Delivery executives of food aggregator Swiggy have been on strike in Chennai since Tuesday, 20 September, demanding better pay for their services.
The stir led to a disruption in services, with several users complaining on Twitter about a large number of restaurants being unavailable for delivery in the locations where workers are striking, or about extremely long delivery timelines.
Swiggy's delivery workers have alleged that the proposed revised structure will lead to a steep decline in income – at least of Rs 5,000 per week – and that after paying for expenses such as petrol, they will have hardly anything left, according to MoneyControl.
"They have given Rs 24 as petrol allowance per day, which works out to Rs 168 per week. In reality, we spend Rs 200-Rs 250 a day. How can we manage with such low payment,” an executive told The Hindu.
What Do the New Rules State?
According to the new rules, executives have to finish 180 orders a week to earn Rs 11,500, MoneyControl stated.
A delivery executive told the news portal that 180 orders would require them to complete 26 orders a day every day of the week, which will require them to be on the road for over 16 hours.
There are five shifts per day and the employees have been asked to work two shifts during the week and three during the weekend.
As per a communication by Swiggy to its delivery partners, on completion of 110 orders the pay is Rs 7,000, 125 orders for Rs 7,500, 140 orders for Rs 8,500, 160 orders for Rs 9,750, with the 180 order slab being the highest one.
Even on completion of 179 orders, there would be a loss as it would fetch only Rs 9,750.
Some weekly incentives are being done away with as well. “If you earn Rs 3,500, you earlier got Rs 1,500 as weekly incentive. Now, that too has been removed,” the delivery partner quoted above said.
What Has Swiggy Said?
In a statement, Swiggy said the new payout structure is created to provide more flexibility to the delivery worker “while ensuring that they are able to earn well with us irrespective of the platform orders.”
“There are no changes to how much Swiggy's delivery executives have the potential to earn or how long they have to work. We are in continuous discussion with our delivery executives to help them understand their payouts better, and are confident of them resuming deliveries at the earliest,” MoneyControl quoted a Swiggy spokesperson as saying.
Earlier also, delivery executives from Swiggy have protested in metro cities across the country over poor compensation. Last year, some delivery partners from Swiggy as well as Zomato took to Twitter to highlight the various issues they and their colleagues face.
Such delivery partners are reportedly often overworked, underpaid, and uninsured.
(With inputs from MoneyControl and The Hindu.)
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