Food delivery and ride hailing workers in BC have expressed that they are paid less and sometimes even earn less than the minimum wage. Their concerns are highlighted in a “what we heard” report recently published by the province.
The BC government started a public engagement process in fall 2022 about app-based ride-hailing and food-delivery work. This included an online survey, as well as meetings and roundtable sessions with workers, platform companies, labour and business organizations, academics and researchers.
Feedback gathered through the Province’s public engagement has been compiled into a “what we heard” report.
“We recognize that British Columbians have embraced ride-hail and food-delivery services, but most people involved in the sector agree there is room for improvement,” said Harry Bains, Minister of Labour. “We are working together with workers, with platform companies and with others on solutions to improve working conditions and protections.”
A number of themes emerged from the engagement. Overall, workers value the flexibility of this work, but they have concerns about low and unpredictable earnings, the costs of fuel and vehicle maintenance, the transparency of pay for assignments, and “deactivations” from a platform, i.e. termination.
Most platform companies indicated their support for improving working conditions, including guaranteed minimum earnings, as long as flexibility for workers is maintained.
The survey asked, “Do you have any other comments about your experiences with gig work that you would like to share?” In response, calls for a minimum hourly rate and a higher per-job rate, were among the top themes. This aligns with the input received at in-person roundtable meetings in which ‘higher, more-predictable pay’ was consistently raised as a top priority.
“I love being a ride-hail driver, but I work long hours and have to deal with the wear and tear on my car. I have family members to care for and I am not being compensated fairly for the time and effort I invest in my job. I hope the conditions for drivers like myself improve soon,”Kuljeet Singh, Uber driver in the Lower Mainland said.
App-based workers must cover their own fuel and vehicle maintenance costs. Workers stated that significant increases in gas prices can have a real impact on how much money they end up making at the end of the day after they subtract their vehicle costs to operate. Workers further indicated that the cost of gas and for vehicle maintenance can be difficult to predict, making planning and budgeting difficult. In the online survey when workers were asked what protection they would like to see for app-based workers, “support for capital costs” was the most common response.
In some cases, workers told the payment offered for an assignment2 is less than the cost of gas that would be required to complete the assignment. However, because workers feel pressure to maintain certain assignment ‘acceptance rates’, they feel compelled to accept these money-losing assignments.One issue raised by workers – in a number of different contexts – was the pressure to maintain a high assignment acceptance rate. Workers emphasized that they value being able to accept or decline orders, but also noted the many incentives they face to maintain a high order-acceptance rate. The minimum assignment acceptance rates and the incentives workers receive to maintain them vary between platforms and can be significant.
Workers are not paid for the time they spend waiting for assignments (un-engaged time). They reported that the more time spent waiting, which at times can be significant, means the lower the pay at the end of the week.
According to the report, Workers felt that 100% of tips from customers should be passed on to workers and noted that did not always happen.
“Through our engagement, we learned there can be serious vulnerabilities for some app-based ride-hail and food-delivery workers,” said Janet Routledge, Parliamentary Secretary for Labour. “Gig workers, like everyone who works in our province, deserve to be treated fairly. That is the foundation of our effort to make work more reliable and less precarious.”
In recent years there has been significant growth of the gig economy where income is earned outside of a traditional employment relationship.
