surrender to the system. Accept his labor."
In July of this year, some delivery staff were dissatisfied with the management’s repeated reductions in the unit price of delivery of meals and the lockdown of accounts without warning. The first wave of small-scale labor broke out, forcing the management to have physical meetings with laborers. She took the initiative to contact the delivery staff to accompany them in the negotiation. Opportunity to set up a concern group.
Until October, when another CUHK master's "infantry" Xiao Tang joined, the two finally formed a group and began to intensively join different WhatsApp and Telegram groups to collect opinions. Until the foodpanda delivery staff resented, they finally started on the 13th of last month. In conjunction with multiple regional groups of takeaways to announce the launch of the non-accepting industrial action, the takeaway rights concern group plays an important role. The seven-member group of labor representatives participating in the negotiations this time, two of which are Jiayong and Xiaotang's attention group member.
Takeaways abandon the big platform to organize an industrial action spontaneously
Jia Yong said bluntly that compared with the previous trade unions, this takeaway industrial action is different from the past. "You can't find the role of "big platform" or like a leader in this industrial action. It was always initiated by the workers. We hope to coordinate the labor movement in the middle. Take the largest foodpanda tg group as an example. The number of members is as many as 1,500. However, the South Asian riders speak Urdu in their messages, and the local riders speak the vernacular. We want to collect opinions and focus on discussions. , There will be an English voting option, and everyone can choose the next step."
Looking forward to successfully seeking compensation for work-related injuries from the takeaway platform
Afterwards, the labor and management reached 15 improvement agreements. The incident seemed to have ended, but Jia Yong pointed out that this was only the starting point for fighting for the rights and interests of the delivery staff.
"A Deliveroo driver was injured in a head injury in Sham Shui Po last September. He was on sick leave at his home. He only claimed 80,000 yuan for group personal accident injury insurance compensation, but he recovered the statutory holiday compensation through the Labour Relations Division. At the time, the management initially proposed a settlement plan before the 23rd of this month. As a result, they have recently informed that there is no employment relationship between the two parties and there will be no compensation.” She believes that in the final analysis, the food delivery platform does not want to bear the responsibility of the employer. The concern group will go to the hospital in the future. With the goal of "catching work-related injury cases", we urged the first lawsuit for delivery workers to successfully obtain compensation for work-related injuries from the delivery platform, and changed the entire industry ecology.
Labor and management reached an agreement to focus on issues that have not improved
He Hongxing, director of the Food and Hotel Workers’ Association, another involved in the negotiations, said that since the labor-management negotiations, the management has always given people the feeling of "holding first". The problem and the employer’s refusal to set up face-to-face consultation and support services only through the system. Although the employer promised to improve, the former claimed that it would not know whether the headquarters can complete the map after February next year, and the latter claimed that they would provide face-to-face support services at the Tsim Sha Tsui office. , But what kind of enquiries or requests for help will be handled. I don’t know if I ask 9 questions. What makes him even more chilling is that the management proposed to re-elect the labor representatives. Reshuffle the labor negotiation team to reduce the possibility of re-launching industrial actions.
"Employers use to fight big data, the system is not transparent, employees have no decision-making power, and Hong Kong laws have no regulation, so that the employers can wander through the legal system." Worried that the delivery staff are at a disadvantage under the system data.
The Free Workers Branch of the Service Industry Federation of the Federation of Trade Unions also followed up on 3 cases involving injuries to Uber Eats and foodpanda riders during takeaways.
The chairman of the association Wang Shile criticized that the takeaway platform has always claimed that the takeaway is a self-employed person. The two parties do not constitute any employment relationship. They do not provide any labor insurance, statutory holidays and other protections. The compensation under the Traffic Accident Injury Assistance Program is similar to "The takeaway accident is not the employer’s responsibility, but the taxpayer’s public money." The union is advancing one of the work injury cases to apply for legal aid. It will require the takeaway platform to pay compensation for work-related injuries.
Wang Shile, chairman of the Free Workers Branch of the Service Industry Federation (right), and his workers petitioned at the Labor Department, and the prescription representative accepted the letter.
(Photo by Zeng Fengting)
Trade unions: Hong Kong's laws cannot keep up with the development of the times
She also pointed out that Hong Kong’s labor laws are no longer keeping up with the development of the times. The Mainland has established a flexible employment protection law to protect the labor rights of freelancers. On the contrary, Hong Kong rests on its laurels. Every dishwashing application can be applied through the App, but the current application through the online platform cannot protect freelance workers on the Internet. Government departments need to treat it as amending the law."
FoodPanda: The delivery person is an "independent contractor"
A FoodPanda spokesperson responded that starting from the end of November, the company has used the official Telegram channel 6 times to explain the company's latest progress to the courier.
On the 20th and 22nd of this month, the first online "operation update exchange meeting" was held to explain the latest progress of 15 key points to the entire delivery team.
The company also met with the courier whom it met earlier to explain the details of the measures and how these measures can enhance the delivery experience.
The delivery staff made some suggestions at the meeting, and the company will continue to study and follow up. However, generally speaking, the progress of various measures is quite smooth and good, and most of the delivery staff are satisfied.
As for the relationship with the courier, foodpanda Hong Kong’s couriers are all "independent contractors" and have signed an "Independent Contractor Agreement" with the company.
Independent contractors have a lot of freedom and can choose their working hours and regions at will.
The company has always attached great importance to the safety of the couriers, so it provides free group accident insurance to each courier to provide them with protection against accidental injuries during delivery services.
In the process of applying to become a courier, the application form will clearly ask whether the courier is willing to accept the insurance, so that they can choose according to their needs, and emphasize that the safety of the courier is the primary consideration.
If the courier is unfortunately injured while providing the delivery service, they are highly encouraged to submit an insurance claim application to provide appropriate assistance.
Household delivery: free insurance protection for the delivery specialists
A spokesperson for Huhusong Hong Kong said that the food delivery specialists are important partners of Huhushang. The company has always attached great importance to their well-being and maintained close communication with them.
Hong Kong cooperates with more than 10,000 self-employed food delivery specialists and hopes that the delivery specialists can enjoy flexible work and feel at ease.
Therefore, starting from October 2018, Huhukou will provide 100% free insurance protection to all self-employed Huhukou food delivery specialists in Hong Kong and around the world, including personal accident insurance, income protection and public accident liability insurance.
If the food delivery specialist is injured during work and cannot continue to work, he will be able to claim compensation from the insurance company, and we will also provide assistance.
Uber Eats is out of service | The delivery staff said that the company did not mention the compensation arrangements for artificial injuries and was suspended for many days. Labor Promotion Department Investigates Foodpanda Strike|The courier submits 15 appeals, and labor negotiations are deadlocked for more than five hours
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