Uber Eats Japan halts hiring of foreign students for food delivery

An Uber Eats Japan Inc official told Kyodo News it has stopped recruiting new foreign students because checking their visa status every half year in person and confirming their attendance at schools "requires a lot of human resources," making it difficult for the company to ensure compliance.

It's better just to stop all foreign students recruitment rather than comply to rule that can have some additional cost.

Ok so if you don't have the resources to properly check, it's better to just assume all foreign students are just criminals trying to take advantage of your poor multi-national company?

So you're either incompetent, lazy, or racist?

Or all three, actually.

This sucks for all those who follow the laws here.

A decline in the number of employees could also reduce service quality, despite growing demand for food deliveries amid government stay-at-home requests.

Service Quality of Uber Eats Japan Delivery is already at rock bottom. It's not just the issue of illegal hiring of foreign students but all including Japanese staffs and the attitude of the company, They don't respect traffic rules, they don't respect social manner, they don't behave as if they are in customer service business, which have been already a social problem. It should be biting the dust

two Vietnamese overstayers

Wow... Huge social issue.

So if a business accidentally hires just 2 Japanese criminals, they totally stop hiring Japanese people ?

"requires a lot of human resources," making it difficult for the company to ensure compliance.

Er...is not doing the paperwork of their staff the only job of that kind of intermediary ? What else are they paid for ?

Isn't it easy to just ask to see work permission stamps in passport before hiring? Hire those with permission and don't hire those with no work permission.

Ok so if you don't have the resources to properly check, it's better to just assume all foreign students are just criminals trying to take advantage of your poor multi-national company?

So you're either incompetent, lazy, or racist?

Or all three, actually.

exactly! welcome to Japan.

two Vietnamese overstayers

Wow... Huge social issue.

Exactly!! LOL!!

But the Japanese are masters of making mountains out of ant holes. Especially when it comes to foreigners.

So if a business accidentally hires just 2 Japanese criminals, they totally stop hiring Japanese people ?

See now you are dealing with common sense, which is not a forte of the way of thinking here.

"requires a lot of human resources," making it difficult for the company to ensure compliance.

Er...is not doing the paperwork of their staff the only job of that kind of intermediary ? What else are they paid for ?

This is would require them to ACTUALLY do work, which many here don't. They're really good at LOOKING BUSY without actually doing much.

Isn't it easy to just ask to see work permission stamps in passport before hiring? Hire those with permission and don't hire those with no work permission.

Uber Eats Japan don't bother such things at all. They don't meet or interview the delivery staffs. I don't believe there is such an idea like compliance at Uber Eats Japan. Exactly speaking it is not employment relations but contractual relations with each individual proprietors, by which Uber Eats can and is dodging miscellaneous responsibilities as an employer, every small to big problems and refusing directly dealing with customer-complains on deliveries, leaving all the legal responsibilities to each individual business owner.

That's why such issues like, The staff eats foods by himself during delivery, dumps foods like garbage in front of the door, opens the home entrance door without any notice, hits on young female customers, cancels the orders without notice, violates always traffic rules with risky driving, goes into fight with pedestrians, etc... etc,,

Seriously, This company should cease the operation in Japan no matter how successful it could be in the US.

This is not just foreign students - it's foreign everyone. As a PR, my status is checked often at my workplace. Damn sick and tired of always being a suspect.

That's why such issues like, The staff eats foods by himself during delivery, dumps foods like garbage in front of the door, opens the home entrance door without any notice, hits on young female customers, cancels the orders without notice, violates always traffic rules with risky driving, goes into fight with pedestrians, etc... etc,,

Seriously, This company should cease the operation in Japan no matter how successful it could be in the US.

Uber Eats as a company is as awful as you put it. But the behavior of the drivers is not even as close as you mentioned above.

Sure there are drivers with bad behavior but if you were to close any of these delivery companies because their "employees" misbehave, you'd have to close every single delivery company.

Yeah, really good move Uber eats…….I’m sure you already have loads and loads of Japanese people lining up to work for your company as it is.

Good luck staffing your areas with more ruthless bikers. “Hopefully” none of them get run over by a bus…….

Sure there are drivers with bad behavior but if you were to close any of these delivery companies because their "employees" misbehave, you'd have to close every single delivery company.

Like I said, they are not employees which is why such issues DO OFTEN happen.

well, recently there has been a huge influx of domestic delivery companies pop up.

if Uber eats is on its way out, there will be more than enough local domestic companies to pick up the slack. That’s good news for them. And The majority of the profits will stay in Japan. Also helps add to domestic the economy

what a coincidence!

and that helps add to the domestic economy

This is not just foreign students - it's foreign everyone. As a PR, my status is checked often at my workplace. Damn sick and tired of always being a suspect.

agree 100%

An Uber Eats Japan Inc official told Kyodo News it has stopped recruiting new foreign students because checking their visa status every half year in person and confirming their attendance at schools "requires a lot of human resources," 

What employer doesn't have the resources to simply ask their employees to submit a document once every 6 months?

Answer: A really horrible tech company with an extremely anti-social business model.

Hope they go bankrupt.

One's eligibility to work can be proven very easily with a simple printout of one's resident registration (juminhyo), available at every city and town hall. You don't even have to risk copying a passport or "gaijin" card.

Surely Uber Eats has people in personnel who are familiar with this. Or maybe they are using this as cover for dumping employees that some of their less-modern-thinking customers don't like.

Uber Eats What? Isn’t this like the Brnb company that got pushed out so the two big realty companies can control rentals?

Why don't they allow people with other types of visas such as me with my humanities/engineer/international services...I mean they need the workers and I am not overstaying or doing anything illegal, my visa is valid...this really frustrates me because I was more than willing to make a quick buck while cycling and exercising myself from time to time...these stupid visa restrictions lock a LOT of potential workforce which Japan really needs right now, it wouldn't hurt anyone right now to have more available hands to do the job.

Surely Uber Eats has people in personnel who are familiar with this. Or maybe they are using this as cover for dumping employees that some of their less-modern-thinking customers don't like.

Surely Uber Japan may have people in personnel to manage only employees of Uber Japan but NO, there aren't such people in personnel to supervise drivers and their behaviors as employees representing the company because the drivers are not its employees. That is Uber Eats' business model which is to save any cost to select and educate proper drivers or to deal with customers' complaints or actual troubles.

Uber Eats is no more than a sort of dating apps. The food-service industry itself should boycott this kind of company if they are to maintain their names.

Why don't they allow people with other types of visas such as me with my humanities/engineer/international services...I mean they need the workers and I am not overstaying or doing anything illegal, my visa is valid...this really frustrates me because I was more than willing to make a quick buck while cycling and exercising myself from time to time...these stupid visa restrictions lock a LOT of potential workforce which Japan really needs right now, it wouldn't hurt anyone right now to have more available hands to do the job.

This news should not be considered as racism as some always make knee-jerk reactions. The issue is the business model of Uber (Eats) Japan and it's negligence of responsibility as a corporate citizen.

Well done! They are supposed to be here to study not to work.

Just send your application to Wolt, Demae-can, ??? panda. Lots of options.

Or, or, they should learn how to operate drones and set up a company that wipes all of these Uber and Uber clones off the map. Drones can deliver your food to your balcony, one day in the future.

Or they can set up those "ghost kitchens" and wipe out 90% of restaurants, one day in the future.

The world is their oyster. Speaking of oysters, they should learn to farm raise those.

And what is the difference between a student and a resident if both have expired or otherwise invalid visas? I don't think this is Uber's decision, just the Japanese branch's. Such a half-hearted "solution". If they require someone to show a zairyu-card, then it also implies that they have to verify the validity somehow. If they don't or can't verify the validity, then the requirement to provide the document is useless. And to the argument "but 28 hours!" there's a counter-argument, "so it'll be side business and partially unreported". And if this decision is in fact based on the fact that someone forged a zairyu-card, then that is a systemic problem and basically anyone can present a forged gaijin card.

Uber Eats, a perfect exemplar of the gig economy exploits workers without care - it has no employees, only independent contractors. There is no actual infrastructure, it relies on an app. Offers no benefits, insurance, retirement, minimum wage or any of the benefits of being an employee. It is a highly unethical business entity that has had numerous legal filings & litigation, worldwide, by its employees and customers. The large majority of profit goes to a handful of owners who pay minimal attention to the company, other than collecting the cash.

Uber charges restaurants 30% for food delivery. The complaints about no delivery are manifold and typical.

Uber has been taken to court in numerous countries - typically either being found in violation of the law or settling out of court. The company is continually in litigation for unethical conduct. It does minimal, if any screening of its employees - which is standard procedure for the company.

In addition, Uber avoids paying taxes thru a horde of shell companies. Its founder is an CEO was an amoral admirer of Ayn Rand. He has now been replaced by a smooth talking American-Iranian who is simply more deft at deflecting criticism but has lowered the bottom line and continues to exploit labor and violate employment laws. Softbank, has invested in Uber Eats.

The foreign students are much better than Japanese UBER delivery workers.

If 7-11 can screen, hire, train (rather well actually…) and employ 27,000+ part time NJs (Lawson too, where the level of Japanese language ability and service often exceeds J-staff), why can’t Uber Eats ask to see a passport or Registration Card? It’s not rocket science.

This taints all NJs, casts a shadow on those working part-time jobs, and reinforces a mostly false stereotype of people from certain countries.

The solution is to follow the US model of business and immigration: let in millions of people and don't care if they are legal or not. That's how the US builds its houses, landscapes its yards, fill restaurant kitchens, picks fruits and vegetables and butchers and packages all of its beef, chicken and pork.

It's a tax boom for the government. All these millions of people have taxes and social security (nenkin) taken out of their pay, but the government gets to keep it all because the people are illegal, so they cannot collect it later.

Laziness, xenophobic prejudice or both? Do they do any checks on Japanese hires? If any Japanese employees broke rules would they close down?

The current prejudice against migrant workers is economic suicide. All economies use migrant brain and brawn to optimise their economies and top up sectors, whilst exporting to other nations.

Have fun finding enough Japanese citizens willing to plug the gaps. You'll end up like the UK. Staff shortages everywhere, gaps on the shelves, sectors operating so far below their capacity that they struggle to turn of profit, plus rising costs leading to rising prices. Juche doesn't work in North Korea and it won't work anywhere else either.

Foreign nationals who have no restrictions on working hours such as permanent residents and spouses of Japanese nationals are not affected by the measure

So, let's not get our undies in a bind now.