I think the gig economy should have a similar Pedlar's License. There should be some paperwork. Maybe no more hard than Basic Food Hygiene that you get working in the food trade.
This would also allow local authorities to refuse. So if they didn't want the food delivery guys then they could just restrict licences.
Standards, e.g. lights on bikes, MOST for cars, all should be part of this license for doing door to door deliveries.
Standardisation could result in no drivers getting it wrong whether hired the UPS or FedEx way.
If the driver ID was a standardized way of doing tracking then that could even be part of the final mile procedure.
If we had rules about what a license should promote (such as public safety, accountability, etc) and what it should try to prevent (rent seeking, protectionism) and metrics by which to measure this (even if an impartial panel), we could possible greatly increase the number of licenses we require while also lowering the bar of entry for many existing licensed businesses.
I understand this would be a tricky path to take. It's layering bureaucracy, which is often problematic. But I'm not sure we necessarily want random unaccountable people driving around throwing packages at us, nor doctors practicing without experience, and I don't think having to pay $1000 and take a one week course for licensure to deliver packages for Amazon is useful either.
1: http://www.npr.org/sections/money/2017/04/14/524007928/episo...
Not only would that not help your thieving at all, but the company that hired you having all your info on file would make you much more likely to get caught. Assuming you are robbing houses you can deliver too.
Putting on a fake delivery uniform and carrying around boxes that aren't meant to be delivered makes a lot more sense if you just need to case the houses before robbing.
plenty of people have life long careers of house burglary.
here are two, but there are very many others.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/11/16/burglar-with-crim...
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/12187965/Career...
Yes. Fedex, UPS, and USPS drivers clearly have a much better grasp of how to correctly handle delivery exception scenarios. That's probably because they actually train their employees, and schedule them so they can learn their routes. You're never going to get that with with the short-term gig-economy randos Amazon hires.
Yes, actually there are background checks.
What is actually unprofessional about Amazon contracting package delivery to random individuals?
I'm not in favor of it, but I haven't thought about it enough to have a good argument about the topic. @viperscape does bring up good points though: personal vehicles and the perception that Amazon has "granted permission" to random people to enter property and handle their goods. What are the arguments in favor or Amazon's new delivery model?
What's stopping a random guy from walking around taking pictures through all the windows when they see you leave? Nothing. Dude just dresses up like the meter reader and does whatever he wants. Even if you "catch" the guy he did nothing illegal. In most places it's totally fine to stroll around on other people's land unless "no trespassing" is clearly marked. Got one of those big signs in your front yard?
If you ever leave the house I'm sure pictures of you with your family have been streamed on countless webcams over the years and probably live TV.
You have no real security unless you've got a cement room with no windows and a metal door. Anything less is just to make people feel better
Your perceived privacy violations sound pretty mundane to me.
Houses are easy enough to find. You don't need to get a job as a delivery person to find where houses are. The fact that they delivered a package to your house doesn't make you any more of a target than anyone else. Maybe if you were having gold bricks delivered and they were clearly marked "expensive gold bricks" on the package.
That or the dude legitimately expects white glove delivery for bottom shelf pricing, which is even more absurd.
My experience has been far better with Amazon's deliverers than with shipping companies. I even had one who left a package under my doormat early in the morning and then noticed our lights come on so she came back to let us know it was there.
With UPS, it's more likely I check my tracking number after being home all day and see it go from 'out for delivery' to 'waiting for pickup at UPS store' with no notification. They don't even make the attempt to deliver it, and that makes things less efficient (loading the truck up just to unload it again, making me wait all morning just to have to go to the store anyway, etc.)
So yeah, personally it makes much more sense to me from all kinds of angles for Amazon to handle this stuff directly rather than deal with UPS or Fedex. Those companies are fine for getting a package from me to someone in Halifax, but for getting something from Amazon's warehouse an hour away to my doorstep, it makes no sense.