LPG shortage: Delivery agents hit by long waits, limited orders in Tamil Nadu

As hotels downsized menus and petrol bunks ran dry, food delivery aggregators were thrown off gear, as many people faced delay in services. Gig workers faced long waits in hotels to receive items for delivery, and had trouble refuelling their two-wheelers between trips. Many residents reported hour-long delays in delivery of food items.“We waited for an hour for fried rice, from an Anna Nagar eatery. Restaurants were cutting down menus between orders, and this affected bookings,” said S Kaushik, a customer. Many hotels also shut midway, forcing residents to seek refunds from aggregator apps. Gig workers faced a cash crunch as they did not get as many orders as on regular days. Nirmal Gorana, national coordinator, the Gig and Platform Service Workers Union, said in a statement that workers got only five orders in the past few days, against 30 orders daily. “The apps must not punish the workers for their order crashes,” he said. “In one hour, we used to get at least three orders; however, over the past few days this dipped. It is hard to get even a single order. It has severely impacted our daily income,” said S Vignesh, a Swiggy delivery partner. Usually, delivery partners earn between Rs 800 and Rs 1,200, depending on the number of trips completed. With fewer restaurant orders and long waits between deliveries, many claimed their earnings nearly halved over the past few days.Delivery partners also lost working time waiting in long queues at petrol bunks amid panic buying. “We spend 30 to 40 minutes in a queue at petrol bunks and lose orders,” said K Ramesh, another delivery partner.