A video that was trending on Twitter on Tuesday shows a food delivery driver on Long Island, New York, berating a customer over an $8 tip. The altercation sparked a debate about proper tipping and the perils of gig economy work.
Posted on the popular Twitter account Fifty Shades of Whey (@davenewworld_2), the video starts with the woman ringing a doorbell and asking to speak to the person who ordered the food.
“I need to speak to you … I don’t think you realize the distance it’s coming from because you would never would’ve actually given [the $8 tip provided],” the driver says into the doorbell camera.
She says she drove 40 minutes from the pickup to the customer’s house. A man responds through the doorbell that he doesn’t understand her complaint.
“Do you realize you ordered from Commack, and you’re in Smithtown?” the woman says. But the problem with the driver’s argument about geography is that it can be disproved.
“Commack and Smithtown are neighboring towns that only take 10-15 min to drive through max,” Fifty Shades of Whey wrote. “$8 is more than enough and if that was my food I’d be PISSED.”
The Daily Dot confirmed via Google Maps and Viamichelin.com that if the driver took the straightest, shortest route from Commack to Smithtown, the drive wouldn’t take longer than 22 minutes no matter the time of day.
To that point, the man tells the driver, “That’s a 15-20 minute drive.”
The driver continues to argue, saying, “You need to try to drive it; it’s 40 minutes. You need to adjust your tip. You gave an $8 tip.”
“What the hell are you looking for?” the customer says. “I gave an $8 tip.”
The delivery driver then announces she’s going to take the food back. She picks up the bag of takeout food and walks away from the house. “Is she fucking kidding?” the man says as she leaves.
On Twitter, the argument about the tip amount and the distance driven continued. Some users argued that the driver knew what the job was when she accepted it, whether she thought the tip was decent enough or not.
@Urban_Walrus wrote, “She knew where the [pickup] was, where it was going & how much the tip was in advance. Lose/lose.”
Others said that taking back the food wasn’t a smart move since there’s now video evidence of her taking food via the doorbell camera.
“She just cost herself that gig,” user @GrooveRider_ wrote. “The [customer] complains that he never got his food, shows video proof, he’ll get his food comped and she’ll be fired. She only played herself here.”
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