‘Unblock our lives’ | Women gig workers protest in Delhi

In ‘Nosedive’, an episode in Black Mirror, a popular dystopian TV show which explores the dark side of technology, a woman’s life starts falling apart when her rating begins to drop. She anxiously checks her smartphone as it buzzes many times a day, because every interaction she has will determine where she stands on a scale from 0 to 5 in a world where ratings are a marker of socio-economic status.

Ten years after this episode stirred a conversation on the dangers of an algorithmically-driven society, Sunita (name changed to protect privacy), a platform-based worker offering beauty services in Delhi, worries about how her rating has dropped to 4.69 out of 5. The app on her phone reads, ‘First profile strike’, and cautions her to maintain a rating over 4.7.

Also read: From ‘flexible’ to fearful: women gig workers hemmed in by new rules

The strike means that she has to undergo training again, for which she will have to buy products, pay for conveyance to the training site, and lose out on 10 days’ wages. If she gets two more strikes, her ID will get blocked on the Urban Company app, which would effectively render her jobless.

This is not a dystopian TV show; it is reality for many. Their rating, along with other deliverables such as number of weekend hours, determines whether they are in the bronze, silver, or gold category. Those with a higher ranking get better benefits, including higher health insurance for families and less frequent equipment checks.

“Whether it is rain, flood, or issues at home, we cannot cancel more than four trips a month, or we will get a strike. If our ratings fall, we get a strike. We have to fulfil every demand by the customer, even if they are unreasonable, or they threaten us with a low rating,” Sunita says, during a protest at Jantar Mantar by a women-led gig workers’ union.

Also read: Women gig workers go on strike to protest unfair policies

The Gig & Platform Service Workers’ Union (GIPSWU), which is one of the few women-led gig workers’ unions in the country, called for a countrywide strike on February 3. They demanded an end to “unregulated algorithmic control” and for a worker-centric legal framework. Protests took place in Delhi, Jaipur, Bengaluru, and Mumbai, with 250-300 women showing up.

According to Urban Company, there are more than 50,000 service professionals operating from their app in India, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, and the United Arab Emirates. The union estimates that 30,000 workers are associated with them across India, most of whom are women.

The protests came soon after the government asked all quick-commerce platforms to stop promising “10-minute deliveries” following a nationwide strike by gig workers associated with apps such as Blinkit and Swiggy. But the battle has only begun, the workers say.

The threat of blocked IDs

The union has submitted memorandums to the management, as well as to the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), calling for intervention to remove ID blocking, restrictive cancellation rules, and auto-booking features.

The phrase “Gig toh unhone khatam hi kar diya hai” (They have taken the gig out of the work) is on every worker’s lips at Jantar Mantar, where the protest took place in Delhi. They argue that they joined the platform with the promise of flexibility, which has now been snatched away with features such as “auto-booking”, under which they do not have the option to say no to a job. They have to maintain 70 hours of work even on weekends for every two weeks, failing which they get strikes. Additionally, they are constantly being tracked to ensure that the partner does not offer services outside the app, say the workers.

Editorial | High and dry: On gig workers, social security

During the protest, women dressed in their Urban Company uniforms, covered their faces, afraid that their IDs would be blocked if they were identified. Some workers’ IDs have already been blocked, while others are here to fight the looming threat. They hold up posters that read, ‘unblock our IDs, unblock our lives’.

An ex-worker shows how her profile has been frozen as the all-women members of the Gig & Platform Service Workers Union hold a protest at Jantar Mantar in New Delhi.
| Photo Credit:
Shashi Shekhar Kashyap

Reena Das’ ID was blocked because she made multiple cancellations due to issues at home. When she joined the job five years ago, she was told by Urban Company that she would be able to take care of her family while working. Unlike those who are afraid of IDs being blocked, Reena is not afraid of speaking loudly when she says, “If there’s a fight between husband and wife, or if my baby is crying at home, what do I do? I bear the cost of the cancellation.”

Seema Singh, the union president, a resident of Lakshmi Nagar, was herself blocked after she started being vocal about the company’s policies. Singh, who joined as a partner in 2018, earlier thought she was the only one facing issues.

“Soon, I started speaking to other workers, and then we all started coming together,” she says. Almost every gig worker present at the protest, some men and mostly women, finds her among the sea of protesters and greets her. They applaud her when she gets up to address the gathering. She says she has no intention of going back to the “exploitative conditions”.

Singh says that workers do not have spaces to relieve themselves while they are out for their jobs. “If someone gets her period, how is she supposed to manage without a washroom?” At the protest site, many women say that customers do not usually let them use their washrooms. Almost every worker has an anecdote to share about how customers did not let them use their washrooms. If a woman insists, this could impact her rating.

When she was pregnant, another worker requested an exemption from pedicure services but did not get any help from the company, she says. “I could not do a pedicure because it needed me to bend and sit on the ground. My response rate fell, because of which my rating dropped, and eventually my ID got blocked,” she says, vowing that she too would not return to gig work. There is no pregnancy time off. Women have to re-register, undergo training again, and buy new kits.

Contrasting pictures

On social media, UC promotes itself as a platform empowering women. In a video uploaded by the company, a worker talks about how she almost lost her daughter due to a preterm birth. She says, “She was the reason I kept going then, and she is the reason I keep smiling now,” further elaborating how the flexibility of the job helped her take care of her daughter while sustaining the household.

Back at Jantar Mantar, Neha (name changed), a single mother, paints a contrasting picture. “I had to leave my daughter alone at home, even when she was unwell… because I would not be able to pay rent otherwise,” she says, adding that she has to leave her app on for a minimum of 13 hours a day, and can get work any time.

From the time she joined the platform 8 years ago to now, she says policies have changed drastically. She used to run her own salon earlier and left it when she joined Urban Company due to the promise of flexibility. “It is anything but flexible. Even if I want to apply for a medical emergency, I am told that I would have to apply two days in advance. How would I know that I am about to fall sick?”

She says that they are constantly being tracked and worries that even coming to Jantar Mantar for a protest would get her in trouble. “Even if I go back to a friend’s house which is near a customer’s house, I get a notification saying that I have returned to a customer outside the app,” she says, sighing, tired of the constant surveillance.

Another worker says that she barely gets to see her children on weekdays. “I am lucky because my husband picks up and drops off the children at school every day. Even then, when I go back home after a long and tiring day, I see that the house is a mess, and it is always my responsibility to clean up,” she says, adding that balancing home and work is not “as easy” as it was made to appear when she first joined.

For Neha, who joined the platform for better earnings after her husband left her, there is nobody to help her with the household work. She strives to ensure that her daughter will finish school soon, go to a good college, and become a lawyer. She is struggling to pay her school fees, and maintain a good rating at the same time. “I joined here to make her future better, but everything got worse. Mothers with daughters have to be the strongest, so I try my best,” she says, softly.

Earnings increased: UC

Urban Company has not commented on the protests publicly, or responded to The Hindu’s questions about the stringent rules. But the day after the protest, Urban Company issued a press statement that their partners’ earnings have increased. It said that professionals earn at par, and in some cases, higher than entry-level IT salaries. They said that partners earn ₹28,322 monthly, on an average, an increase from ₹26,489 in the same period last year.

According to UC, salaries range from ₹55,244 to ₹98,341. Of this, the commission cut by UC is around 28%. They admit that a chunk of it, ₹2,662 to ₹4,701 is used up in commute, and product costs range from ₹8,061 to ₹13,141.

Workers say they are expected to buy products such as waxing kits, facial kits, and disposables from UC, which they argue are much higher than the market rates. The workers spend thousands of rupees buying joining kits. And if they get blocked and have to start over, they need to purchase the kits again.

Workers are also protesting against bundle booking, a feature where they say that the customer gets discounts on multiple bookings, which are cut from their earnings.

The press statement additionally said, “Urban Company continues to invest in partner enablement across safety, insurance, access to credit, long-term financial security, training and technology. All active service partners on the platform are covered under group life and accidental insurance, which includes life insurance cover of up to ₹10 lakh, disability cover of up to ₹6 lakh, and accidental hospitalisation and OPD treatment coverage, among other benefits.”

The statement said nothing about the issues raised by workers about ID blocking, lack of washrooms, and constant surveillance.