THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The Uber Eats delivery partners in the district who were on an indefinite strike alleging drastic wage cuts by the company, temporarily withdrew the strike on Monday and resumed their services. The strike was withdrawn following a meeting between the representatives of Uber Eats and Uber delivery partners. Representatives decided to concede to the demands of the delivery partners.
The delivery partners went on strike on Friday which continued for four days after the company refused to comply with their demands. Although a meeting was held with the management on Thursday, the discussions failed to reach a consensus and the workers decided to protest against the drastic wage cuts.
“The management has given us the assurance that they will concede to all our demands. Due to technical delay in fulfilling all the demands at a time, the management has asked us for more time,” said Regi, a delivery partner.
Albin Robins, a delivery partner who is differently-abled, said: “Earlier we were given many incentives during peak hours which has been drastically cut down. Over 2,000 online delivery partners protested against the wage cuts as it is the only means, especially for people like us, to earn a livelihood. There are also women and college students who do part-time jobs.”
The Uber delivery executives also said that they had protested three months ago when the salary cut began but it was in vain.Meanwhile, the delivery partners are planning to form a union comprising all the online delivery partners of Swiggy and Zomato to deal with such issues.
Uber Eats started its operations in the city one-and-a-half years ago and has employed over 10,000 delivery executives.
The demands put forth by the Uber delivery partners include reinstating incentives, boosting peak hours, regulating daily schedule, taking back the executives who have been blocked and regulating the recruitment of new employees.With the Uber delivery executives calling off the strike, the food business in the city is back to normal.