The food delivery platform Uber Eats announced this Thursday that it is giving up its autonomous delivery drivers in Spain. It is the only large company in the sector that continued to operate with this work model, after the change that materialized. Like the yellow backpack company, Uber Eats does not take this step out of pure volition. It changes due to pressure from public administrations, waiting to know the result of its operations.
Sources from the Ministry of Labor advanced that the initiation of criminal action (such as the one currently affecting Glovo) was avoidable if they corrected their model in time. They gave the deadline for the month of January and the decision is known right in the middle of the month. Thus, almost five years after the approval of the rider law In the Council of Ministers, the three major players in home delivery accept the salaried model. Just Eat complies with the law from the beginning, Glovo changed half a year ago and now Uber Eats completes the circle.
In statements sent by the company, a spokesperson states that “Uber Eats reaffirms its commitment to compliance with the Rider Law; after four years in which we have accumulated extensive experience working with expert logistics companies, and with the aim of promoting a long-term sustainable model, we have made the decision to stop collaborating with autonomous delivery drivers.”
“Deliverers who still use our application as freelancers will be able to continue working as employees of one of our collaborating fleets. We express our commitment to complying with the obligations that correspond to us, as well as our intention to put an end to all pending litigation and we are at the disposal of deliverers, unions and the Government to guarantee a fair process for all,” adds the company.
The model with which Uber Eats has been operating in Spain is hybrid: one part works on a salaried basis through subcontractors [que en el sector se conocen como flotas] and another does it on their own, as freelancers. The company does not detail how many delivery drivers it employs in each type, but several sources in the sector indicate that Uber Eats has reduced the weight of self-employed workers “a lot” in recent months. That is, it was preparing for this model change.
Before this hybrid scheme, Uber Eats has worked with other work systems. At the beginning, when , it only operated with self-employed workers, a situation that changed in 2021. With the approval of the rider law It turned towards a work model, the one it maintains today for VTC cars. There are no freelancers, but neither are they directly employed by the company, so they operate with subcontractors. So Glovo did not move, it persisted in its freelance operation, which changed Uber Eats’ strategy shortly after.
announced a new twist: in the face of Glovo’s persistence, Uber Eats once again opened the door to self-employed delivery drivers. It moved to a hybrid model, in which some delivery drivers are salaried via fleets and others are self-employed. The other large company, Just Eat, stayed the course and persisted in its employee model. Glovo operates fully with employees, while the criminal process against its top leader, accused of a crime, continues.
This criminal threat is what, based on what was expressed by the ministry led by Yolanda Díaz, Uber Eats can avoid with this decision. In December of last year, ministry sources stated that Uber Eats had time to amend its actions and prevent them from resorting to criminal proceedings.
That is to say, the administrative sanction of the Inspection is ready, but the criminal complaint against its leaders can be deactivated if they changed their model before the file was issued. This is the position of the ministry, but the complaint could come from other actors, such as self-employed workers, so this route cannot be ruled out even if Uber Eats rectifies in time. The same sources have defended at all times that this company has collaborated with the investigation.
The ministry’s plan, if the change in Uber Eats had not occurred, was to file a complaint based on the first point of article 311 of the Penal Code. Establishes punishments for “those who, through deception or abuse of a situation of need, impose on workers in their service working or Social Security conditions that harm, suppress or restrict the rights recognized by legal provisions, collective agreements or individual contracts”, under the threat of prison sentences of six months to six years and a fine of six to twelve months.
