As a former dasher myself, dashers are expecting that because it needs to be worth the time, cost of gas, and wear and tear on their car to even do the order.

Doordash only pays around $2.50 per order. If it’s a really bad one (long distance, a slow restaurant that takes up a lot of time, long driving distance) DoorDash might add a dollar or two to get someone to take it. If your food is cold, it’s probably because no one wanted to take your order because it wasn’t worth it, so you have to wait until a driver who doesn’t understand that they’re spending more money than they’re making takes a bad order. Sometimes the restaurant is slow or says an order is ready when it isn’t. The “tip” is pretty much the whole pay for the order. And if the tip is really good, sometimes DoorDash takes part of it without telling anyone.

Also, DoorDash doesn’t always show you the whole tip amount. There’s a note that says “the actual tip may be higher.” Usually it’s not, but they leave that “maybe” in there to bait you into acceptimg orders that cost more to deliver than you earn.

There are definitely some shitty drivers. But a lot of people don’t have a choice but to do gig jobs. People with disabilities who need to have flexible schedules because they don’t qualify for disability assistance and they can’t commit to a schedule because of random symptom flare ups. People with criminal records. People with social anxiety. Minorities. People learning English.

DoorDash is to blame here, not the drivers. They need to call it something other than a “tip.” The suggested “tip” amount should be based on the driving distance, not a percentage of the order cost. And they should pay drivers more out of the “service fees” they get for sitting back doing nothing and letting the app print money for them.

Let’s blame the right people here.