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Deliveroo_Rider_Taking_The_Lane_In_Bristol_(32611782273)Deliveroo cyclists speak out about harassment
Female delivery riders have spoken out about the harassment they receive from men while trying to do their job.
Bristol delivery rider Alex Ramosova, 22, said that she often wears masculine clothes when she’s working to avoid getting unwanted comments.
She said: “I dress like a man, I hide my hair and wear a really bulky, puffy jacket.
"I want to look bigger so people will leave me alone. A lot of the girls who ride mopeds for deliveries seem to take a similar approach.”
Speaking to Bristol Live, Alex, who uses her bike for deliveries, said she has worked for Deliveroo and similar services for three years.
She explained that she loves most aspects of the job, but says it is common for males to 'invite themselves into my personal space' when she is out making deliveries.
She continued: “It’s astonishing to me that a lot of people don’t know the boundaries of personal space.
"Maybe they know what they’re doing, maybe they don’t, but at the end of the day it’s uncomfortable and you’re frozen in the moment, not knowing what to do.”
She added: “I have guys invite me inside, trying to get me to come in. I say, ‘I am here, I am at the gate’...
“...there are some men who make sexual comments and come up really close to your face.”
Violence against Bristol delivery riders is not limited to women – male riders in the city have spoken out in the past about being assaulted while doing their job.
However, Alex said: “It is one thing to be a Deliveroo rider – it is another to be a woman Deliveroo rider. It’s doubling down on the trouble you get.”
Alex recently helped form a WhatsApp support group for female delivery workers in Bristol to share their experiences of harassment and intimidation. It has around 50 members.
“It’s nice, if you’re not feeling great about something, or you’re a bit uneasy, to be able to message each other,” she says.
She also pointed out that in her opinion, Deliveroo were actually a lot better at putting safeguards in place than other delivery companies.
A Deliveroo spokeswoman said: "The safety of riders is our absolute priority and we take every step to ensure they feel safe when on the road.
"We regularly communicate with riders about how to keep safe, including not accepting an order if they have any concerns about the location.
"Riders can raise safety concerns via the rider app and we regularly share safety advice with our riders, including the offer of free personal safety alarms. We also have a dedicated rider team to help riders with any concerns that they may have and make sure they feel supported at all times.”
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28 comments
I get what she's saying.. I have to dress like a woman when I'm cycling to stop women harassing me.. ok, that's not true
Sorry to hear about these experiences.
It would be interesting to hear more about what the companies are actually doing to protect riders. The quote from Deliveroo is evasive and meaningless and sounds as if riders are very much on their own. "Not accepting an order if they have concerns" and "offer of free personal safety alarms" is just victim blaming. "Concerns about the location" is odd too; surely it's not just about "rough locations" but problematic customers that can live anywhere?
Do the companies actually have a system that riders can rate the customers too, so that riders get automatically alerted if the customer has cause problems before? And do problematic customers get blocked (and, most importantly, their address, so they can't just sign up again with a different account)?
Before delving into this, I'd firstly like to say that I absolutely love working as a delivery courier with Deliveroo. However, yes the support for riders is very much a grey area. While there is rider support, this is only for live orders (an order you are currently completing). If you have issues with anything else, you must email them and tediously long for a response. We are able to call Deliveroo rider support, through the customer service line, which isn't intuitive.
But yes, we can reject any order we don't feel comfortable completing for whatever reason, and the safety alarm they provided us with recently was free. Ironically enough there were no instructions so you have to figure it out on your own with a quite loud device screaming at you... I also haven't tried to use it on a shift yet as I am worried I'll be pressing it more often by accident than on purpose!
I do wish I had carried it with me though, as a few days ago I was unable to give a customer their order as it contained alcohol, and they didn't have any ID. They told me "you're not going anywhere till I get my beer or my money back in my account" (they did have a photo of their ID but I am not allowed to accept that as a valid ID). I was too afraid to leave as I wasn't sure how far they were willing to go to get the beer! But maybe if I had the alarm I would have been more confident, as rider support was utterly useless, even though I used phrases such as "please hurry, I am very uncomfortable". Their responses are very bot-like, and our training to deal with aggressive customers is non-existent. Instead, we get very red and flashy messages in the app exclaiming WE MUST CHECK EVERY ID EVEN IF THE PERSON IS 70! And emails threatening us to be fired if we are reported as not having checked the ID. Of course, the customers don't know about this and most wouldn't care...
On the bright side, Deliveroo representatives have reached out to me after they have seen both the articles and are coming to meet me face to face in a few days to discuss how to make riders feel safer. Very exciting!
I wish you had contacted me before using my name in your story. As I have never met you, this came across and a shock. I appreciate you spreading the story, especially because the comments here are a lot more human and sensible than the ones on the Bristol live article. Yet can't help but feel I've been taken for a ride here. I could have given you a more original article had you spoken to me.
If you haven't already. email info [at] road.cc with your details. Unfortunately the site is mainly a conglomeration of cycling stories from around the web / news so I suspect it would be rare for a subject whose name has been in one article to be contacted about the repeat. However they have removed names before and tbh, if you are still up for it, it would be nice to know deliveroo from the inside although as expect a warts and all anonymous inside take is now off the cards.
Hi there, apologies we didn't get in touch. As the reader above has alluded to, some of our weekend output is aggregation of content from around the web as we only have one team member working on Saturday and Sundays, leaving less time and resources to publish fully original stories. We'd definitely be interested in following up with a more in-depth story, so do get in touch either at info [at] road.cc or jack.sexty [at] road.cc if you're interested.
All the best!
Jack
Sorry to hear about your experience with badly behaved customers - I wonder how much of it is due to people pandemic-drinking at home (not that that's any excuse)?
I had the opposite experience with Road.cc and BristolPost - I submitted a close-pass video on here and jokingly stated that I was wearing a squirrel suit and a few days later saw it a rehash of it on BristolPost (and I'd had no contact with them apart from being an occasional reader). I found it amusing as the squirrel in-joke had been taken as fact in the Post article, but it was still a bit disconcerting to suddenly see an article.
Anyhow, hope you get a response from Road.cc and hope Deliveroo sorts out the unruly customer issue.
A squirrel suit sounds like a hilarious conversation starter. I love it!
My story was was a little twisted in the sense that I've never actually had issues with any customers, only with certain restaurant staff and members of the public. My colleagues, however, have had issues with customers touching them and saying nasty stuff, some of them drunkenly but some of them simply out of the confidence of being with their circle of friends (especially teenagers who would never do this had then been alone). Alcohol does play a huge part but a lot of this behaviour is sheet ignorance, as I have come to believe. I do, however, think that the physical isolation has had a huge impact on people's ability to behave adequately in social settings. The next few weeks will be quite challenging so keep your eyes open!
For your entertainment, here's the two articles:
https://road.cc/content/news/252775-near-miss-day-226-maybe-they-just-dont-people-wearing-squirrel-suits
https://www.bristolpost.co.uk/news/bristol-news/motorist-warned-police-after-near-2313498
Problems with restaurant staff must be troublesome as presumably you'd be picking up food from them repeatedly.
It's quite shocking how many angles on story can take.. somewhat of a Chinese whisper game!
Thankfully there are enough restaurants to avoid the bad ones.
hawkinspeter is our resident squirrel-o-phile.
I don't know what you mean
I don't know what you mean
[/quote]
This is the worlds smallest violin playing for all the unfortunate drivers delayed by cyclists, whether or not they are wearing squirrel suits
That Hawkins is always on the fiddle....
You may think that's funny, but personal attacks could get you banjo
Context is everything and understanding the intent can be open to interpretation. However "I never get food delivered to my house but if you were the one delivering it, I would order every day" could simply be a nice compliment for a service well done from someone who was having a bad time and who's day had been made better by a cheerful delivery person.
It was a random passerby who had made my day with this comment and his outstanding acceptance upon my rejection, which was refreshing. This has, however, been twisted both here and in the Bristol live story in a negative light, which was not my intention.
I've never had a customer facing job, but I know from second hand accounts and seeing it myself on occasion that some members of the public can be absolute arseholes and very disrespectful of those who's job it is to provide some sort of service, be it at a checkout, emptying the bins or serving in a restaurant.
I'm also aware of how lonely some people are, especially these last 14 months and how much a casual interaction with someone like yourself can mean. Genuinely the hilight of their day. Old people especially can lose their social filter and say things which would mortify most of us without meaning any harm. I think I may be going that route myself and find myself much more guarded around young people.
Keep up the good work in bringing a little bit of joy along with the food you deliver and know that most customers appreciate what you do. I'd hate to live in a society where the only interaction with personal service is to select a frowny face or smiley face icon on a touchscreen.
I'm fortunate that i can set prices based on customer attitutes. Can confirm that some people are just arseholes for no discernable reason.
Certainly. I have a degree in psychology and I absolutely love getting to discover the mindsets of different people. I am one of the few people who have no idea how tough this physical isolation had to have been for everyone as my job is very much people facing. I am absolutely there for a friendly chat as I know a lot of people have been feeling socially robbed these past few months. Though my experience as a woman is that often kindness and smiles can be mistaken for something much more. I am still learning how to maneuver this difficult social minefield! It can be hard trying not to step on each others' toes, but I think embracing rejection amicably is underestimated heavily! Often people recoil or take things very personally, when in reality all that may be needed is a simple change in the direction of the conversation, or a humble apology for misunderstanding someone's intentions. Sadly, aggression seems to come easier to some people.
There are many blokes out there that hit on any female they find attractive.. apart from the creeps/sleazebags, it's a numbers game, as the more they hit on, the more likely they may get even just one positive response to their pursuit.
Is that different to being a creep/sleaze? I might have got your meaning wrong but you seem to differentiate the two groups. Apols if that's not the case
Agreed. I would have thought that "hitting on any female they find attractive ... its a numbers game" is a pretty good definition of being a creep or sleazebag?
So there needs to be a formula, an agreed and understood set of indicators, with which to replace the 'any'. And, more importantly, how to negotiate the encounter. It gets more confused as previous norms are overturned with increasing frequency.
The previous "norms" were that of being creepy and sleazy, so perhaps this is no bad thing.
I would have thought it is fairly straightforward let alone common courtesy to assume that a woman isn't likely receptive on a chance meeting whilst merely doing their job.
There is a big difference between a well-meant compliment that could, potentially, get someone a date, and a sexual comment, which makes one party feel objectified at the other's poor mating ritual attempt! Such errors should become obvious with the increased number of attempts, however, it seems to be the ones who attempt to use such comments the most, who say the worst things! If the numbers don't add up, the rational thing is to change the tactic... so maybe this isn't a numbers game, but poor learning behaviour to say the least?
A Deliveroo spokeswoman said: "The safety of riders is our absolute priority and we take every step to ensure they feel safe when on the road.
"We regularly communicate with riders about how to keep safe, including not accepting an order if they have any concerns about the location.
And I hope they blacklist the customers who cause the concern for these riders. Maybe share these with their "competitors" as I'm sure Lyft and Uber have a shared blacklist in some areas.
Urgh. I realise my fellow men may (usually) not mean to offend, but we should pause to consider how comments may be received (as well as intended) and that it just mightn't only be you who offers unsolicited compliments about appearance, attractiveness, etc. There are plenty other options for brief smalltalk.