The City Council is expected to pass a package of bills on Monday expanding legislation that improved working conditions for food delivery workers to include nearly 20,000 grocery delivery workers.
A groundbreaking package of bills passed in 2021 set a minimum pay and addressed difficult working conditions for app-based food delivery workers, but only those who delivered food from restaurants through apps like Grubhub, DoorDash and Uber Eats.
The new legislation will require third-party app companies, like Instacart and Shipt, to pay grocery delivery workers a minimum of $21.44 an hour to match the increase food delivery workers received in April.
The bills, five in total, will also mandate that the companies provide an option in their apps to give at least a 10 percent tip, before or at the same time an order is placed, and that the companies must pay workers within seven days of the end of a pay period.
The delivery industry, which boomed during the Covid-19 pandemic, has continued to grow in New York City with over 100 million deliveries from third-party apps. According to the city’s Department of Consumer and Worker Protection, there are around 60,000 restaurant delivery workers in addition to grocery delivery workers.
“It’s a huge milestone to make app delivery work more dignified, better paid and safer in our streets,” said Ligia Guallpa, a co-founder of Workers Justice Project. Her group organizes Los Deliveristas Unidos, an advocacy group for delivery workers.
James Parrott, a senior fellow at the Center for New York City Affairs at the New School who consulted with the city on the delivery workers’ pay, said there needed to be more improvements in the minimum pay standards for delivery workers.
But, he added, “we shouldn’t lose sight of the fact that these pay standards for delivery workers in New York City are the best pay standards that exist in the United States.”
Juan Felipe, 30, a grocery delivery worker, said he had cut back working for Instacart because he was only making roughly $2 to $7 an hour, but did not plan on rushing back anytime soon even if the legislation was passed.
“We have to see the conditions,” he said. “I’m pretty sure if we get the rate, that would be amazing. But we have to consider how it’s gonna be.”
Mr. Felipe said he would park outside Costco in Queens, just one of dozens of other gig workers waiting for possible gigs to appear in their apps.
Councilwoman Sandy Nurse, a Democrat who sponsored the grocery delivery workers bill, said she had watched the delivery companies evolve over the years at the workers’ expense.
“The apps are creating an environment that is unregulated, that doesn’t have a lot of worker protections,” Ms. Nurse said. “Because a lot of these workers are predominantly immigrant workers, there’s just a lot of opportunity for exploitation.”
On Saturday, Grubhub said in a statement that it was working with advocacy groups and the City Council “to make sure New York’s delivery work force is protected without sacrificing the flexibility customers expect.”
Instacart said in a statement: “At a time when millions across the city are already struggling with rising costs for food and daily essentials, we urge the City Council to consider the real-world consequences this bill could have on the families and communities that depend on grocery delivery the most.”
Uber and DoorDash did not reply to a request for comment.
In 2023, Grubhub, along with DoorDash and Uber Eats, filed requests for a temporary restraining order just days before the initial increase of the minimum wage for food delivery workers, to $17.96 per hour, was to take effect. The requests contended that regulators used inaccurate data to calculate compensation.
A judge ruled against the three food delivery companies, allowing the city to raise the workers minimum wage to nearly $18, and increase it further to $20 or more in 2025.
The three companies had also filed a lawsuit in 2021, arguing that the city’s 15 percent cap on fees charged to restaurants for online orders and 5 percent cap for other fees was unconstitutional and prevented them from negotiating their own prices with restaurants. The case was dismissed in June.
Although legislation would signify a victory for delivery workers, Councilman Shaun Abreu, a Democrat and a sponsor of three bills in the new package, said he had noticed forms of “retaliation” from third-party apps, like randomly deactivating workers from their apps and removing the tipping option at checkout.
Mr. Abreu said he planned to introduce legislation to prohibit the abrupt deactivation of delivery workers by major third-party apps.
William Medina, 37, who delivers for Uber Eats and is a member of Los Deliveristas Unidos, said he was very concerned about the “thousands” of delivery workers who had recently been deactivated.
“This is a very critical issue that we’re experiencing,” Mr. Medina said. “We just need somebody, a real person in the middle between the company and the worker who can decide very fair about the deactivation process.”
Samantha Latson is a Times reporter covering New York City and a member of the 2025-26 Times Fellowship class, a program for journalists early in their careers.
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