A portrait of the deliveryman as a human being

Organising themselves like the Dabbawalas of Mumbai could do wonders for the pay and status of delivery people

On the evening of January 8, 2022, Delhi’s streets were deserted. The third wave of Covid-19 was rising and a weekend lockdown was in place. It was anyway not a great Saturday evening to step out: unseasonal rains had made it unusually chilly and damp. In the spirit of the new metropolitan India, food orders were pouring in at online delivery platforms.

One of those orders pinged Salil Tripathi’s phone as he sat astride his motorcycle, parked on a street side. As Tripathi took out his phone, an SUV driven by a drunk policeman rammed into him. The impact threw him up in the air and killed him instantaneously.

Several reports, especially a particularly poignant one in the South China Morning Post, painted a moving portrait of Tripathi. Covid-19 converted him from a restaurant manager into a delivery “executive”. His son, said the SCMP report, was expelled from a private school because the delivery “executive” could no longer afford the fees.

Tripathi was a useful factoid in a narrative about the future of work or the shrinking middle class. The accident on January 8 turned him into a fatal accident statistic.

But human beings are more than factoids and statistics. It is an aspect we sometimes miss, such as in the ongoing saga about a quick commerce company, which, say reports, has lost a thousand of its delivery people to rivals because their earnings fell sharply — by half, or thereabouts. The drop is perhaps sharper when compared with a year ago.

Thinking gig

First, it is quite striking that the company had a thousand delivery people (apparently, there are 2,000 more that have not yet quit). This is how e-commerce has generated jobs. India’s e-commerce logistics industry is set to exceed 10 billion parcels in ready deliveries by 2027-28, according to Redseer Strategy Consultants, up from 4 billion in 2022-23.

That is a lot of deliveries and a lot of people needed to make them. That is also a lot of jobs, which, although gigs, can pull large sections of the population out of poverty and increase women’s participation in the workforce by making it easier for them to choose their area of work, working hours, and whom they work for.

The rise of Ola, Uber, Zomato, Swiggy, Urban Company, and many other tech platforms infuses the delivery people with acceptability and status. Gated communities in Gurugram, for instance, allow them in with minimum fuss.

Now, the not so good

There is frequent talk of fluctuating earnings and long hours. Some delivery people might request you to get into confirmations and cancellations so they can make an extra hundred rupees. Their desperation is palpable.

Several gig platforms like to call their gig workers “partners” or something equally exalted, but their place in the pecking order is usually at the bottom. On top of everything, quick commerce has added a mad dash for each parcel.

A lot can happen in 10 or 15 minutes if that is all the time you have. You can fall sick, meet with an accident, your vehicle can break down, or there may be a good old traffic jam — all the while getting automated calls about the importance of being on time. But failure to meet the delivery deadline can result in irate recipients, bad ratings, and maybe a fall in income.

It will do wonders for the pay and status of delivery people if they could organise themselves on the lines of the famed Dabbawalas of Mumbai, who have earned a certain status in the local trains in addition to a Harvard case study. But the Dabbawalas do not need to contend with 10-minute deliveries. They have hours to pick up lunch boxes from homes in the morning and deliver them at offices by lunchtime.

A talking puppy that bites

A while ago, while I was trying to run my own company (a euphemism for being less than fully employed), a lot of people used to seek my advice, though several of them did the opposite of what I advised. One person asked me if an e-commerce company should tom-tom 10-minute deliveries.

“Is that worth talking about?” the person asked.

“Of course,” I said, “This is unheard of and therefore worth talking about.”

“But, do people really need 10-minute deliveries?”

“Maybe, maybe not,” I said, “But it is like having a talking puppy. It might not be of much use, but, if you have one, you should definitely show it off.”

Not saying this happened on my advice, but companies have gone on to forge their branding around quick deliveries — successfully — and attracted investor money. But building a brand and getting funding is different from building a remunerative business.

Hari Menon, the co-founder of Bigbasket, an online grocery delivery platform owned by the Tata Group, maintains that it is not possible to be profitable while making all deliveries within 10 minutes. Bigbasket has a quick commerce offering, BB Now, which delivers in 15 to 30 minutes. Mr Menon believes this works because BB Now shares warehousing and other costs with Bigbasket.

“The consumers did not want it [10-minute delivery] either; it was thrust upon them and they said why not,” Mr Menon was widely quoted as saying at an event in Mumbai.

He drew a sharp response from Aadit Palicha, the founder of Zepto, which is known for 10-minute deliveries. Speaking at the same summit,

Mr Palicha dismissed Mr Menon’s contention as the gripe of a legacy company.

It will be more telling if Mr Palicha demonstrated the success of his business model. Sure, a start-up takes time to stand on its feet and be profitable. But, in the meantime, the hapless delivery people can be given a deal that is less than raw, because right now their status is being talked about in the context of quick commerce.

Unless that happens, we will have to revisit the story of the talking puppy. Sure, it talks, and is cute as hell. But it also has claws and teeth. And it bites.