No tip, no service?: Food app delivery drivers say orders with no tip aren’t worth it

Calgary food app delivery drivers say they’re dropping or refusing orders if there’s no tip because it’s not worth it for them to make the drive.

CityNews spoke with a few delivery drivers who have requested to speak anonymously to protect their employment.

“The cost is not enough to cover for the expenses you have,” said another driver.

The definition of tipping according to the Oxford dictionary is to give (someone) a sum of money as a way of rewarding them for their services.

A Reddit comment on a previous CityNews story called the food delivery tipping system in Canada “broken.”

Some say it’s only fair to tip when someone delivers you food.

“I usually like to tip, because what they get is really low,” a woman from Calgary said.

Forty-sixty per cent of an average delivery driver’s income comes from tips. When an order is placed for a downtown location for example, and the driver is several kilometres away, the driver will often end up losing money on that delivery.

Restaurant owners say food is going to waste if its not picked up.

“And then the driver went on to say that he’s releasing orders, and I had confusion all over my face. And I asked, ‘well, why is that?’ And he’s like, ‘well, nobody’s tipping.’ I was take aback. And I said, ‘well, that’s not fair to the customer and to the restaurant.’ Because if food sits here too long, we have to remake it and that is costing us for no reason,” said Jim Braun, Calgary restaurant owner.

Randy has worked with DoorDash for five years, he says it can be costly for a driver to make a delivery for little to no tip.

“With gas prices up you will lose money if people aren’t tipping,” Randy said. “Some drivers do get pretty selective about their orders. I do what I can, but every now and then you do get an order, it might be $4 and you’re driving 15-20 km, so you have to decline some of them.”

He adds some drivers are using multiple phones, so they can drop one order and take another with a higher tip.

“Because they’re not making enough money, they’re opting into running more than one phone,” Randy explained. “And when they’re getting multiple deliveries on each phone, they’re picking up whichever one is more, and cancelling the other one, and making that one wait.”

“Just maybe consider how far they are away from the restaurant and tip accordingly to that.”

According to DoorDash, UberEats, and SkipTheDishes, delivery fees vary from different locations, and the driver gets 100 per cent of the tip.

However, the drivers CityNews spoke with say the fee doesn’t vary enough, and they hope customers can be more aware of the location they’re ordering from when they’re tipping.