I was laid off my stressful job when the pandemic decided to try food delivery, enticed with the notion that I can decide when to work and no one to boss me around. It was great until it was no longer the case ever since the introduction of multi-customer pickup and UberEATS and their continuous attempt to underpay their delivery drivers.
Somewhat recently they introduced Multi-customer pickup is when one delivery driver goes to two different restaurants to pick up order for two different customers.
UberEats sold this to us by telling us we’re going earn more money with the new system but it couldn’t be further from the truth. Normally each delivery gives us a base fare of 300 yen and additional fare based on how far the customer is.
With the Multi-customer system, we’re not given the 300 yen base fare for the second or third pickup, only for the first one. We’re only given their rate for the distance. Customers pays for the base fare but UberEATS pockets them.
Not only does UberEATS deprive it’s drivers the base fare but also deprives orders that other drivers needs.
Back then delivery drivers greet each other thanking for their hardwork, now we’re seething at other drivers recieving orders
Circumstances can be different depending where you live for sure but I live in okachimachi which is just few minutes from Ueno, Akihabara, Chuo, Asakusa. I cannot fathom how I and others can be waiting at the center of a mega food district for 30+ minutes without a new order and we’re not even paid for waiting nor are we paid for waiting for the restaurant to complete your order.
What’s even worst is that I can be sent off to deliver to a far off residential area with no restaurants nearby to get new orders from so I have to bike back to the commerical area wasting another 30 or so minutes.
Since the orders are far few in between, drivers will take anything that comes their way no matter how criminally low the fare they’re presented. I was once forced to take a 4.5 kilometers delivery for 400 yen (usually around 650 yen). You can say I can always decline the order but given it takes another 15-30 minutes for me to get another order, it seems like a complete waste not to take it.
As a result of all of the things I’ve mentioned, it came to no surprise for me that people are complaining about how UberEats drivers can be careless people, they’re not paid enough to care. I can work for 9 hours straight and just make 5000 yen per day
Don’t even get me started on the rating system which is utterly garbage, customer blames everything on the drivers.
Food not sealed properly? Drivers fault. Restaurant gave you the wrong order? Drivers fault. Food came in late because the restaurant decided to take their sweet time to cook your food? Driver’s fault.
There is no way for us drivers to control the situation with the rating, we’ll get low ratings now matter how hard we try which also impacts how much order we receive.
It’s a self perpetuating cycle of disaster.
40 comments
That sucks, but it sounds like it’s time for you to change jobs? It’s not meeting your needs or expectations anymore.
Tough gig.
Might be time to look for a new one.
Thanks for the post and good luck.
Hate to say it but the only way to improve the situation is to quit or refuse to take the bum jobs. At least you’re planning to do that but it seems like even as Uber lowers the payments they still have plenty of delivery people, so it’s likely they’ll just keep making it worse until people get fed up and stop doing it.
Also considering how Japanese people rate a shop low for very petty reasons, I can only imagine how bad it must be for the delivery, they’d never be able to have the same standards as in other countries where under 4 stars means you’re finished.
Saw an Uber eats driver on a bicycle blow a red crossing line causing a driver turning right to slam on their brakes.
Sounds like a shit system designed to fuck the drivers so they take drastic steps to make money
Do you get to pocket the tips at least?
Do people tip their UberEats delivery drivers?
Wow, I did it back in 2020, and I was making solid 20-30 k per day, seven days a week. Never would have thought it would go down like this.
Uber was fantastic back in 2017 when I started. We could easily average 2,000 yen per hour for the whole day, and 3,000 only working busy times. Then the pay started gradually declining: The base pay used to be very easily calculable based on distance, now it’s “dynamic based on current market needs.” We used to get 30-50% extra by working downtown; that gradually changed to 10%, then eliminated altogether. The weekend incentives (“complete 8 deliveries this morning to get an extra 3,000 yen”) dropped to 200-300 yen, then switched to a random lottery, then was eliminated altogether. Meanwhile, support who used to be Japan-based and able to change stuff has been off-shored to people using machine translators and with no authority to actually help anything.
They’re a terrible company and their business model was never actually sustainable once they were expected to actually turn a profit.
Uber pocketing the 300 yen base fee on multi-delivery is criminal. They’re so willing to just add surcharges to every part of the process. Charge the customer more for the food (and charge the restaurant more for listing the food). Charge drivers more for “access to delivery jobs”. All so that a bunch of IT dorks can sit on their ass being super overpaid and patting themselves on the back for having invented the notion of a dispatch system.
Just curious, if you as a driver accidentally hit a car or a pedestrian while on a delivery, is the responsibility solely to you?
I don’t think the customer is blaming the person delivering the food. From a customer’s perspective, you are asked to select the problem (e.g. missing item, spilled food, etc) and take photos. There is no option to blame. Uber’s system will determine this.
I did UberEats back in 2020 (beginning of pandemic) for about 6 months in Tachikawa, and could very much relate with this one
>What’s even worst is that I can be sent off to deliver to a far off residential area with no restaurants nearby to get new orders from so I have to bike back to the commerical area wasting another 30 or so minutes.
Like at least a third of my orders were to deliver a food from Tachikawa to Hino (neighboring city, have to cross the Tama River bridge), then since it’s a super residential area I had to cycle back to Tachikawa every time.
Base food price is marked up horribly too- a bowl of ramen costs 800 eat-in but 1400 in the app excluding delivery fee… all pocketed by Uber and I receive what, 400 yen? Quickly stopped delivering after my 100th delivery, mostly because I finally got a part-time in a konbini near my place.
You should definitely change the job and so do other drivers. The lowest pay in Tokyo is 1113 yen from this October. If you work for a supermarket for 7 hours, you can make 7791 yen per day, which is much better than what you make now. I work part-time for a supermarket in Kanagawa and we are always shorthanded.
Thanks for your perspective on this.
Multi-order pick ups seem awful all around. I’ve had multiple orders arrived completely cold because the driver gets stuck waiting for food at the second location. Certainly been making me think it’s time to stop using them.
For what it’s worth, the app makes it very hard, in my opinion, to file a complain in such a way that it doesn’t look bad on the driver. I tried to complain about the cold food and slow delivery without blaming the driver but it was quite hard to find such an option.
So you’re saying the gig economy, which sold itself as being able to pay you more because it was unregulated and you were an independent contractor then took massive losses by overpaying it’s contractors to drive number of participants up and other delivery services out of business is finally having a correction in it’s pay scale and reality?
Uber would like a word with you young person.
Demae would be a better deal, yeah?
Avoid all these techbro money skimming operations, ubereats, airbnb etc. They are designed to make money off YOU, avoid taxes and skirt regulations.
What about the tips. I’m eager to hear if people are tipping ?
Uber is infamous for ripping off their drivers for a reason.. disgusting that they’re pocketing the base fare completely.
Uber Eats is just another greedy business that charges too much for what you get, and doesn’t pay their staff enough.
I hope you can find a better job soon.
Sadly, Uber has little incentive to change as long as there are drivers willing to work under these conditions and customers willing to pay the inflated costs.
Uber could make some changes, like ignoring bad driver reviews which are clearly the fault of the restaurant or somehow moving them to the restaurant instead of the driver.
I wouldn’t expect other changes until the system starts to breakdown and impact their bottom line.
done that for deliveroo for 2y in france and spilled a good dozen of maccies’ due to diagonal posture on the bike, the way to win in this game is to not play it. Rules keep worsening (“free shift”, “multi-ordering”, “distance/rate adjustment” and other terminology/propaganda they come up with every driver knowing it’s a regression in their end income — not even considering how dangerous this job is for the mere need it fulfills), i guess japan is no different in that regard, i hope you save and use your income diligently OP as this is a temporary job 100%
Uber is a disgracefully shit company that treats their workers badly and pays awful wages, the drivers are generally reckless maniacs, the food always arrives lukewarm and they rip off honest local restaurants by taking an obscene cut. Fuck Uber, I will honestly never ever order anything from them ever.
I’ve never used a food delivery service even once in my life and never will.
This sort of atrocious business model only serves to validate my decision.
Have you considered using Demaecan or Wolt? I can’t imagine they would pay that much better but I think Uber is the worst of the worst.
As a customer it’s a scam as well.
It’s ridiculous how the prices on the app are inflated by 20-30%. Plus a 10% service charge on top of your order + a fee if you’re under a certain amount (even if you’re subscribed to Uber) + delivery fee if you’re not subscribed or under a certain amount.
Just an example : kfc’s twister’s store price is 380 in the app it’s 490. If you order that alone you get a 150 small order charge+49 service fee+100 delivery fee = 789. That’s almost a 100% increase.
I don’t see any plus sides to be a delivery driver for these companies. As you said, everything is your fault and you get paid shit.
I’ve heard a narrative a couple years back that DEMAE takes care of it’s drivers, they have a union, etc. It’s that still the case, or have things changed with DEMAE as well?
You should make a strike all the drivers until Uber improves your rates, in my country they all together started a strike and after few days the conditions magically improved
Thanks for this perspective. This looks like a race to the bottom – only the most desperate drivers will take the deliveries and they’ll have no bargaining power ever. Uber and others don’t care, all that money they’re saving is going towards replacing the drivers with automation. Unfortunately I don’t see a way out of it.
This “self employed” contractor gig economy bullshit you see in Uber Eats or MLMs is just corporations squeezing profits from places where it’s already been squeezed dry while absolving themselves of any responsibility. It’s evil.
I do 出前館 full time after getting laid off due to getting ill. I make around 50万円 monthly with my scooter.
I haven’t been using the service since they implemented that stupid multi-delivery system. it’s stupid of them to have that kind of system but then also allow the customer to track the delivery driver. because twice I could see a delivery driver pick up my food, drive to a totally different pickup location, then drive right past my place, only to deliver food to another customer that paid extra for the premium delivery service. I don’t feel like paying their ridiculous marked up prices when they then also make their drivers (who aren’t at fault for this at all) drive my damn food around town before delivering it to me ice cold.
Think it’s pretty clear you know what you need to do.
That’s why I only order Uber eats in an emergency so like once or twice a year. I always tip too, even though my husband says not too
Tell people to go pick up their own food. It’s just laziness, if they’re too busy to go to the restaurant they can always grab something from the convenience store.
My friend who does UberEats as his primary job told me its no longer profitable to go on bicycle. Its people with motorbikes and cars who can make some kind of decent money out of it. Still, if we divide the time he spends working(including waiting for orders) the hourly wage isnt great
isn’t it better to deny the 2nd pickup then?
> “I was once forced to take a 4.5 kilometers delivery for 400 yen (usually around 650 yen).”
That is not the definition of “being forced to”, you picked a bad one because it was a good choice in your opinion, but nobody forced you.
> “I can work for 9 hours straight and just make 5000 yen per day”
JFC, why not work an arubaito at that level, which should pay double of that, at 1100-1300 yen/hour?
Thank you for sharing this. It’s unfortunate businesses never have the best interest of their workers
As someone that uses UberEats alot….I feel bad now. Knew it wasn’t a great job but didn’t know it was that bad.