Foodpanda riders are going on strike over new payment scheme

Foodpanda recently revised its payment/incentive scheme for riders outside the Klang Valley, with the new system supposedly offering the 12,000 or so riders in Malaysia more “flexibility”. However, this hasn’t gone down too well in certain quarters. Malaysiakini reports that riders affected (outside KV) are planning to go on strike next week, as the new system allegedly decreases their earnings—despite Foodpanda saying the contrary.

In the same report, a source confirms that the protest in Johor, Malacca, and Negeri Sembilan will last 3 days, with Perak riders to go on strike as well. This is compounded by riders’ plans to strike in Penang for the entirety of next week, as reported by Oriental Daily.

The new payment scheme, effective September 30 2019, increases the amount that riders outside the Klang Valley earn from payments-per-order: from RM3.50–RM5 to RM5–RM7, with a RM100 bonus given if a rider has completed 60 hours per week. However, riders will not be paid the RM4 hourly rate (the reported current pay), which Foodpanda says “ensures riders who want to work more have high volumes of deliveries available to them and vice versa.”

“A rider that previously received RM5 per order would now receive RM7 per order. Riders are also incentivised with a RM100 bonus upon completing 60 hours a week. In addition to that, riders will receive an extra RM1 per order for all orders between 11pm to 9am daily. “

Despite an additional bonus for a limited period of time (30 September–6 October) for a minimum of 80 orders completed, riders feel that excessive delay times between orders of up to 3 hours will result in a lower overall income. Meanwhile, riders have reportedly already been protesting outside Foodpanda’s Johor Bahru and Penang branch offices.

At the moment, we don’t yet know how Foodpanda plans to address the strike, or the concerns over which the protests are made, but Sayantan Das, Managing Director of Foodpanda, has admitted:

“Foodpanda riders are a key stakeholder in the Foodpanda delivery ecosystem.”

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