
Instacart paying 80 cents an hour because worker received a large tip - timebomb0
https://www.workingwa.org/instacart-eighty-cents
======
tedivm
There's a related blog post up on Medium by this same group (Working
Washington) where they placed the same order, once with tip and once without,
so people could directly compare.

From my perspective Instacart is stealing from its customers and workers by
doing this. I'm a huge fan of instacart (my fiance and I use it regularly),
but this is definitely going to push me away from the platform. At a minimum
I'm going to be tipping in cash.

[https://medium.com/@workingwa/instacart-heres-
our-22-cents-n...](https://medium.com/@workingwa/instacart-heres-our-22-cents-
no-more-tip-theft-low-pay-and-black-box-pay-algorithms-8ff1d7c6b66)

~~~
twothumbsup
> From my perspective Instacart is stealing from its customers and workers by
> doing this.

This is 100% wage theft.

~~~
kevin_b_er
It will not matter. Washington state law does not apply. The sovereign state
of Washington laws are superseded and invalidated by mandatory binding
arbitration. The rights set out in the State of Washington's constitution do
not apply, for they are superceded and ignored by mandatory binding
arbitration.

Any dispute will go to a monkey court instead.

~~~
sokoloff
Washington state law certainly does apply. The _state_ did not sign a
mandatory binding arbitration agreement. The employee/contractor may not have
the right to bring suit against Instacart, but the state maintains that right.

Thought experiment: could Instacart assault, kidnap, or murder a delivery
driver and claim that arbitration is the only venue for redress?

~~~
dabockster
And even then, the worker does have the right to petition the court to review
the clause itself. So the worker can still sue with the knowledge that it will
be thrown out if the judge decides to uphold the arbitration clause.

------
B-Con
> That's right: the customer's tip doesn't get added to the worker's check —
> it just gets deducted from what Instacart pays. In other words, up-front
> tips go to Instacart, not to the worker.

My understanding is that the Fair Labor Standards Act does not allow for
employers to whithold tips.[0]

Gratuity/tip is a legally recognized concept. You can't just throw the word in
your app and do what you want with the money it generates. There are legal
expectations around how the money goes from the customer to the worker.

[0] [https://www.ramoslaw.com/is-your-employer-committing-wage-
th...](https://www.ramoslaw.com/is-your-employer-committing-wage-theft-by-
withholding-your-tips/)

[edit] Added "not"

~~~
cribbles
Instacart delivery workers are classified as independent contractors, which
allows the company to flout basic labor laws. This is commonplace in digital
age 'gig economy' jobs, but dates back to the early days of food delivery -
e.g., most pizza delivery drivers are classified as independent contractors.

That having been said, the concept of defining contractor wages in relation to
customer tips is new to me. I could see a legal argument being made in the
employer's favor if the worker gave due consent to the transaction.

The idea here would be: Instacart states somewhere on the order prior to
pickup 'if you choose to accept this order, you will receive $10, of which
$.80 will come from us.' Since the delivery worker isn't running a 'shift' as
an 'employee,' but just coincidentally happens to be running Instacart orders
for 10 hours straight, this counts as one of many transactions that they've
accepted and hence waived the legal right to complain about.

If this legal fiction sounds absurd to you, you're not alone.

~~~
klathzazt
I would agree, if the app didn't say "tip for delivery person" instead of "tip
for instacart" or something maybe more ambiguous like "tip." Take a look at
the screenshots of their app being discussed here:
[https://www.forbes.com/sites/bizcarson/2018/04/24/instacart-...](https://www.forbes.com/sites/bizcarson/2018/04/24/instacart-
adds-tipping-back/#6b01149b74e8)

~~~
mikewhy
Are you sure those aren't the upcoming changes? There's another older
screenshot further down that has more ambiguous wording.

Edit: welp, even that says it 100% goes to the person doing the shopping.
Gross.

~~~
Spivak
Insidious, right? 100% of the tip technically does go to your shopper.

Welcome to the world of 'tipped wages'. In my state, every paycheck, the first
$520 worth of tips effectively goes straight to your employer for the purposes
of paying your minimum wage and then you can have whatever is left over.

~~~
gbear605
What’s more, this article is made by employees from Washington state, where
they don’t even have a separate tipped minimum wage.

------
rafiki6
More evidence as to why tipping culture needs to die. Tipping fundamentally
takes away the responsibility of paying someone for their work from the
employer to the customer. In what other business context do I pay an employee
of a company I deal with directly outside of the service industry where
tipping is common? Wages are a cost of doing business. Pay the worker enough.
If you want to still provide them an incentive to work hard, offer them
incentive plans! Bring up your prices to reflect the true cost of your product
or service. It's time to abolish tips.

~~~
mruts
Well it should start with you right? Are you willing to never tip again in
your entire life? If so, let us know how it goes (or maybe is going?)

Or, alternatively, maybe you don't live in a country with a tipping culture.
And if so, then tipping doesn't really affect you.

People like to tip. I like to tip. Waiters and waitresses like to be tipped.
My wife used to work as a waitress and would clear over $300 a night in tips
alone. It's only a small minority of people who are against it.

~~~
throwaway415415
It does. Most people I know in SF, including me, don't tip. Waiters here are
way more used to it and don't necessarily expect it.

~~~
boucher
You are simply wrong. It's trivially easy to disprove your several comments
about SF tipping culture with a few google searches.

Don't confuse the fact that nobody has confronted you for the idea that
waiters don't expect you to tip them.

~~~
the_clarence
I live in SF. I don't tip, most of my acquaintances don't tip either.

------
muppetman
It's funny (to me, anyway) that this sort of things affects only America (and
I guess Canada?) This odd culture you have there of tipping and how it's so
tightly integrated into your society.

As a non-American I had to read the article a few times to understand what the
problem was - I thought this was just how tipping worked in the US.

I always read of service workers who only manage to "stay afloat" by the tips
they earn, this seems to be almost the same thing, but reading it again I can
see it isn't.

Here in NZ there is sometimes a "tip jar" at the counter of a cafe where you
might throw in a coin or two (say $1 or $2) as a way of thanking the staff
overall. High end restaurants will also offer a place for you to add a tip if
you feel you got exceptional service, but there's also no hard feeling or
death stares if you don't put anything there.

I hope tipping dies in the US and people get paid fairly regardless. But then
you have bigger problems to solve first of all :)

~~~
on_and_off
I have moved to the US not that recently.

The tipping system still baffles me (and I never know when I am supposed to
tip or not .. )

From what I gathered, it comes from the prohibition as a way to supplement
hotels and restaurants personnel wages (since they were making less in that
context).

Why it persisted to nowadays and has been extended to many service works
baffles me to no end.

Taxes are also added at checkout when you buy e.g. groceries, so it seems
pretty cultural to have a very opaque 'what you pay' system.

~~~
flyingpenguin
We have also obfuscated what you make. Combined its very strange.

You could tell someone they get a new job paying $30/hour and you are selling
them this house for $10/hour. After everything is said and done, those numbers
could be the same... what?

------
tareqak
Isn’t this similar to what DoorDash (a YC company) is doing?
[https://notipdoordash.com](https://notipdoordash.com)

These sorts of stories confirm my feelings about tipping that I’ve had all
along: tipping is just a way to subsidize employers by pitting employees
against customers and guilt-tripping the latter.

Follow-up update: Aren't all the gig economy start-ups (Uber/Uber Eats, Lyft,
Caviar, Eat24/Yelp, Fiverr etc.) potentially doing the same thing? They are
probably exploiting the same loop-hole in whatever set of laws. It might be
just a UI update, but I remember seeing a message of the form "our drivers get
100% of their tips" in Uber Eats just yesterday, which is sort of like saying
"we are following the law about tips".

~~~
pfarnsworth
Uber/UberEats drivers get 100% of every tip, that is completely outside the
equation for their pay.

~~~
tareqak
Sorry, that's what I meant: an independent contractor getting 100% of their
tips doesn't mean Uber/UberEats hasn't adjusted the amount they pay the
contractor.

------
swozey
I was a huge user of Instacart 2 years ago when my nearest grocery store
turned into one of the busiest Whole Foods in my city that I didn't enjoy
dealing with.

The way they keep working to create opaqueness around their tipping to the
point that last year Drivers were handing out pamphlets explaining how to
remove the "Service Fee" (which nobody but Instacart gets) to tip the drivers
was a huge red flag. Removing the service fee was on a 2nd page you had to go
to and by default I believe was 10% of your order. If you've never used
Instacart the groceries in my experience have been quite a bit more expensive
than they'd be in stores so they're making revenue on that end already.

I started using them a bit again this year and now there's only a "Driver Tip"
section with I believe a hard locked in service fee. Does the shopper get the
tip as well? Is the driver the shopper as well now? In my situation the
shopper is doing FAR more work than the driver. I want to tip the people well
because I know Instacart doesn't pay well, but I don't want to give a $26 tip
for $130 in groceries (which is usually 3-4 bags) going to the person who only
spent 10 minutes in a car to drop my groceries off at my front door (and
Instacart drivers never read the Delivery notes, I've had to walk out and walk
them over to me each time last year that I ordered).

Is the tip split between the shopper and the driver? It only says "Driver
Tip".

Everything just seems to be disgustingly opaque with this company and I really
do not feel right even using it anymore so I've used it incredibly sparingly
(maybe 3 times last year) as of late.

edit: I just checked, there's an info icon and it says 100% of the tip goes to
the driver. So should I not tip based on the entire process of shopping and
delivery? I don't even want to use this app anymore because I shouldn't have
to stop and waste time considering these things.

This company just screams deceptive to me. Guess I'll be done with it.

~~~
weaksauce
100% of the tip goes to the driver yes. but, that statement is completely
compatible with instacart changing how much they pay their driver for that
delivery down to 80 cents. I hope this was a mistake on the part of instacart.

~~~
kuhhk
> I hope this was a mistake on the part of instacart.

According to the screenshot of Instacart's email, they confirmed this is
accurate and was most definitely not a mistake. And according to the article,
Instacart has doubled-down instead of apologizing.

~~~
weaksauce
Come to think of it their aggressive upselling techniques always left a bad
taste in my mouth. I do like the service but they really need to up their pay
for their drivers.

------
blaisio
Wow. I'm cancelling my instacart account immediately. They've made so many
mistakes in the past, but I liked their app. But this crosses the line by a
mile. When I give someone a tip, it's not because I chose to pay more for an
order just for fun, it's because I want the worker to get extra. They don't
get to charge me a service fee, and ask me to tip, and then not give the
worker my service fee. That's just crazy.

~~~
richardfeynman
I'm also pretty sure that they say that 100% of the tip goes to the driver
when you place an order.

~~~
jld
They probably think the money is fungible.

“We gave the driver 100% of the $10 from _your_ tip, and withheld _our_ $10
from their wages.”

------
mrgordon
Instacart started out by secretly marking up groceries. Once that game was
played out, it seems they started secretly marking down employee (oh sorry,
contractor) wages

~~~
kkotak
Frankly I can't fathom how this company is still in business. I live in the
bay area and I don't know a single person who's ever used it or mentions it.

~~~
jogjayr
I've not really understood the point of grocery delivery other than in cities
where car ownership is uncommon. And even there, you can rent a Zipcar once a
quarter to stock up on bulky or heavy items (toiler paper, bags of rice or
flour etc.) That's what I did when I was a car-less student. For other
groceries, especially produce, I prefer to pick stuff out myself. And going to
the store myself often exposes me to new products that I would not otherwise
have learned about.

------
seancaptain
Hi. I'm a Fast Company reporter, and we've been investigating this and many
other issues for about a week, including asking Instacart to explain them all.
Stay tuned for a full report this week or early next. Thanks, Sean Captain
@seancaptain

~~~
ampersandy
Would love to see the article expanded on with a legal analysis of the
situation.

------
awake
I used to work for a delivery company with this same pay structure. This is
garbage and its taking advantage of young people who are looking for jobs.

~~~
dymk
Serious question: if somebody knows that a job like this is such a ripoff
(even if the rates aren't advertised, you _will_ find out soon enough, if via
stories like this), why would somebody take a job like this?

~~~
adetrest
Not everyone is a software developer with companies fighting over them. Some
really don't have options, and the choice is either get no income and be
unable to pay your bills, or get screwed over but get some money to pay the
bills.

~~~
HillaryBriss
> Some really don't have options.

Unfortunately, in this economy, it's probably more accurate to say "most
people really don't have options" rather than "some"

~~~
CameronBanga
The job market is as strong as it has been in the past ~30+ years?

~~~
fzeroracer
It's important to keep in mind that a low unemployment rate does not say
anything about the overall quality of jobs in the market.

So while it's a 'strong market' in the sense that 'unemployment is low', it
could also be examined from another angle. Which is the rise of the gig
economy giving people a lot of opportunities for work, but work that comes at
a cost of being heavily exploited like with Instacart. Nor does it say
anything about whether or not people are holding full time vs part time jobs
or the stagnant wage issues.

~~~
HillaryBriss
yes. "unemployment is low" is a measure of the job market. we can say it's
"strong" by that measure. but, as you say, when we look at the actual jobs
there's a helluva lot of retail and other low wage, limited benefit positions,
positions whose salaries have lagged far behind the skyrocketing costs of
health care and higher education.

------
IMTDb
Their help section specifically states :

"Shoppers appreciate tips as a way of recognizing great service and 100% of
your tip goes directly to the shopper delivering your order. For more
information about tipping, follow this link."

Source:
[https://www.instacart.com/help/section/200761924#213895126](https://www.instacart.com/help/section/200761924#213895126)
payment/service fee section

If confirmed this is straight out lying to your customers

~~~
smallgovt
What you quoted is not a lie. 100% of the tip is going to the shopper. The
problem is they are not paying the shopper on top of the tip.

~~~
D_Alex
I am sure you are being humorous, but anyway, the FTC says:

"When consumers see or hear an advertisement, whether it’s on the Internet,
radio or television, or anywhere else, federal law says that ad must be
truthful, not misleading, and, when appropriate, backed by scientific
evidence. The Federal Trade Commission enforces these truth-in-advertising
laws, and it applies the same standards no matter where an ad appears – in
newspapers and magazines, online, in the mail, or on billboards or buses."

and:

"Statements that are literally true may be deceptive if they leave a
misleading impression".

Unfortunately, the first step the FTC takes _if they even get around to it_ is
to direct the advertiser to remove such statements. No fines are levied if the
advertiser complies with this request.

------
stonogo
Why doesn't the headline read "Instacart (YC S12)"?

~~~
basil-rash
They don't add that to companies most people will already recognize:

Airbnb:
[https://www.bing.com/search?q=site%3Anews.ycombinator.com+ai...](https://www.bing.com/search?q=site%3Anews.ycombinator.com+airbnb)

Stripe:
[https://www.bing.com/search?q=site%3Anews.ycombinator.com+st...](https://www.bing.com/search?q=site%3Anews.ycombinator.com+stripe)

Cruise:
[https://www.bing.com/search?q=site%3Anews.ycombinator.com+cr...](https://www.bing.com/search?q=site%3Anews.ycombinator.com+cruise)

etc.

~~~
macintux
“Most people” surely doesn’t apply here. I’d never heard of them, much less
knew they were YC.

------
rdm_blackhole
I have never understood the tipping concept.

Just pay your workers minimum wages at least and make tipping optional.

I shouldn't have to tip the "employees" just because a company can get away
without paying even minimum wage to its "employees".

There is something seriously broken with the whole tipping thing.

~~~
rafiki6
Or increase the cost of your product or service and offer incentives to
employees after you've already raised their wages.

------
babaganoosh89
DoorDash does the same thing of “stealing” tips. Either you should tip in cash
or not at all.

~~~
Someone1234
I want the worker to receive 100% of the tip as much as anyone.

But does anyone else find it obnoxious that all these digital services exist,
often starting out with no tip straight pricing, then tipping re-appears, and
then you suddenly need physical cash to morally use the service at all?

Obviously workers should get fairly compensated. The problem is tipping
culture itself, just set a price that customers are willing to pay and workers
can enjoy a reasonable standard of living.

Plus the whole tipping thing is extremely inconsistent. Floral delivery? No
tip. Pizza delivery? Tip. Some brands support credit card tipping, others
don't, and even the ones that do you have to research how much using it hurts
the employee...

The US needs law changes that outlaw tipping. It will be culturally painful
while we adapt but once we do both workers and customers will be better for
it.

~~~
dragonwriter
> The US needs law changes that outlaw tipping.

No, it just needs to not treat workers that might receive tips differently:
they should have he same minimum wages as other workers and tips should not
count as compensation by the employer satisfying minimum wage mandates.

Private employers might then wish to prohibit employees accepting tips (since
it no longer benefits the employer as it does now for the worker to be classes
as “tipped”), for similar reasons to those for which public employers already
do.

EDIT: And we need better enforcement (and possibly slight changes to the basic
rules) against mischaracterization of employees as contractors, which is most
of the problem in this case.

~~~
Dylan16807
> No, it just needs to not treat workers that might receive tips differently:
> they should have he same minimum wages as other workers and tips should not
> count as compensation by the employer satisfying minimum wage mandates.

Now they're getting minimum wage and I still feel the need to tip. That
doesn't fix the problem unless we also make major changes to the minimum wage.

> Private employers might then wish to prohibit employees accepting tips
> (since it no longer benefits the employer as it does now for the worker to
> be classes as “tipped”), for similar reasons to those for which public
> employers already do.

They wouldn't do that at minimum wage, and they get negative value out of a
combined pay-more/anti-tip policy.

I don't think it's enough to fix the problems with tipping culture.

~~~
dragonwriter
> Now they're getting minimum wage and I still feel the need to tip.

I'm not sure that your dislike of your own sense of obligation is sufficient
cause for a legal prohibition on tipping. I think you _should_ be free to tip
(though employers should likewise be free to prohibit employees from accepting
tips, and should have fewer reasons not to do so than they currently do.)

OTOH, I would get behind (and meant to include this before) prohibiting
employers from taking, offsetting, or redirecting tips, including directing
employees in a sharing regime; requiring tips, if given and accepted
(employers would be permitted to prohibir the latter as a condition of
employment, so long as the policy was uniform) to be property of the recieving
employee independent of the employer. Basically, they are now a dodge around
sales taxes for many employers, but effectively still revenue that the
employer controls, within some limits, which gives employers a big reason to
protect tipping culture.

~~~
pishpash
What sense of "obligation" are you referring to? If it is obligatory then it
definitely should be outlawed, because it becomes false advertisement of
prices.

~~~
dragonwriter
> What sense of "obligation" are you referring to?

The sense of “sense of obligation” in play when one says “I feel the need to
tip”, as I would have thought was obvious by the quoted bit I responded to.

> If it is obligatory then it definitely should be outlawed

It is not _actually_ obligatory (except where it is advertised as required, in
which case there is no false advertising), even if some people have a _sense_
of obligation which demands tipping.

------
twothumbsup
How is this not wage theft? They're literally taking the tips from workers and
using it to pay them. I'm tipping the worker, not Instacart.

~~~
lkbm
I thought that was simply how tipping worked. Wage+tips have to average (at
least) minimum wage.

It's obviously a terrible system, but is this different from how most
everywhere with tipping in the US works? I've never worked a tipped job in the
US.

~~~
hn_throwaway_99
Many, many decades ago when I worked in a restaurant, the rule was tipped
employees needed to be paid at least 50% of the standard minimum wage. At the
end of the day, if the employee didn't clear the minimum wage rate with the
total of their wage + tips, the employer was required to fork over the
additional amount to equal the minimum wage.

However, the absolute bare minimum the employer was allowed to pay was 50% of
minimum wage. Not sure if this was just state-specific or if it changed.

------
tzhenghao
This is ridiculous! We need to start moving away from tipping. This reminds me
of US restaurants. I'd much rather be charged mandatory service fees. It's a
poor way to signal poor food/service by hurting those in front than the cooks
behind.

------
aagha
WTF is going on?!

Some engineer somewhere decided or was told: Hey if someone gets a big tip,
lets consider that as part of their pay and not pay they what's due. And then
they just blindly do it?!

I can understand that an engineer might just be following requirements, but
_someone_ made that decision--probably a PM, or does this go higher than that?

It seems that companies (FB, Google, etc.) are almost going out of their way
to be evil!

We need the equivalent of a "known to do evil" blacklist: companies and
employees known to have been working on specific products/projects should be
black-balled:

You wrote a VPN to collect information off people's phones? Good luck getting
work with another tech company. You wrote/designed functionality to get kids
to play games that require money and is hidden from their parents? Screw you.
You wrote/designed a feature that said that people should be screwed out of
their wage because they got a big tip? F you.

------
kbyatnal
DoorDash does the same thing, which is why I stopped using them as well.

Source:
[https://www.reddit.com/r/doordash/comments/963kyv/if_you_are...](https://www.reddit.com/r/doordash/comments/963kyv/if_you_are_a_customer_do_not_tip_via_the_app/?st=JRICRPTX&sh=61c36ffa)

------
sokoloff
I read it as they paid him only $0.38 (not $0.80) for his time.

~~~
jtbayly
You are correct. You can't really count mileage reimbursement as "pay." It's a
reimbursement for wear and tear, fuel, etc.

I mean, it's hard to fathom how you could get worse than $0.80. But less than
half that? That's worse for sure.

------
gabrielblack
I'm European, in my country if an employer only try to do something like that
go strait to the jail. Now is in progress a process to guarantee to the guys
employed in the delivery of food by bike a minimum wage because they was
exploited by some companies, but that case isn't distantly comparable to this
one. I can't believe this behavior it's tolerated in a civilized nation.

------
parshimers
What absolute garbage, it defies the entire point of tipping. Is this even
legal? If a restaurant got caught doing this, they would definitely lose many
customers or even get run out of business.

~~~
EpicEng
It's the norm in many states, so I don't think so. I grew up in IL where
waiters make something like $3 / hour. If that + tips is less than minimum
wage then the company has to make up the difference. Not quite the same as
they don't dock your pay if you make good tip money, but same principle.

~~~
munk-a
It works out to the same end result (with the exception that waiters usually
have some absolute minimum wage they can earn, so if a waiter makes 20$/hr in
tips the restaurant still need to pay a bit on top of that.

One super annoying thing about this system and people choosing not to tip is a
situation like this, assume a waiter is serving two customers in an hour, the
local minimum wage is $9/hr and the sub-minimum wage is $3/hr, the first
customer tips $4 dollars, yielding a potential wage excess of $2 (assuming a
reliable rate) when the second customer tips $0 then the waiter ends up making
no money beyond minimum wage. So if you're a tipper another customer that
doesn't tip can cancel out your tip.

I'm not certain how these are aggregated from an accounting perspective, but I
wouldn't be surprised if the window was either a full day or a pay period (in
the latter case, every two weeks someone totals $3 * hrs worked, adds on total
tips and verifies if that number is above $9 * hrs worked (do nothing) or is
below (make up the difference out of the employer's pocket.

------
usaphp
Why do they even have a “tip” field is beyond me, you already paid for
delivery, what do you tip for??!!! And on top they ask you for a tip amount
_before_ the service is even performed. Tip is to reward for extra work that
server did, what extra work is there in food delivery service? And how do you
measure it _before_ you even got the food??

------
zeko1195
The whole tipping system should be stopped. The businesses will be forced to
start paying fair wages to their workers.

~~~
magic_beans
A restaurant in my neighborhood did not have tipping before New York raised
its minimum wage to $15 because they paid their servers a "fair wage". It has
since re-implemented tipping.

------
karl_p
My wife looked into instacart and we canceled after learning they don't
provide business car insurance for their drivers. What a scam.

------
steve19
This is terrible for the worker and highly deceptive to the client. Surely
this is fraud? Collecting tips but not passing it on?

~~~
pjc50
Of course it's illegal to steal tips, but actually enforcing that is another
matter. Companies will blatantly build illegal business models. And of course
some developer coded this automated tip stealing.

~~~
mesozoic
Can you cite any statute that says this is illegal?

~~~
siphor
Might fit under fraud. I hope it does. When I first learned of this tactic, I
felt tricked. I assumed with a tip, that I was boosting someone’s salary for a
job well done. I’m sure it’s debatable, and that my assumption was wrong? But
I imagine most people feel this what a tip is.

Fraud n. the intentional use of deceit, a trick or some dishonest means to
deprive another of his/her/its money, property or a legal right.

~~~
panda888888
It's explicitly illegal under Washington State law:

RCW 49.46.020 section 3:

"Tips and service charges paid to an employee are in addition to, and may not
count towards, the employee's hourly minimum wage."

------
rebuilder
I guess this is how you actually disrupt a labour-intensive industry. You
lower costs, or provide a much better service that somehow established
companies haven't been able to provide profitably.

Sure, you can try to use technology and innovation to reduce overhead. That's
the pitch usually, I think. If you can provide a service with a lower
headcount, you can be much more cost-efficient. But it seems a lot of the
companies aiming for disruption aren't able to actually do that, so instead
they reduce payroll costs by simply refusing to take on the responsibilities
employers are traditionally expected to take.

It'll be interesting to see how long this model of "disruption" can be
sustained.

------
RoboTeddy
(The following is completely predicated on the truth of the report that a
customer tipping $x doesn't result in workers' total compensation being
increased by $x)

As a YC alum, I'm disgusted to see a YC company behaving like this.

Instacart: It shouldn't have to be said, but you don't cheat your customers
and workers. Whatever internal rationalization you've developed for this
practice is just that — a rationalization.

Stop cheating people. If your unit economics are so broken that you can't
survive without deceiving and cheating people, then shut down instead.

------
Rapzid
Uber was great until they introduced tipping, and somehow now we are supposed
to tip employees for delivering stuff when the _entire_ business model of the
company we are also paying is delivery?! Why are we supposed to tip door dash
drivers, but not Amazon delivery drivers or FedEx/UPS/USPS? I refuse to use
Door Dash due to the expectation of tipping their employees on top of the
super high up-charges and service fee I'm paying FOR DELIVERY.

Tipping has ruined this whole new batch of convenience services for me.

------
warp_factor
people should simply NOT tip. At restaurant maybe because it is socially
mandatory, but anywhere else, a signal should be sent that it is stupid and
doesn't make any economical sense to tip!

~~~
nsenifty
It is not "socially" mandatory as much as the workers suffer otherwise because
they are paid less than minimum wage.

~~~
jonesdc
If an employee who earns tips does not make the equivalent of minimum wage pay
his or her hours worked, then the employer is required to pay difference
(i.e., employees will be paid at least minimum wage for their work)

~~~
vkou
Not tipping still makes the workers still suffer, though, because with tips,
many of many of them make above minimum wage.

Honestly, in the general case, I don't understand how anyone can manage to
live on minimum wage, unless they live in a barracks, their mother's basement,
or under a bridge.

------
WheelsAtLarge
The tip economy SUCKS. When will it stop! Now it's part of the future that is
being sold to us as the new nirvana. Why can't things change?

Employers love it since they can underpay. Some employees love it since they
can make a very good living but that's a fraction of the total. But overall it
creates an economy subclass that's constantly struggling. They have trouble
paying the bills. It's tough work plus they have to deal with upset customers
even though they likely had no control of the situation.

I'm a fan of a permanent surcharge on the bill rather than having to deal with
giving a tip. Pizza delivery places have a delivery charge now plus a fuel
surcharge, as far as I am concerned they can add a service charge too.

Yes, services will become more expensive. But over time an economic
equilibrium begins to appear at which time we can reevaluate and change. But
the last thing we need to do is bring it into the future.

------
thejerz
This is why I never tip on Prime Now, Instacart, Uber, Lyft, or Postmates: I
don't trust them. Show me whatever the price is, and based on that I'll decide
whether to use your service today. I'm not interested in voluntarily giving
your business money.

------
sudosteph
I've always wondered why someone hasn't tried to reverse the model on these
delivery service apps (postmates, doordash, instacart)

Instead of delivery people blindly accepting orders and hoping for the best,
the people who are requesting the delivery should have to set a rate at order
time and make the full order and destination visible so couriers can decide if
it's worth it and make a counter-offer if it's too low to be worth it.

If you ever go read what the workers are saying in subreddits for these
services, it's clear that the incentives for quick and accurate deliveries
just don't line up with the current gig system.

~~~
dogweather
> the people who are requesting the delivery should have to set a rate at
> order time

That's an interesting idea --- reminds me of e-coins with variable transaction
fees. You can offer more if you want people to work on your transaction
faster.

------
sfilargi
I suspect DoorDash is doing something similar, that's why I always choose 0
tip on the app and tip them cash when they arrive.

------
leipert
German reader here. Because of minimum wage you'd only tip if service was good
(or always tip if you have enough money, my parents generation are more frugal
than I am). Delivery services often get around minimum wage because they use
the "Uber" trick and technically the drivers are "self-employed", always
tipping those folks.

Anyway: Are tips taxable in the US? Here in Germany tips are tax-free under
certain conditions: If I give it directly to the barber, waiter, etc., it is a
non-taxable event, while if the employer collects the tip and divides it up
under all employees it is a taxable event.

~~~
ylesaout
Here is a difference between EU countries. In France, you cannot even tip by
credit card or anything else that can be controlled by the employer or the
state. It's only cash and at your discretion. Thus, it cannot even be a
taxable event. However you need to have some cash if you want to tip.

~~~
evilolive
I think you can, you have to ask "I want to tip x euros" before the waiter
puts your cc in the machine. It feels really awkward and so most don't do it

~~~
ylesaout
Indeed you are right, you can do it! However they need to add a line to the
invoice to sell you something more (e.g. a bottle of water). And when they
will report what they have sell and what they have buy there will be a
difference. So for few customers it may be OK, but they can't do it every
time.

------
notJim
Instacart is not the only one of these apps doing this. Amazon Flex/Prime Now
also does the same thing:
[https://www.reddit.com/r/AmazonFlexDrivers/comments/66zkx7/w...](https://www.reddit.com/r/AmazonFlexDrivers/comments/66zkx7/who_is_going_around_telling_customers_that_amazon/)

There is some back-and-forth in that thread, but the gist of it seems to be
the same as here, where Amazon takes tips into account when they calculate the
base wage, which can result in getting a low base wage if there's a large tip.

------
seancaptain
Update: Instacart is introducing a $3 minimum on all jobs, in the wake of the
80-cent debacle. [https://www.fastcompany.com/90300962/reeling-from-
algorithm-...](https://www.fastcompany.com/90300962/reeling-from-algorithm-
glitch-instacart-institutes-3-minimum-fee-for-drivers)

------
danans
FWIW Good Eggs directly states their pro living wage (and no tip necessary)
policy on their website:

[https://help.goodeggs.com/hc/en-
us/articles/360007378212-Do-...](https://help.goodeggs.com/hc/en-
us/articles/360007378212-Do-I-have-to-tip-my-Good-Eggs-delivery-driver-)

I have no stake in them but it's interesting that they addressed this at all,
and well before this instacart controversy.

------
hathawsh
This makes me wonder why people bother working for Instacart when there are so
many alternatives. I googled for "service economy gig" and got this huge list:

[https://www.wonolo.com/blog/best-gig-economy-
apps/](https://www.wonolo.com/blog/best-gig-economy-apps/)

I guess this Wonolo service is for choosing the right services to work for.
Now I'm wondering how many Wonolo clones there are. :-)

~~~
vkou
What makes you think these other jobs haven't adopted, or won't adopt the same
'business model'?

------
jiveturkey
Instacart doesn't list any company officers or important contacts on their
website. I guess because they would end up dealing with irate customers too
much.

But here are the vile people responsible for this practice:
[https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/instacart#section-
cu...](https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/instacart#section-current-team)

------
leesjensen
This really isn't that different than tipping at your favorite bar. Employers
artificially pay service workers less than they should with the assumption
that the customer will make up the rest. The real answer is to supporting the
broken tipping model. Pay people an honest wage and expect them to do their
job without expecting a consumer to pay a bribe to get good service.

------
jeena
Could someone explain to me what's up with those tips? If I'm doing a job I
expect to be paid a specific amount. Tips to me seem like pittance which you
would give to someone who at least can't work or something, for services you
just pay a normal price which the owner of the place needs to calculate with.

I'm often thinking about Mr. Pink in Reservoir Dogs
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V4sbYy0WdGQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V4sbYy0WdGQ)
he makes the point I'm also trying to make. People should get paid for doing
service and not need to rely on pittance of the customers because their bosses
don't calculate the real cost of doing business. If it were up to me tips
would be forbidden.

In Japan (as far as I understand) it's an insult to tip, it's almost like:
"This business probably isn't doing well enough to pay you a proper salary, so
here's a little something extra."

------
pageandrew
Absolutely terrible practice, and dishonest to both their workers and
customers. Shame on Instacart -- never using them again.

------
qwerty456127
Always tip in cash. Tips should be a purely private thing, nobody but the
tipper and the tipped should know about the tip.

~~~
justtopost
Technically the IRS gets a cut, but yes, no private entity needs to know.

~~~
qwerty456127
Perhaps it does but my opinion is it should not.

------
mothsonasloth
Gigeconomy is just modern day slavery dressed as an informal employee contract
with, "work your own hours".

------
nsenifty
This is why the tipping system in the US is absurd. The whole "you must tip
because they get paid peanuts" argument is a circular logic. How about making
sure that the worker gets paid fairly by their employer and customers can then
optionally tip for outstanding service?

~~~
nck4222
That's not the logic behind the tipping system. It's, "tipping incentives
employees to perform well because they'll make more money for doing a better
job".

It doesn't work that way either, but that's the rationale.

Forcing people to tip to ensure people get paid enough money is a consequence
of the system, not the reasoning why the system is implemented.

~~~
nitwit005
People do make the argument that you should tip generously because they're
poorly paid.

~~~
ilikehurdles
The very people writing these workers’ paychecks are effectively making this
argument.

~~~
megy
The very people collected those checks are making those arguments, directly.
Lets be honest, service staff prefer the way it is. They can prey on their
customers, and they end up making more than they would if paid min wage.

~~~
bunderbunder
Most service staff are probably thinking within a set framework, where getting
a minimal base pay is a foregone conclusion.

A more interesting and useful comparison would be to poll individuals who have
held similar service industry jobs in countries that do and do not have
tipping cultures, and ask them which they preferred and why.

------
purple-again
I’m confused and hoping someone can clear it up. My understanding is you are
allowed to pay well below minimum wage to employees that receive tips. If the
sum of those tips plus what you pay them does not equal or exceed minimum wage
the employer is required to pay them more money until they reach minimum wage.
This isn’t often an issue because tipped employees will beat minimum wage
significantly.

Is this not Instacart doing the same thing where your wage is .82 plus tips as
long as that amount is above x wage. If it’s below x they will pay you x.

However in this instance it’s an issue because the tipped employees are not
often making more than x even with tips therefore the consumer is misled about
who their tip money is going to.

------
ggm
In a context of pushback over casual hire/gig-economy workers and their actual
employment status this feels like both egregiously stupid and possibly illegal
behaviour, which the company does because its a scofflaw. If its legal its
wrong. if its illegal then its wrong both equitably and legally.

I can't see in either case how its sustainable business practice to offer gig
work, but claim the tip is the pay.

I really wish there were penalties reserved for CEO and Board of these
startups, which couldn't be passed on to shareholders or customers.

Flaying alive feels like it might be about all we've got left.

Happy to put on an old crone's clothes and sit below the scaffold knitting,
while it happens. Maybe the sans-culottes had a point?

------
bwb
Should be shut down.

------
jklein11
Isn't this what restaurant's do with wait staff in the US? I know in NJ wait
staff are required to be paid minimum wage. Typically the restaurant pays them
less (I think it was around $3) and then their tips get them to minimum wage.
If they don't get enough tips the restaurant is required to pay them the
difference(although in practice I'm not sure this ever happens)

If someone is willing to be paid $10 to deliver groceries, does it matter who
is paying them $10 for it?

I've never used instacart before. Is the verbiage around leaving a tip lead
the end user to believe that they are giving it directly to the person making
the delivery?

------
miguelmota
In the ancient history of gratuity, tips were originally given _before_ any
service was received so that you can get priority service. It's absurd that
tips now feel mandatory because of social pressures particularly in the US.

------
RoadieRoller
Our team of 5 went to a good restaurant/steak place in LA last week, ate and
drank for $300, enjoyed the ambience and ate great food, enjoyed the warmth of
the service, spent great time together and tipped $75

Who should the tip go to?

\- To the owner who spent/spends a fortune running it in LA?

\- To the chef who catered to our needs without seeing us?

\- To the person who immediately and happily tended to us everytime we raised
our heads and looked around

\- To the person who cleared the used plates and never let us wanting for
crockery

\- (we tipped the valet guy separately)

I wonder what as a customer should I do? How do I know the share goes to all?
I cannot pay cash for that amount. I carry barely $5 with me in cash.

~~~
fencepost
It's been 30 years since I worked in a restaurant, but at that particular
place the waitstaff received tips and split them according to some formula. I
think busboys got 10%, not sure if or how much went to the bartender or anyone
"back of house" in the kitchen.

In any case, the owner's revenue is based on the menu pricing; if the owner
wants more then the prices get raised. For anyone else, the expectation is
likely to be that tips go through the server and are divided from there if
they're divided at all. Don't stress too much about tipping the other staff
unless someone's gone far above and beyond.

------
supernova87a
I guess the real test of how this system works is:

\-- if TIP > minimum wage \-- does Instacart record a negative -$ adjustment

such that a person's payment will only ever be the maximum payment, regardless
of how much tip the customer gives?

That would really be egregious.

------
caconym_
This is theft from the customer, who tips with the understanding that it will
be extra money in the worker's pocket.

Disgusting, reprehensible, and frankly unbelievable. I've never used Instacart
and now I never will.

------
jolmg
> We include tips in the calculation so that you can get a more accurate
> picture of what your earnings will be after completing the batch.

> Tips have always been included in our calculation of earnings and it helps
> provide a reminder to customers that you are providing a valuable service.

Being fed garbage like that is pretty insulting, though it's interesting to
see how far they're willing to stretch logic to try to put a positive spin on
it. I mean, "we reduce your earnings so you can feel useful"? Man, logic broke
right there.

------
JohnGB
One of the many things that I love about the Netherlands is the lack of
tipping in the culture. People get paid a decent wage, and so tipping is only
something done if the service is amazing.

~~~
electriclove
I'm almost with you there. Get rid of tipping completely. Employers should pay
people a decent wage and reward excellent behavior. Don't put that on the
customer at all.

------
harry8
When workers are thieving from their employer there is a very real prospect of
jail. There seems to be no prospect of jail for managers thieving from
workers. Why is that?

------
hamilyon2
What I don't understand is why the law in USA allows someone be employed, and
by signing some contract thing still count as if she is not employed.

In Russia, distinction is clear in law. Do you pay her regularly? I. e. at
least one a month? Then she is employee, no matter who says what.

I understand less protection for workers, less vacation, less regulation
overall, this is all understandable. I don't understand why facts are ignored
in favor of words.

~~~
speedplane
In the U.S., there is a multi-factor test if someone is an employee. Just
paying someone regularly isn't enough. You might get a haircut once a month,
but your barber clearly isn't an employee. It requires more, like control over
their day-to-day actions, if you provide benefits, and several other factors.

The Russian law may seem clear, but in reality it's just a stand-in for a more
complex analysis.

------
galkk
I've read that similar happens in Guitar Center.

Basically, all floor employees salary is commission based. If you don't get
enough commission, they will pay you minimal wage but will get rid of you in
several months, otherwise your sale commission kind of "fills" your salary
until it gets to minimal wage, and only then starts to increase your wage.

Won't be surprised if most of retail works in similar way.

------
jliptzin
I always tip in cash, except in the rare cases where I happened to not have
cash on me. I am always under the assumption that this kind of thing is the
default not the exception; when you add tip to a credit card who knows what
happens when the mothership sucks up that cash and filters it through various
middlemen before finally (if ever) getting to the person who provided a
service to you.

------
chrisacky
What would the worker have received if the customer had tipped $50 on a
smaller order? Would Instacart have pocketed the additional $40?

------
leesjensen
This really isn't that different than tipping at your favorite bar. Employers
artificially pay service workers less than they should with the assumption
that the customer will make up the rest. The real answer is to supporting the
broken tipping model. Pay people an honest wage and expect them to do their
job without requiring a consumer to pay a bribe to get good service.

------
duxup
This is terrible, but unsurprising.

The whole gig thing is basically passing the risks associated with having
employees (injuries and managing them) / sales variation risks (having to pay
people when sales are up or down) onto folks who are no longer employees.

The idea that they'd take even more from their contractors based on other
factors just seems natural.

Maybe a "franchise fee" type thing is next....

------
sofaofthedamned
I'm not an American so looking at this from afar - but according to this tips
go straight to 'Shoppers'? Are they actually doing something completely
different?

[https://www.instacart.com/help/section/200761964#11500564332...](https://www.instacart.com/help/section/200761964#115005643323)

~~~
draw_down
The tips go straight to the shoppers, yeah. And then their pay gets, you know,
"adjusted" (in Instacart's favor) in the amount of the tip.

The whole point of the tip is that it is supposed to be a bonus on top of the
worker's normal pay. Instead, here it is displacing the money that Instacart
would have otherwise paid them.

------
neuralzen
Absolutely crazy. By comparison, Go-Jek in Indonesia ends up paying their
scooter delivery workers about about $3-$4 on average per hour (in my
experience) depending on traffic, for deliveries (food, shopping, etc). There
is also no option to tip in the app, and tipping isn't expected but isn't
alien either.

------
40acres
Really disgusting behavior, honestly I think the "gig economy" has the right
idea of where we are headed, we are moving to a service / high skill
(technology) economy. Gig economy tools combine the best of both worlds, but
these exploitative labor practices and low hanging industry targets have got
to end.

------
gorpomon
If Instacart can't afford to pay their employees, then they should not
operate. They are stealing tips from their employees to make profit. It is
unethical to use their service. Stop using it and write them an e-mail
explaining why. Feel free to resume using it if they stop this practice and
apologize.

------
_robbywashere
Are instacart 'employees' private contractors/1099? Wouldn't that mean
instacart is even LESS legally able to take their tip money? As in actual
employees who are tipped will have a minimum wage that must be met, which is
why in some places tipped positioned wages can be as low as $3.

------
fouc
Perhaps tipping should always bypass the company.

If there was a popular 3rd party app for tipping directly to any individual,
regardless of where they might be or whether they're working or not, that
could actually prevent companies from snooping in on the tips. Even at
restaurants.

------
dpwm
I wonder what happens if a customer tips more than what Instacart would have
paid?

I read through the blog post on Medium and the article, but couldn't find any
case where the customer had tipped more.

Is $0.80 the minimum payment they will make, or will it decrease further –
negative?

------
cloud_thrasher
How is this any different from the what wait/serving staff experience. Most
jobs are a flat wage (possibly minimum) and tips. It's always like that and
still is. Maybe, the next time you leave a dollar tip for your server, you'll
think again.

------
xfitm3
This is an outrage. I used instacart for awhile and eventually stopped - it
just became too expensive. I would always waive the service fee when possible
and tip the driver in cash. Glad I did - now knowing they use it to deny
living wages.

------
HillaryBriss
Over the past two years, these kinds of complaints have piled up against
Instacart:

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instacart#Controversy](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Instacart#Controversy)

------
sergiotapia
Instacart, a YCombinator funded company pays their workers $0.80 cents an
hour.

------
wiggler00m
Build app to receive tips anonymously.

Integrate seamlessly into checkout experience (like Affirm does for micro
lending).

This could prevent Instacart etc from reducing hourly rate based on tips
(because they don't have access to that info).

------
watmough
I will not use any of these gig economy BS companies.

They're often exploitative of workers and this is just exactly the kind of
thing that reinforces my decision to never stay at an AirBNB, never take Lyft,
Uber etc.

------
elken
This is taking advantage of both the customer and the worker.

I am not an instacart user myself but I use similar services and I expect that
any tip will be delivered to the driver.

I'd be pissed off to find out otherwise.

~~~
ylesaout
I don't live in US, but for sure the only way to ensure your tip goes to the
right person is to give it with cash.

------
wiggler00m
We should tip shoppers with Venmo, Cash App, Paypal, etc, when the shopper
delivers.

Instacart won't see this transaction and therefore won't reduce their wages.

Less convenient. But this policy is unfair.

------
module0000
Vote with your wallet - tweeting/posting/complaining is fine and should be
done - but _denying them revenue_ is a universally effective message to bad
businesses.

------
miaklesp
Just don't tip. Tipping is bullshit.

It's company responsibility to set the pricing policy so everyone one gets
paid.

If they don't pay their workers, it's not my problem.

------
anonuser123456
It's almost like working as a contractor for instacart is a crappy job that
people should quit doing since it doesn't pencil out financially...

------
imtringued
What happens if the tip exceeds the actual cost of the service? If the tip was
$11 would they deduct $0.20 from the tip? This is completely absurd.

------
ddingus
No Instacart for me. This is not OK at all.

Others have said why. I will spend some time to make others aware.

I really hate this sort of thing. Viscerally.

------
_robbywashere
I would be interested in seeing a gig economy service being run and equally
shared by the employees, or worker-owned.

------
mesozoic
This is legal though right? Isn't it the same way restaurants pay their
servers so little wage?

My opinion is abolish tip culture.

------
pishpash
It's about time tipping died, that's the bottom line. There never was a good
outcome to opaque pricing.

------
throwaway66666
So you are essentially thanking and tipping instacart, not the worker. Evil
like a villain from a disney movie.

------
jerry40
What if a tip amound exceeds a worker's payment amount? Will they demand from
the worker to pay?

------
skilled
Haha what the fuck? And who was the brilliant mind behind this thinking it
would be okay to do this?

------
droithomme
Hm, 42 cents of that was his mileage pay for the trip. 38 cents was his actual
salary.

------
Pfhreak
Anyone know if Amazon Prime Now or other similar delivery services operate the
same?

------
todipa
I use instacart weekly. Not going to leave them any tip via the platform
anymore...

------
prvc
Why $.22? Is that the minimum before the tip has an impact on the nominal
rate?

------
HillaryBriss
i heard this same thing from an instacart worker more than a year ago. at the
time i was confused and kind of doubted her story, but now i see that
Instacart employment really is just as shitty as she said. wow.

------
_drimzy
I don't get it. Should the minimum wage be excluding tips?

Edit: I meant shouldn't.

~~~
dan-robertson
Well typically people give tips under the understanding that they are
supplementing the worker’s income, rather than the company’s bottom line

------
YeahSureWhyNot
oh really? employer paying way less than minimum wage because employee gets to
keep some of the tips is shocking news now? ever heard of restaurants? they
have been doing this for decades.

------
calhoun137
I swear to god I am never going to order from instacart ever again.

------
SN76477
Shame on them.

The gig economy has so many problems like this it is silly.

------
diminoten
Where's the outrage for the millions of service industry employees who _also_
have to deal with this, and have been dealing with this for decades?

Why's Instacart getting the unique bad press?

~~~
DATACOMMANDER
In part because they’ve added a layer of deception to the practice. In
part—and I’m speculating here—because this is a young company, founded and run
by people in (or nearly in) our cohort, and were disappointed in them as peers
(albeit peers who struck it rich).

~~~
diminoten
Maybe, I'm leaning towards the, "people didn't realize what tip wages were"
explanation though.

------
wnevets
and to think I was just about to sign up and use it with www.bjs.com. Now that
won't be happening

------
malandrew
DoorDash does this too.

------
snissn
(just tip in cash)

------
dzonga
Problem here: Isn't Instacart but the so called rich-hipster millenials that
need / want / to use Instacart. Or lazy or just for the sake of convenience at
the sake of a poor soul, don't wanna shop groceries for themselves. If your
time is limited then you could easily use Amazon fresh/ Walmart / Boxed for
your groceries. But nah, it's SV 2.0 Human exploitation at it's finest,
Capitalism as usual. & to people building these services, put humans first.
It's sad to see someone in HEB wearing a green tshirt shopping for someone -
it's like society has rendered these people useless only fit to serve master.
Basically slavery 2.0 with a little wage on top.

------
bambax
Startup culture is a study in psychopathy.

\- lack of empathy: Uber, Instacart, etc. etc. etc., exploiting the poor

\- parasitic behavior: aggressive tax optimisation/tax evasion, Amazon
employees relying on food stamps for subsistance

\- superficial charm: get rich quick

\- pathological lying: cf. Facebook denying they ever did anything wrong

\- manipulativeness: "make the world more open and connected"

and my personal favorite,

\- grandiosity: "change the world!", "solve physics for good!", "be immortal!"

~~~
tchaffee
That's quite a broad generalization. For sure a lot of the biggest names have
done ethically questionable things. It's no doubt that growing that fast and
gaining that much power is going to hugely amplify whatever ethical flaws the
founders have. And no one is ethically perfect. That's not to excuse Uber,
Facebook, Google, Amazon or any of the more egregious companies.

But it's just a case of confirmation bias if you didn't look for counter-
examples to try to disprove your theory.

Are the following companies ethically perfect? I doubt it. But I haven't heard
much bad about them and they have changed my life for the better
significantly: AirBnb, Dropbox, Stripe, Rappi, WhatsApp, Square, Netflix. I
bet I could find others.

~~~
gbear605
WhatsApp is owned by Facebook as of 2014, so unfortunately all the same issues
with Facebook apply to them too.

~~~
tchaffee
I agree that folks have very good reason to keep a much closer eye on what
WhatsApp actually does, and also what the user agreement says. However, you
can't say that the WhatsApp team or product is necessarily and already
violating people's privacy in the same ways as Facebook is. You can have all
the healthy skepticism you want, but it doesn't mean that WhatsApp is doing
those things.

------
m3kw9
Dick move, instant back lash

------
atom-morgan
Seriously, this is the responsibility consumers have in a free market. If
there's behavior you don't like, move on. You don't get to complain about bad
actors when you're literally keeping them in business.

~~~
lenticular
Collective action is essentially impossible among consumers though. Boycotts
essentially never work. Not only that, but who are you going to use instead of
instacart: Amazon Fresh? Uber? Or will you drive yourself to the store and buy
it from minimum wage employees who work unstable hours? Also, what do you
think the working conditions were like for whoever picked that asparagus?

~~~
aqme28
>Boycotts essentially never work

Is this true?

~~~
berbec
No, this is not true.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montgomery_bus_boycott](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Montgomery_bus_boycott)

~~~
tivert
The consumer collective-action economic effects of that boycott changed
_nothing_. What did change things was the _government action it triggered_ :

> Pressure increased across the country. The related civil suit was heard in
> federal district court and, on June 4, 1956, the court ruled in Browder v.
> Gayle (1956) that Alabama's racial segregation laws for buses were
> unconstitutional. As the state appealed the decision, the boycott continued.
> The case moved on to the United States Supreme Court. On November 13, 1956,
> the Supreme Court upheld the district court's ruling, ruling that
> segregation on public buses and transportation was against the law.

~~~
dnautics
also keep in mind that the segregation rules were unpopular with the bus
companies themselves (think about the infra you need to enforce segregation),
as soon as the court ruled against the local laws, the montgomery bus company
was rushing to flip over to desegregated.

------
wilkskyes
What are the poor legitimately at fault for then?

I'm tired of this implication that the poor can never be at fault for
anything, because they are so poor. It is an overly simplified sympathy that
doesn't always reflect reality.

~~~
ergothus
Nothing.

Sure, INDIVIDUALS are at fault for a variety of options, but if you're looking
to blame the poor as a group for something, you're using the wrong criteria,
since it's a status that has no direct mapping to choice.

~~~
shard972
So the rich, powerful and elite are also not responsible for anything either?
Just individually?

That seems like quite the atomised society.

~~~
ergothus
> the rich, powerful and elite are also not responsible for anything either?
> Just individually?

The distinction is that money provides opportunities, poverty is the lack of
them.

You can hold the wealthy responsible for what they do with their wealth, or
what they don't do with their wealth. Because wealth is something they HAVE.
The poor, on the other hand, don't HAVE anything, so you can't say they are
using their lack of wealth foolishly, nor can you say they are failing to use
their lack of wealth wisely.

~~~
bunderbunder
FWIW, you could argue that they are failing to handle their economic situation
as well as they could.

But even that is fraught, since, in the current economic culture, consumers
are pretty much constantly being preyed on, and actively encouraged to make
questionable decisions. Consider, for example, the predatory mortgage
practices on the part of the banking industry during the 2000s. Or predatory
lending practices on the part of the student loan and private college
industries. Or payday loan companies.

(There's arguably a double standard there - if it's a person with relatively
little money swindling people out of relatively small amounts of money, it's
con artistry. If it's a company with lots of money swindling people out of
lots of money, caveat emptor.)

------
gowld
How about paying people who serve you instead of passing the "buck" to the
someone else?

Why start tipping for outstanding service, instead of setting the floor at $0
for 0 service?

Answer: because people like to pay less for stuff and let the company eat the
blame.

~~~
Verdex
Yep, personally, when I go to mcdonalds, I like to pay the guy at the
register, the people cooking, the manager, and the unfortunate individual on
trash duty all separately.

Additionally, I refuse (on basic principle) to eat at any restaurant where I
haven't mapped out their _entire_ supply infrastructure. I made myself an app
that keeps track of how much I spend at each of these restaurants in any given
month and then I tip each entity a healthy percent (20% being the _minimum_
because really if you can't afford 20% you can't afford to eat out).
Currently, I'm tipping the truck drivers that deliver supplies, the factory
workers who prepare the frozen food, the farmers, the accountants, the HR
department, and the people who do road maintenance on the streets that all of
the above use to get to work.

~~~
dependsontheq
“the customer can decide how much he wants to pay everybody in the supply
chain” sounds a bit to too much like a possible pitch for a startup.

~~~
lovich
I mean, if that utility of every part of the supply chain was actually
surfaced and you could make payments directly to parts of the supply chain, I
could see trying that business model out as a consumer.

Whats happening here is that companies have figured out they can just extract
value out of a subset of their employees and pass the cost onto their
customers by manipulating social norms.

If I'm paying the worker directly they should be treated like a contractor,
but the companies want the control of hiring an employee and the
responsibilities of hiring a contractor

~~~
Verdex
I mean, I see what you're saying. I really do. But it feels a bit cynical to
me. Personally, I think everyone should try giving 20% (or more, haven't you
ever received some freshly cooked chicken nuggets and just __knew __that they
were delivered to the store with extra care) to every individual and /or
corporate entity in the entire supply chain. It just increases the feeling of
community in an ever growing global landscape.

~~~
franciscop
I don't agree, I think money is a fairly poor incentice for _increasing the
level of community_ and might even do the opposite and make it too profit-
based. I think everyone should be putting the extra effort on treating others
with care instead! _That_ increases the feeling of community.

Got those lovely nuggets? Buy there again, tell their manager how great the
service was, and be a great customer. Also, treat better the next person you
interact with, don't just offset your morale to paying some dollars and then
be an assh __e...

~~~
Verdex
(psst, this series of responses are kind of a joke)

~~~
franciscop
What do you mean series? And I'm not joking, it's how it works in Japan and it
seems to be working great here

------
consultSKI
Ouch. But unions are not the answer.

------
debt
Instacart is AWFUL.

They're paying shit wages and thus offering shit quality, because they're
offering a service that literally is unscalable. The logistics of laser-
guided-bomb-type delivery of groceries from store to fridge is asinine.

Yo, grocery store shopping doesn't suck bad enough to pay someone else to do
both the shopping and delivering! I'll pick up the pre-picked-up/bought
groceries. I don't need you to delivery them directly to my fridge; I think I
can handle that part. Just bring them out to my car when I pull up.

Problem solved, wages go up, quality goes up, I get my groceries. Everybody
wins.

~~~
coupdejarnac
I saw the ceo speak at a YC event in NYC a few years ago, and I looked around
the room and thought "what the fuck is this shit". I guess Instacart ticked
the checkbox of tackling a problem that doesn't scale, something YC looks for.
To me it symbolizes everything I hate about startup culture- the CEO trying to
change the world by doing something mundane, the circle jerk celebrating a
stupid idea and dubious ethical practices...etc.

------
throwaway5752
I am 100% in favor of tipping, and all of you people calling to ban it don't
understand service jobs. Those doing so should be ashamed, as they are
effectively victim-blaming in this context (in what really seems close to wage
theft, at least in spirit, by Instacart) to push this cause.

This is really much more a story of ethics in software development. Someone
had to know they were doing the wrong thing when they wrote this.

edit: No, not going to talk about tipping. Like it or not, it is extremely
common all over the world, and unrelated to this submission (which is about
lowering "shopper's" compensation to almost negligible levels when tips are
given).

~~~
passivepinetree
Why are you in favor of tipping? Can you justify your reasoning?

~~~
perpetualpatzer
Not parent commenter, but the common argument is that for the class of service
jobs where the employee's role is to interface with the customer and provide
them a service, customers are in a better position to assess the employee's
job performance than a manager. For that class of jobs, giving customers
influence over the employee's "merit bonuses" is a more accurate system of
rewarding performance and requires less managerial oversight to ensure good
service.

There seems to be some logic to that to me. Whether that justifies a reduction
in the minimum base wage for tipped roles, etc. I think of as a separate
question, but I don't see tipping as a structurally problematic norm as long
as the job interacts with many customers and a significant portion of the
population actually tips.

------
standardUser
This isn't uncommon or new. Many states allow for tips to offset wages, even
if wages fall below the minimum wage. Some states even have a separate minimum
wage for tipper workers that is below the standard minimum wage.

If you want to blame someone, I suggest looking for the actual culprit and not
a law-abiding company. This has little to do with Instacart and everything to
do with state wage laws.

~~~
lixue
This was posted by "Working Washington", so it seems reasonable to look at
Washington state law: It requires tipped employees to be paid minimum wage. So
does the rest of the west coast, including California (where Instacart has
it's HQ).

[https://www.dol.gov/whd/state/tipped.htm](https://www.dol.gov/whd/state/tipped.htm)

It is, of course, entirely possible that the worker in question is not on the
west coast, but Instacart is still welcome to pay a fair wage even if not
required to by law, and Instacart should certainly avoid lying about their
business practices either way (from the article: "Even Instacart seems to know
how messed up it is to pay workers less when they get tipped more — which is
why they’ve denied the practice when speaking to reporters at Business Insider
& the Miami Herald.")

~~~
kevin_b_er
Washington state law does not apply. All of the State of Washington laws and
constitution are fully invalidated and superseded by the American Arbitration
Act.

~~~
DATACOMMANDER
Let’s hope that’s tested in court.

