to think that Deliveroo etc should be banned!

[Coastalwalks]

Hi all,

I live in London and was recently nearly knocked off my bike by a deliveroo driver on a moped (he was completely in the wrong, though will not be drawing a road diagram to illustrate lol). When I shouted at him he just made fun of my voice and it enraged me soooo much. These are my chief issues with deliveroo etc:

• There are now so many dangerous drivers either on mopeds or bikes with batteries illegally fitted to them - flagrantly going the wrong way up one-way streets, running reds etc. Very dangerous and a friend of mine recently had someone break into her secure underground parking area to steal her electric bike. There was so much damage to the property and she basically thinks that her bike was nicked to order.
• I looked into it and deliveroo actually acknowledge that deliveroo drivers 'rent out' their accounts to others, many of whom are undocumented migrants - but they put the responsibility on the original driver to check that the person renting the account has the right to work etc! Complete dereliction of duty, and basically facilitates the exploitation / trafficking of illegal immigrants who then have no legal protection, don't pay tax etc...
• On a slightly pious level I think it's terrible and lazy that so many people now think it's normal to be able to just order food in so rapidly - like it is genuinely quite aristocratic to expect to press a button and have a shawarma wrap at your door in <20 minutes. People should learn to cook or at least have to walk round the block to the chippy. It's lazy!
• Meeting the deliveroo orders in small restaurants means it takes twice as long to get your actual food, and it ruins the ambiance when there are loads of deliveroo drivers outside or at the door (though acknowledge this is not the case at Naice restaurants)
• Everyone I know who works in FS has to basically eat a deliveroo at their desk at 8pm every night - maybe without deliveroo everyone could go home a bit earlier ! ! ! !

YABU - let me have my massaman curry you calvinistic treat-hater
YANBU - deliveroo is a scourge

I suppose Deliveroo runs the way it does because it's cheaper. If we want it to be more accountable then it would cost more. Would we pay that?

(It goes without saying that disability benefits should be higher, so if the answer is yes, I'd hope that could be how customers with disabilities could absorb the cost.)

This is Mumsnet. We are allowed to have an opinion even if you don't agree with it. Even if you think we're judgey!

Food delivery cyclists, and those on mopeds and scooters are a plague on our planet. They have a reckless disregard for the safety of pedestrians. They cycle on footpaths, they cycle the wrong way on one-way streets, they cycle on pedestrian only streets. They converge on streets near restaurants blocking the pavements. They wear balaclavas and hats, even in Summer, so there is no way to identify them. It's time for number plates and matching numbers on their high-vis jackets and hats and insulated bags so members of the public can make a complaint about individual cyclists and others.

Interestingly, in Ireland, in a recent court case Deliveroo drivers were deemed to be employees of Deliveroo and not self-employed so if any of you have been a victim of a an accident involving a Deliveroo cyclist then please investigate suing the hell out of Deliveroo.

Recently a Deliveroo driver failed to engage the handbrake as he was making a delivery near us. His vehicle rolled backwards and into a parked car, luckily the damage was not extensive though would be expensive based on the car model. He fled the scene in his vehicle. Twenty minutes later, another man arrived on foot with the Deliveroo order, brother of the first man. He was "spotted" by neighbours who were out trying to find out which house the delivery had been intended for so they could track down the driver for damage to the parked car. The brother owned the vehicle. The original driver was uninsured for that vehicle. The matter was resolved civilly because the neighbour who owned the car worked somewhere he managed a few dozen men of the same nationality as the driver and advised the brother he would have no problem in tracking him down and referring the matter to police which would have had disastrous consequences for the extended family.

Before Deliveroo & Just-Eat etc, there were ways to have food delivered hot to your home by a local restaurant employing their own driver. So banning Deliveroo cyclists would not leave a disabled person without options, though it would limit their choice. I suspect that the overwhelming majority of the "service" are able-bodied. And how many people, able-bodied or otherwise, could afford to have Deliveroo daily as their only meal option?

We occasionally get fast-food as a treat when it's on our way home from something else. We've never had it delivered. I remember about 20 years ago a salesman for a pizza place was trying to sell us some kind of pizza discount subscription service. He couldn't believe that we'd never had a home delivery of pizza. He'd probably collapse if I told him the same thing today.

These companies are taking a cut of the money the restaurant receives and a cut of the delivery fee too. It would be far better for the local economy if we all dealt directly with the restaurants.

If I can do that, why can't the police??

It's not hard is it? Not only would it get rid of untaxed, uninsured vehicles but it would also uncover other things ranging from unregulated working to illegal migration to people trafficking and expose the whole industry for what it is.

But no, let's put our fingers in our ears and go la la la la la.

It must be politically motivated as I struggle at times to understand the role of the police anymore.

Oh well, if someone can sit in their onesie and have a cold Big Mac delivered to their door then I suppose we're all good.

Well, I love it! Looking forward to getting my delivery tonight, even though I’ll be somehow unfortunately contributing towards the destruction of the moral fabric of society..

As the Fraud Act and Theft Act seem to have been disregarded by the Police, I'm not sure that I'd hold out much hope of enforcement.

@NonPlayerCharacter ahhhh you work for BK hence so riled up, and some free advertising thrown in for good measure. Got it.

Any other options I’m allowed to choose, or must it be these?

All very cute, but as tired as I am, I’m off to Waitrose now, as used up my self imposed deliveroo quota for today with breakfast and have dinner to consider.

Grateful, I have a choice of course, a point clearly lost on you. Interesting, maybe it’s an empathy issue.

I told you how BK could stop its home delivery service from exploiting the vulnerable. You don’t allow a restaurant to sell food with fat, sugar or whatever over 25% of the product on a delivery app.

@NonPlayerCharacter why exactly are you repeatedly replying though?

Sorry, didn't see your post. But would it still be available to order through the website?

And honestly, I replied that time because I wanted to use the BK pic.

ETA: Would you also say then that no takeaways should be able to take orders by app?

Nope, we've just over 135k officers and the highest ever was 140k. I think the bigger problem is that so many of them are "family friendly" and part timers. Like most public sector organisations, it's now so fragmented and lots are "specialist" in particular areas so basically ignore everything else. Go back a few decades and "proper" constables did everything, i.e. beat work, accidents, investigations, etc. Now police will just ignore everything happening around them if it's not within their own "specialist" remit.

YABU - I was very grateful to Deliveroo when I was recovering from Norovirus last week (meant I could get things like Sprite and bread delivered without infecting anyone else.)

You don’t allow a restaurant to sell food with fat, sugar or whatever over 25% of the product on a delivery app.

Why on earth would you want this? This is not a nanny state (or it shouldn’t be). And as PP said, is it just the app which you’d ban it on? So if people got up and went in store it would be fine?

Life would be so much better if we just stopped banning things. Let people live how they want.

@RamblingEclectic

Well, if the government isn't going to regulate it, then it can't be banned. Banning requires government regulation.

The thing is, the laws are in place already. We just need the law enforcers to get off their backsides and do some enforcement.

We already have traffic laws which could stop the illegal cars, dangerous mopeds/cyclists etc.

We already have employment/immigration laws which could stop the illegal immigrant workers, and modern slavery.

We already have tax laws which could stop the black economy employment where the delivers aren't paying tax/nic on their wages.

All we need is enforcement of existing laws. We don't need anything new.

It wouldn't work anyway. We already have "sugar tax" on high sugar soft drinks, yet plenty of shops, takeaways and restaurants continue to charge the same whether you want a "low sugar" soft drink or a "high sugar" soft drink.

It's actually good on the franchised chains like McDonalds and Burger King that they ARE following the law and charging more for high sugar drinks. Shame that loads of smaller takeaways, cafes, restaurants and "corner" shops continue to charge the same for both kinds!

Obesity is connected to poverty anyway. Poorer people are more likely to be obese. Whatever the solution to obesity and poor health, upping food costs - even if just the unhealthy stuff - would not appear to be it.

@CornishPorsche It's the same attitude as people have to kettles, washing machines etc that can be switched on remotely or shoes that can be slipped on, grippy soled socks, push button devices etc

No one has any weird attitude to these things

I hate the business model of companies like Deliveroo and would try my best to avoid if they existed in my location.

Banned is too much, but the whole delivery thing needs to be much better regulated, and Deliveroo itself needs to be held accountable for any problems it's drivers cause. They are just taking the money and have no responsibility at all.

The whole sub contracting lark is completely out of control, as PPs have said you have no idea who these people are who are coming to your home.

D H was assaulted by two delivery drivers because he asked them to move their van so he could get his car into our driveway. They then threatened to come back and burn our house down.

This is petty but before my boycott I hated the way they knock so hard on the front door, it's scary !

That is so awful

Also what happens is the drivers injure someone on the bikes that they are not meant to be riding or they are injured themselves

The whole thing is a tinderbox imo

Spending over £300 a month on delivery of one person meals leaving you nothing to pay rent isn't good....a burger king meal is what £7 he pays £23 for 1 burger fries and water because he thinks that's what it is in the shop

Exactly it's not like he's rural he lives in London 10 minutes or less from bk

No way does it cost the company anything like the £16 to deliver 10 minutes away by push bike ...so they make a very high percentage profit on that burger

How does £7 become £23 of food

Food delivery drivers are an absolute menace where I live. I’ve seen several serious accidents caused by them, not to mention they have trashed the pavements outside the local McDonalds, repairs them are paid by local tax payers. It’s nuts. The drivers should all have full UK driving licences - most of them round here cant negotiate a round about. Companies like Deliveroo should be heavily fined for allowing illegal or unqualified delivery drivers. And local restaurants should have appropriate pick up sites - not moped on the pavements

Lol....you haven't a clue do you think because you don't go out you sit home in the dark and cold 24 hours a day with no bills to pay so can spend 500% plus more on food....an Iceland delivery in a van would be free for £50 of food ..in a van taking time to load it unload it and drive through traffic....a push bike is much cheaper to run one man no fuel no loading.