Report: Platform Economy workshop

December 29, 2020

Last Friday, on October 16th, the event “Organising in Delivery Service” took place as previously announced. We extend our sincere gratitude once more to Orry Mittenmayer and Walid Ibrahim for coming through despite the complications caused by COVID 19.

Orry Mittenmayer, an activist of the campaign “Liefern am Limit”, gave practical guidelines for organising as employees of delivery services. His experiences were given a wider theoretical background by Walid Ibrahim, labour- and economic sociologist from University Jena, who spoke about the digitalisation of work, platform economy and the working conditions that come with that.

For everyone who would’ve liked to attend, there is a brief summary of the presented topics under read-more. If you’re interested in the topic, can relate, want to let us know more or just vent your frustrations about it, let us know at organizing-hd@riseup.net.

The "gig economy", which includes delivery services such as Lieferando, describes a sector in which work is assigned to freelancers, marginally employed and self-employed persons. The companies, such as Lieferando, Amazon, Airbnb or Uber, serve as intermediaries between customers and contractors. The mediation takes place via online platforms, hence also the term “platform economy”. They establish digital, highly scalable business models that can mediate unlimited amounts of workers and restaurants and become more and more attractive for customers. The digital companies function similarly to the principle of "well, I'm on Facebook because practically everyone else is there, too". The more restaurants are on a platform, the more attractive it becomes to customers and employees. For these companies (like Lieferando), it is all about growth and achieving a monopoly position in the market, and these companies only become profitable once they have achieved that monopoly position. This can be seen easily in the case of Lieferando, which only managed to make a profits once there was no competition. Of course, these profits don’t come out of nowhere, but happen at the expense of the employees. Having more time, not having to cook and being able to have everything delivered immediately is only one side of the coin here.

Instead of employers, the companies are more like logistics giants providing manpower. The employees are kept at a distance and the responsibility towards the employed personnel is kept low. The employees often bear the risks themselves. In addition to the labour they offer, the employees provide the equipment, such as bicycles and cell phones, and pay the bills and repairs themselves. In their status as self-employed, employees cannot take advantage of paid vacations and sick days and social and health insurance must be paid by themselves. Out of fear of not getting enough orders assigned, employees deliver the goods even when they are ill. At any time, but also especially during Corona crisis, these conditions are anything but humane.

The conditions are also disappointing in terms of labor law. According to the definition of the International Labor Organization (ILO), the precariously employed are those who are only partially protected by labor law, who have little influence on the organization of their work, who enjoy little job security, and who fundamentally cannot secure their material existence via their work. The trend toward fixed-term contracts, short-term contracts and precarious employment is not new and by no means unique to the platform economy. It is extra however notable how relevant it is to the delivery industry.

Orry Mittenmayer, who himself has been working in the industry for a long time, is using his campaign "Liefern am Limit" (“Delivering at the Limit”) to oppose the degrading working conditions, which he and his colleagues no longer want to accept unquestioningly. According to the motto "whatever they can do, we can do too", he and his colleagues started a campaign against Deliveroo in Cologne in 2017. Just as Deliveroo's advertising posters were highly visible in public spaces, on the streets and at bus stops, so highly visible too needed to be those delivering their orders under the miserable working conditions. As a large united group, the riders organized demonstrations several times protesting Deliveroo and Foodora. In the beginning it was difficult to get everyone working together on the cause. Due to large delivery areas and rotating shifts, the riders hardly saw each other at work. However, as the movement grew they managed to organize many demonstrations after all, in which different factions were also involved, among them “Aktion gegen Arbeitsunrecht” ("Action Against Labor Injustice") and the NGGs union (“Nahrung-Genuss-Gaststätten”). Customers were also mobilized and joined in solidarity on the streets and online with thousands of comments on the pages of the delivery mogul. The first goal was to establish a works council and to go public. The establishment of the work council was difficult, and soon after its foundation, the labor dispute became even more complicated.

On the one hand, Deliveroo let the fixed-term contracts of the employees gradually expire. The employee contracts were converted into freelancer contracts. This caused Orry Mittenmayer going to court to set a precedent and fight for his employment contract - so that others would not have to go through the same thing again and again. The next hurdle was the legal situation. There legal terms for the platform economy are highly unclear. For example, the question arose - what exactly "the company" is for which the works council is founded? What does that mean at Deliveroo and later at Lieferando? Who is all part of this machinery? The entire delivery industry with all of its employees or just the headquarters in Berlin? Though the terms are vague and the legal situation is also partly unclear, there are still guidelines under labor law that can be referred to. Public interest, demonstrations, solidarity and direct actions have also proved their worth. Anyone who thinks there is nothing to fight over and nothing to change here, except to continue ordering, is asked to take a look at the solidarity shown here and change fought for and acheived.

Orry Mittenmayer and “Liefern am Limit” continue to fight for fair wages and shift schedules, breaks, work equipment, wear-and-tear reimbursements and humane working conditions - things that should be self-explanatory. Things that we should keep in mind, because the delivery industry and platform economy will continue existing, and the contracts will continue getting shorter. Working in the delivery should not mean putting yourself under the mercy of companies’ goodwill. Further information can be found on Facebook and Instagram under "Liefern am Limit"