I don’t care that there’s a Pandemic
I was courier for a popular food delivery service, SkipTheDishes. The morning shift was steady, but certainly not busy. I was scheduled to drive from 6:30 am to 10:30 am. The mid-morning air was cold, and my shift was nearing its end.
Delivering food orders teased my hunger. I thought about getting a coffee. But I decided to wait till after my shift when I would pick-up breakfast for myself. The courier app chimed.
I unconsciously swiped to accept the offer and to view the pick-up details. It was a McDonald’s location just outside of my courier territory. This happens occasionally. A pick-up outside of my territory shows that the demands of the network are increasing. But it also means extra, unpaid drive time to access the adjacent territory.
I’ve been to this particular location before, and its COVID-19 protocols aren’t conducive for courier efficiency. Signage instructs couriers to use an alternate entrance, the building’s emergency exit door on the far corner. You have to ring a bell and wait for the restaurant staff to let you in. When’s it’s cold outside, my patience diminishes.
Couriers are not paid hourly, nor are we reimbursed for fuel or parking costs. An algorithm calculates order completion earnings based off an estimated delivery distance within the assigned territory added with the customer’s stated tip. However, if I maintain a high order acceptance rate (meaning I accept almost every order the network dispatches), I will make a flat minimum of $6 per order with no tip, regardless of the distance. I need to drive more to make more with the hope that customer’s leave a tip.
I collected the order after a short, cold delay at the emergency exit door and clambered back into my car. I docked my phone and swiped to tell the network that I was ready to drive. The delivery address and customer’s special instructions were presented in the app. I opened Google Maps for directions.
It estimated less than one minute to drive to the address. Surprisingly the delivery location was across the street from McDonald’s. Short drive times aren’t uncommon when couriering for Skip. Some customers are stuck at work, disabled, quarantined, etc. There are a variety of reasonable circumstances for the premium customer’s pay to order food for short delivery.
Another look at the special instructions and the Google Maps directions made me realize that the building right across the street I was to deliver to was the Royal Alexandra Hospital in Edmonton, Alberta.
The customer’s special instructions included her floor, unit, and bed number. Immediately I texted Skip’s courier support and indicated that the delivery was to completed within a local hospital. I wasn’t sure what Skip’s delivery policy said about couriers entering hospitals during a global COVID-19 pandemic. While I waited for Skip to reply, I put my my car in gear and drove over to the hospital’s parking lot.
The province of Alberta had increasing COVID-19 challenges on the day a customer wanted McDonald’s delivered to a hospital bed. The intensive care unit capacity in Edmonton was operating at 92%. The province’s Restrictions Exemption Program came into effect, allowing some businesses to ask patrons for proof of vaccination or a negative COVID-19 test. And lastly, Alberta’s Health Minister, Tyler Shandro resigned. The province was acutely aware of its worsening COVID-19 crisis.
I parked without paying at the hospital’s parking lot. In hindsight I should have left my car at McDonald’s and walked across the street with the thermal bag. With a mask secured over my mouth and nose I entered the lobby of the Royal Alex and was approached by the hospital’s COVID-19 screening staff.
I explained to the staff that I was with Skip to make a ‘quick’ delivery to a patient in the hospital. I shared the order details including the customer’s special instructions, and I said I was double-vaxxed (though I hadn’t procured my vaccination passport yet). The screening staff wouldn’t allow me into the hospital and turned me away. Outside the lobby doors I called customer.
The customer quickly asked me to hold on so she could call a nurse. My grip on the thermal bag tightened when I heard the customer say that. Health care professionals were busy enough with COVID-19, and I felt that in this moment a nurse was being called away from a critical duty to handle a patient’s insignificant SkipTheDishes delivery.
Food is important, however. And although McDonald’s mass produces questionable food every minute of every day, I don’t know the value this patient held for her order. Maybe she was tried of consuming hospital food. Maybe she was going to share her meal with a visiting family member. Maybe she wanted to be reminded of a positive memory associated with this order. An order from McDonald’s just isn’t fast food in every case. It may hold special significance for this customer.
The customer said she’d phone me back. The nurse hadn’t responded to her call. The energy and mild mania of the customer’s voice suggested she was anxious to receive her breakfast order. When I got off the phone I had an unread message from Skip’s courier support.
It was a cut and paste response reminding me to follow the customer’s special instructions.
I sent a reply to courier support asking them to read the customer’s special instructions and informed them that the hospital’s screening staff wouldn’t allow me into the hospital to complete the delivery. I saw the typing awareness indicator appear, the three dots. Courier support was in the process of messaging me back.
The phone rang and I answered. It was the customer calling me from her hospital bed. She explained that the nurse had come and said that I would need to find a hospital porter to bring the food up. I stayed on the phone as I reentered the hospital’s lobby.
The screening staff shrugged when I inquired about a porter to complete the delivery on my behalf. The staff explained they were to check for COVID-19 compliance and administer temperature checks to employees and visiting family members entering the hospital. I was ushered out of the lobby and was told to try a different entrance to the hospital.
I tried to explain to the customer over the phone what the screening staff had said. This is how the customer replied,
“I don’t care that there’s a pandemic [audible coughing] I should be able to get my food.”
That’s what I heard after I told her over the phone that the COVID-19 screening staff wouldn’t allow me to access the hospital during a pandemic. I offered to try another entrance and added that I involved Skip’s courier support. I ended the call out of frustration with the customer’s hyper-entitled attitude.
I started walking across the property to find another entrance to the hospital and I remembered my car and the risk I took leaving it without paying the parking fee. What was the cost I was willing to incur to make this order despite my growing frustration with the situation? Through a lobby window I saw a security guard walking in my direction. I wasn’t certain if my delivery mission caused enough of a hullabaloo to warrant security’s involvement. It was cold outside and my patience for everything was exhausted. I turned and went back to my parked car.
The food was cooling in the thermal bags sitting on my back seat. I docked and unlocked my phone to an unread message from Skip’s courier support. They said to check-off and swipe the order as delivered, despite not actually making the delivery. The customer will be refunded. The food, support said, I was to hold until the end of my shift. Then I could dispose of it, give it to someone in need, or consume it myself. I reviewed the order’s details — I still earned the $6 minimum for my trouble without a tip. I chose to devour the entire contents of the customer’s breakfast.
Later that morning I had posted a rant to my Instagram story. In the rant I shared in a disorganized display of displeasure my experience trying to deliver a SkipTheDishes order to a hospital during a global pandemic. In the afternoon I friend had responded to my story.
She had been admitted to hospital in another city in Alberta during an earlier time of the pandemic. And throughout her convalescence, her nurses and health care providers had encouraged her to order food for delivery to the hospital, which she did. I wasn’t sure how I should’ve responded to her.
Public health polices and circumstances were ever evolving in the course of the COVID-19 pandemic. It’s a difficult line to manage between keeping people safe while allowing people to make their living. I’ve couriered for Skip in 2017 and again in 2021. During both stints with the network I’ve delivered to homes, businesses, other restaurants, warehouses, soccer fields, construction sites, and brothels. I maintained a high order acceptance rate and did my best in most situations to get customers his or her orders. I got by on what I made with SkipTheDishes. But delivering fast food to a hospital bed during a pandemic isn’t my jam.
