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Article

21 Jan 2025

Author:
By Robert Booth, The Guardian (UK)

‘It’s a nightmare’: couriers mystified by the algorithms that control their jobs

… This week gig workers, trade unions and human rights groups launched a campaign for greater openness from Uber Eats, Just Eat and Deliveroo about the logic underpinning opaque algorithms that determine what work they do and what they are paid.

The couriers wonder why someone who has only just logged on gets a gig while others waiting longer are overlooked. Why, when the restaurant is busy and crying out for couriers, does the app say there are none available?...

“It’s an absolute nightmare,” says the driver, adding that they permanently lost access to one of the platforms over a matter of a “max five minutes” wait in getting to a restaurant while he finished another job for a different app…

The app companies say they do have rider support staffed by people and some information about the algorithms is available on their websites and when drivers are initially “onboarded”…

But similar frustrations simmer in Lincoln, where at 9pm one evening, Lucas Myron was delivering burgers, fried chicken and groceries when without warning a chunk of his work stopped. One of the two takeaway apps he used suddenly ceased to function. Without warning, half of the father-of-one’s gig economy income vanished….