Deliveroo changes contracts to keep UK riders self-employed
Deliveroo, the takeaway courier firm, has altered its contracts with riders due to pressure from the UK's parliamentary work and pensions select committee. The company has removed a clause in its “supplier agreement” that prohibited its 15,000 couriers from challenging their status as self-employed at employment tribunals. The new contracts will also permit riders to work simultaneously for Deliveroo and other companies and will no longer require them to give two weeks’ notice. Trade unions said the changes sought to confirm the idea that riders were independent contractors. Deliveroo faces an arbitration hearing on trade union membership this month.
Deliveroo, the takeaway delivery company that relies on 15,000 self-employed couriers, has made changes to its contracts for riders following pressure from parliament.

The gig economy company has removed a controversial clause in its “supplier agreement” that couriers could not challenge their self-employed status at an employment tribunal.

The new contract, which is now only four pages long, will also allow couriers to work for other companies at the same time as they work for Deliveroo and has removed a clause stating that riders needed to give two weeks’ notice to terminate their agreement with Deliveroo.



MPs on the Commons work and pensions select committee had demanded changes.

In a letter to riders circulated on Thursday, Dan Warne, the Deliveroo UK managing director, said: “We know that many riders work with other companies as well as Deliveroo, including our competitors. That is fine with us: as an independent contractor you are free to work with whoever you choose and wear whatever kit you want.

“There continues to be no requirement to wear Deliveroo branded kit while you work with us, but please make sure that whatever you wear while riding means that you are safe and visible to other road users.

“This new simple supplier agreement for riders makes it easier than ever to work with Deliveroo. It makes clear that our riders are able to log in to work with us whenever they want - allowing them to fit their work around their life rather than their life around their work.”

But a trade union representing riders attacked the changes as an attempt to cement the notion that riders are independent contractors when some want to have the status of employed workers with rights including the minimum wage, sick pay and holidays.

“This is another petty attempt by Deliveroo to use armies of lawyers to insert clauses in our contracts that seek to strengthen their argument that we are independent contractors,” said Maggie Dewhurst, chair of the logistics branch of the IWGB trade union. “The fact of the matter is that we should be treated as workers with basic employment rights.”

Deliveroo’s contract change comes before a planned hearing at the Central Arbitration Committee in London later this month where riders will attempt to force the company to recognise their trade union membership and collective bargaining rights. Unions believe such a decision by the court would require Deliveroo to start treating its riders as employed workers.