Recently, delivery services like Uber Eats and GrubHub have become a popular way to receive food from places that ordinarily would not deliver. A viral TikTok, posted by user @deliveryguy100 exposes how hard this job can be. Though some might be under the impression that delivering food is easy money, he shows the realistic side of his job when he cries and explains that he wishes others knew what delivery driving was actually like.
@its.smithsonmichael
The Debate Surrounding Tips
In the video, he explains that he was only tipped $1.19 after he spent an hour driving for a customer, while Uber Eats only gave him two dollars. He explains that this is not enough to even cover gas. This video has gone viral since being posted five days ago, with over 160,000 likes and 850,000 views. He asks how he is supposed to survive like this.
Getting sick & tired of seeing posts from Uber eats/Deliveroo/just eat drivers pleading for tips. Yes, you deserve a tip if you deliver food on time & warm but the greed from the above mentioned companies is bad. Jacking up food, delivery & service prices means a drivers lose out
— s.b (@_iam_sb) June 7, 2021
This has since sparked a debate. Some people believe tipping well is completely necessary, as someone is providing you a service to bringing you the food as opposed to going out to get it. This has been a valuable service over the past year due to COVID-19, where no contact delivery service became even more important to people and the service of delivery became increasingly valuable. Others say that this is the responsibility of the companies itself and tips should remain for those who provide outstanding service. One person commented on TikTok stating “I always tip well but let’s be real…Corporations are to blame.” Many have different ideas of who is to blame and how to solve the problem in a long-term stance, but this does not help the TikTok user at this moment. He notes that he is homeless and is struggling and asks if it is “really that hard to throw us five dollars.”
Many complain that after the delivery fee and the cost of the meal, it is hard to afford a tip after this, as one person comments that he can barely afford his food, referencing the part of the video where it mentions that he can “barely sustain himself.” Some note that if you cannot afford to tip, you cannot afford to eat out or afford delivery. Though the delivery services might be fairly new, the debate itself surrounding tipping is highly common and will continue as long as people are being underpaid.
