Zomato receives backlash over new ads featuring Hrithik and Katrina - Page 3

The entire set-up of these ads is tasteless and cringe and the criticism is valid. Though I think the criticism is extremely mild. Average people don't give AF about the suffering of the lower class.

Nobody is offering cake and selfies and partying with their delivery guys. The ad makes it look like delivery people are late only because of dilly dallying and partying with their customers. The reality is that if they are late, it's because they have to do too many deliveries in a short time and they are understaffed. Or that there is traffic or other issues.

Instead of teaching people the concept of tipping or raising delivery fees so that these people get a fairer living wage, it's made to look like delivery guys dream of running to their customers houses in the rain and cannot even stop for a 10 second selfie if they run into a celebrity once in a lifetime. It's extremely tone deaf but the middle-cass they serve would love ads that tell them what kings they themselves are. So I don't think the majority cares about this at all.

Originally posted by: cutejodikangal

The whole selling point of Zomato is that they will deliver in no time. Which means the people who are seeking jobs in the company know fully well what they were getting into. People should stop making noise about everything. There are actually people who are dying without any jobs, how about you’ll start crying and whining and complaining about the unemployment situation and doing something positive for once?

Firstly nope, delivery in no time is NOT the selling point of zomato. That was the selling point of dominos earlier and now it is of grocery delivery like Swiggy and Dunzo. I don't think you live in India otherwise you wouldn't say people are making noise about anything.

For almost months now just like the uproar in the West against Amazon, most of these food and grocery delivery apps has been engulfed in controversies regarding exploitation of it's delivery partners. Almost all the apps has been accused by the partners of not paying them properly, not compensating for the rising petrol prices among various other things. They are taken in as delivery 'partners' hence they are not considered employees of the company which results in further exploitation since there are no labour laws governing 'partners'. Every single delivery person who comes to deliver asks me personally to not use the app's tip function but rather tip them in cash or not tip at all since they hardly get the tip money. Forget these apps, even restaurants have started their only deliveries since these apps have been charging exorbitant prices from them for the service. The price of the food you order in the app half of the times is more than what the actual price is in the restaurant menu. It takes just a drop of water to fall for the apps to start charging surcharge 'for the sake of the delivery partner' that no one knows they even get or not. Also not to forget the daily road accidents involving these partners putting everyone's life at risk since they usually have to finish a certain number of target orders to get paid more.

Even if it's raining heavily, the delivery partners are expected to ride cycles in pothole filled roads in the city instead of biles due to their 'green initiative'. This is just the tip of the numerous ways the delivery partners are exploited and in this month alone it lead to a huge twitter storm against these apps that brought in a lot of media attention and people started taking notice. That's precisely why the company had to come up with such tone deaf ads using celebrities like Hrithik, Katrina and influencers like Danish Sait to counter the bad press. You mean to say the delivery person can't even spend one second to get a freaking selfie with a star while he can pretty much sits stuck on traffic half of the times and no one has any issue! 🤪

Labour laws in the country are worse for people in the lower strata of society and exploitation is unimaginable. And with some of these grocery apps starting 10 minutes delivery, one can only imagine for things to get worse with time. More the exploitation more the road accidents. I mean this is India and not a western country, there's atleast five kirana stores in every street who themselves do delivery of groceries to buildings. Except for emergency services like medicines, why would anyone in this country need a 10 minute delivery? This looks like nothing but just a business tactic and they are rightfully getting bashed for that.

@bold- Hope you stay updated about the ground reality before making such blanket comment. There's a reason why they are getting bashed. Just getting employment isn't enough, every employee has the right to work with dignity and without getting exploited.

It's true that the delivery boys are way underpaid. These guys were the reason so many ppl(atleast the urban middle class) were able to comfortably stay at home and still got menial pay. So many cases were highlighted where they got beaten up by the police just coz they were out in the open for deliveries (which was permitted). They should instead be rewarded, Zomato could have increased their incentive, that would have been a better PR.

And this delivery in 15 mins is like one of the worst ideas. Will just lead to speeding accidents n what not. What's the harm in getting food delivered in 30-45 mins instead. Matlab how bad can a food emergency be?

Originally posted by: Mahisa_22

99% of the people would be morons then. People tend to blast their anger on whoever they're in direct contact with, be it the delivery boy or customer service.

And that's why it's precisely the Company's responsibility to make sure customers get their food on time

Well then 99% people are indeed morons who do not know how to read clearly what's written in the app- that the time mentioned is an estimated time of delivery and not real time. The app gives it's users various ways to connect with the restaurant or the delivery agent or the cutsomer care to check the reason for delay which is usually delay at restaurants or delay due to traffic. None of the popular food delivery apps has any responsibility of delivering food on time. That's not a part of their service, their service is only delivering food hence the estimated time given. Even Dominos that had timely delivery (30 minutes or free) as part of their service has discontinued it long back when they realized promising delivery time is not possible in Indian traffic. So yeah, if a person has to release their anger on the delivery guy for something that's not in his/her control then they indeed are morons.

Originally posted by: MommaDarling

Well then 99% people are indeed morons who do not know how to read clearly what's written in the app- that the time mentioned is an estimated time of delivery and not real time. The app gives it's users various ways to connect with the restaurant or the delivery agent or the cutsomer care to check the reason for delay which is usually delay at restaurants or delay due to traffic. None of the popular food delivery apps has any responsibility of delivering food on time. That's not a part of their service, their service is only delivering food hence the estimated time given. Even Dominos that had timely delivery (30 minutes or free) as part of their service has discontinued it long back when they realized promising delivery time is not possible in Indian traffic. So yeah, if a person has to release their anger on the delivery guy for something that's not in his/her control then they indeed are morons.

It's not like people give gaalis to anyone, but its true that people tend to become impatient when they are kept waiting for food. As for the rest, about lack of payment etc. that's a valid issue, I'm not denying that. But these ads didn't feel like exploitation is being glorified. It's more about making the customer feel good.

Originally posted by: MommaDarling

Firstly nope, delivery in no time is NOT the selling point of zomato. That was the selling point of dominos earlier and now it is of grocery delivery like Swiggy and Dunzo. I don't think you live in India otherwise you wouldn't say people are making noise about anything.

For almost months now just like the uproar in the West against Amazon, most of these food and grocery delivery apps has been engulfed in controversies regarding exploitation of it's delivery partners. Almost all the apps has been accused by the partners of not paying them properly, not compensating for the rising petrol prices among various other things. They are taken in as delivery 'partners' hence they are not considered employees of the company which results in further exploitation since there are no labour laws governing 'partners'. Every single delivery person who comes to deliver asks me personally to not use the app's tip function but rather tip them in cash or not tip at all since they hardly get the tip money. Forget these apps, even restaurants have started their only deliveries since these apps have been charging exorbitant prices from them for the service. The price of the food you order in the app half of the times is more than what the actual price is in the restaurant menu. It takes just a drop of water to fall for the apps to start charging surcharge 'for the sake of the delivery partner' that no one knows they even get or not. Also not to forget the daily road accidents involving these partners putting everyone's life at risk since they usually have to finish a certain number of target orders to get paid more.

Even if it's raining heavily, the delivery partners are expected to ride cycles in pothole filled roads in the city instead of biles due to their 'green initiative'. This is just the tip of the numerous ways the delivery partners are exploited and in this month alone it lead to a huge twitter storm against these apps that brought in a lot of media attention and people started taking notice. That's precisely why the company had to come up with such tone deaf ads using celebrities like Hrithik, Katrina and influencers like Danish Sait to counter the bad press. You mean to say the delivery person can't even spend one second to get a freaking selfie with a star while he can pretty much sits stuck on traffic half of the times and no one has any issue! 🤪

Labour laws in the country are worse for people in the lower strata of society and exploitation is unimaginable. And with some of these grocery apps starting 10 minutes delivery, one can only imagine for things to get worse with time. More the exploitation more the road accidents. I mean this is India and not a western country, there's atleast five kirana stores in every street who themselves do delivery of groceries to buildings. Except for emergency services like medicines, why would anyone in this country need a 10 minute delivery? This looks like nothing but just a business tactic and they are rightfully getting bashed for that.

@bold- Hope you stay updated about the ground reality before making such blanket comment. There's a reason why they are getting bashed. Just getting employment isn't enough, every employee has the right to work with dignity and without getting exploited.

@Bold:See, if that is not the case then my post doesn’t even apply. I am the last person to support the horrible labour laws which exploit the employees, be it in India or elsewhere.

The question needs to be asked though. that if it wasn’t even their selling point, then why do the customers have these false expectations?

@Blue: One doesn’t have to be in India or be told by someone to know about this. This is literally the situation everywhere. Direct tips are always the most preferred!

@Red: You are saying it is in the job description that they get paid by the number of deliveries? Then isn’t the onus clearly on the delivery men? What exactly do you expect the company to do here? Give them a salary regardless of anything?

@Purple: Agree.

@Green: Always open to learning. Though I never made any blanket comments. Clearly in India(no just in India but more so in India), there is no conversation happening in the mainstream about the bigger problems like unemployment, education etc. People and media pick up stray events and make a big thing about it while the bigger fish keep swimming by without even getting noticed.

KK and HR are SO bad in these adverts...

There is nothing wrong with the ads....WTH....people's minds are working overtime these days..🤔

Also again pointing out, the problematic part in the ad isn't Hrithik or Katrina, they are actors for them it is just another ad but the problematic part is the idealogy of the company being presented here after the backlash that a delivery agent can't even spend a second for a selfie or to take cake from the customer since the next delivery is pending. Some delivery agents themselves ask for water after a tough ride esp in the afternoon, so what are they supposed to do, not wait for it?

This is classic corporate life in India. Make your employees slog like robots and expect productivity while presenting your company as customer centric. Better just use robots for deliveries na?

I'm glad people are able to see the blatant hogwash that they are doing while masking it with a customer centric advertisment. The fact that they had to shoot these ads in a rush after the backlash speaks volumes of how wide the issue has spread.

Originally posted by: Lord_Voldemort

I do not concur with this line of thinking at all.

Instant delivery doesn't mean that you stretch your employees to their limit. Instead of hiring 10 people to do 100 deliveries, they can hire 20 people so that they can breathe a bit.

Saying these people took these jobs knowing fully well how demanding they are - agree, but it is out of desperation. They didn't prefer it. They chose something over starvation and death. But it doesn't mean that that something cannot be exploitative.

Also, people can protest and critcize the government's failure to provide employment - they are already doing that - while still fighting for the rights of employees who are being expoited. It isn't either this or that. Both can be prioritized.

Totally agree with you.

It's straight up exploitation and people are right to kick up a fuss about it. I'm so glad that social media is used to fight social injustices like this.

Then you've got donkeys-ass looking people justifying it like hello you're looking like the type that doesn't tip your delivery people anyways please stfu.