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Comment by csharptwdec19 | Hacker News Reader

Ehh, but it's nothing new in the realm of food delivery (not saying that's -right-, mind you.)

Pizza delivery drivers have been getting the same bad deal for a long time. Most teenagers/young adults who take a delivery job have no idea that they require additional coverage on their vehicle and are one accident away from a lot of financial hardship.

You just see/hear about it much more now because rather than a small business offering the bad deal it's a (multi)national company. VC is just providing a way to scale the pain's visibility up.

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Thing is, for a teenager / college student, it made sense as a side job. Bang around in a shitty car, make friends you work with, get a discount on pizza for yourself, get tips under the table with no tax, and enjoy that phase in your life.

With these services, it's like as though people somehow expect gig-work - already much less certain than being an employed drivers - to be a career. License and insurance requirements, PPE, and the sheer scale of the middleman operation involved in running a huge app like this - it's nuts to think that it could be done for the same price as the conventional delivery model.

And don't forget, your parents are still subsidizing your insurance... and those tickets don't show up on your record for at least 6 months, if you go to court!

> it made sense as a side job

Sure... until an accident happens, you find out that your insurance didn't cover the (undeclared) use for business purposes, and you're liable for somebody's million-dollar medical bills.

Curious as a non-US reader to see what your fear is in this scenario: financial problems

Not sure where you're from but if you're uninsured and cause an accident in France you're basically fucked. If you injure (yourself or someone else) or destroy public/private property you will have to cover it yourself. Many people end up paying hundred of euros per months for decades if not for their entire life.

How common is it for French insurance companies to find a way to get out of paying, when a driver they cover gets in an accident?

For any serious accident there will be an investigation to determine is the driver was meeting the insurance conditions. (did he have a valid license, did he take drugs/alcohol, was he on his phone, was the vehicle modified, &c.)

I'm guessing he would be more concerned about dying or sustaining irreparable physical harm...:-)

In the US, we often has uninsured driver coverage. If the other driver has no insurance, our own insurance will cover us and then go after the other driver. But if they have no assets they are probably not worth going after as court cases cost money.

That sounds absolutely crazy. Nordic country. You may have to pay damages, but it would not be hundreds of euros for decades, that's just entirely unreasonable.

In Sweden that would be a real possibility if you do not have adequate insurance. Say that you cause 200 000 kr in property damage by wrecking someones car beyond repair. The owner or their insurance company can claim that money from you, and if you cannot pay in cash you are now in high interest dept where The Enforcement Authority (Kronofogden) can take money straight from you account on a monthly basis to pay off said debt. If you are a low wage earner you might never pay it off.

Which problem are you thinking of?

So your point is, call your insurance company such that you don't commit insurance fraud? I'm struggling to see your gripe.

You can't get blood from a stone. Or in this case money from a minimum wage pizza delivery driver now without a car.

Has this ever actually happened? Or is this more of a fear-driven thing that everybody just says?

I'd bet money that the insurance company is still on the hook to cover it, but they'll be super quick to drop you.

You would bet money that the insurance would cover it instead of finding a way out of it? What makes you so sure about that? There are examples of homeowner's insurance not covering issues caused by renting on AirBnB, so I would be surprised if motor vehicle insurance was any different.

Happens a lot for small stuff: https://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/local/pizza_delivery_insuran...

Not so sure about someone getting saddled with someone elses medical bills.

This only works if you have a baby boom. Currently there are very few teenagers in the west compared to the 60s or 90s.

Most Uber drivers I know do it full time that is a side job like pizza delivery kids. The difference is I think people think Uber is a full-time job.

Ex pizza-delivery driver checking in. I made about $15/hr (incl tips) delivering for dominos in 2007. I drove a $2000 truck and didn't much care about coverage on it. It was the best summer job I ever had.

If you have nothing, it's highly unlikely you're going to get sued. People who sue always look for the party with the most money, and try to shift the blame to them.

Not sure why this is downvoted. I’m guessing most pizza delivery drivers are basically judgement proof.

Just don’t drink and drive.

That's what I made around year 2000. Though I delivered 'Better Pizza, with Better Ingredients'!

Gas was $1/gallon and we got 70¢ per delivery. I asked a friend about 2008 or so, when gas had gotten up to almost $5/gallon briefly (part of the cause of the Great Recession, I'd imagine), and he said they were still getting 70¢ per run. That sucks.

Also, only 1/10 orders used credit cards, so nobody paid taxes on tips - all cash. By 2008, I'm guessing it was 1/3 using credit, and now, with apps, it's probably 9/10 using cards.

But yeah, it was a sweet gig if you weren't the social / beautiful type to be a successful waiter or waitress / bartender. It paid more and was way more fun than making $6-$8 / hour at McDonalds or Target.

What crushed us was when dominos implemented the "delivery fee". As drivers we only got ~1/4 of the ~$2 fee per run, but customers began treating it as though it was a tip.

> Pizza delivery drivers have been getting the same bad deal for a long time.

Ehh, I had a bachelor's degree and did tech support for a fortune 500 company, and I was earning half what my friend made as a pizza delivery driver.

s/Pizza delivery drivers/everyone

I think there's more than just visibility: the pizza driver at least has a fixed rate which doesn't change all of the time and there isn't a third party hiding part of the billing. Most of the gig apps try to obscure their share of the money, especially from the customer and driver, and anything which has the concept of surge pricing can add noise which makes it harder to understand the impact of changes.

Former pizza delivery person (long time ago). Pizza works better economically because it transports better (stays hot longer) and has higher volume. I used to load up 5+ deliveries for the same small area of town. The dispatchers were hopefully good at grouping deliveries.

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