I always used to wonder if servers in restaurants sneaked off a tikka or two from the serving dish they were bringing to my table. Now while this thought may be a great disservice to most people working tirelessly to bring us the convenience and joy of food cooked by talented professionals, recent evidence indicates that the food-swiping-server may not be such an anomaly!
A couple of months earlier, the video of an Uber Eats delivery man dipping into a bag of fries went viral. People were outraged; they didn’t expect that they were supposed to take the name ‘Uber Eats’ literally!
Here we see a Zomato delivery person taking his time to grab more than just a few bites out of the food he was supposed to be delivering. There we see him sitting atop his scooter, cool as you please, taking a few bites of this, then a few bites of something else; rearranging his orders and proceeding as though nothing out of the ordinary happened.
This tweet expresses the view that the delivery person was performing a useful service by tasting all that he delivered; doing “last mile quality control”.
The video clip quickly became viral and many on social media expressed the view that this was gross and unacceptable. Others responded by saying they would be deleting their Zomato Delivery app and some concluded that this was the end of the brand.
Many felt sympathy for the delivery person whom they felt was probably overworked and underfed. Many tweets expressed the view that the working conditions and wellbeing of delivery people should be looked after.
“We take food tampering very seriously,” the official tweet from Zomato said. The Zomato blog also issued a detailed statement about the incident.
Zomato found that the incident took place in Madurai. After questioning the delivery person, the company dismissed him from his job.
While some suggested tamper proof packing, some had innovative suggestions such as this one. While consumers continue to cogitate the horror of eating food that someone else had already eaten a part of, companies such as Zomato and Swiggy need to do some introspecting. It is true that delivery persons have a terrible job: battling awful traffic, constantly breathing polluted air, dealing with unpleasant customers; all the while racing against the clock. Sure tamper proof packing may be a great idea. Paying delivery persons well and looking after their wellbeing may be an even better one!
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