Nograles claims Grab forcing drivers to work as ‘slaves’ for incentives

PBA party-list Representative Jericho Nograles on Thursday accused Grab Philippines of forcing its driver-partners to work like “slaves” using “unfair sharing mechanism and humanly impossible quotas” for incentives.

Nograles had a dialogue with Grab’s driver-partners on Tuesday at the House of Representatives regarding their situation at work.

“Grab is incentivizing modern-day slavery. While Grab executives like Brian Cu are splurging on things like joining a P35-million per share golf country club, their driver-partners hardly earn enough to be able to afford three square meals a day and keep up with the amortization cost of their vehicles,” Nograles said in a statement.

“With no financial and health risk, Grab is making a lot money while the drivers who are working in slave-like conditions are left without any protection. To me, this is immoral and this is utterly wrong. This has to stop now and put Grab to the place where it really belongs,” the lawmaker claimed.

GMA News Online has reached out to Grab Philippines for their side on the matter at hand, but the company has not yet replied.

During the dialogue, Ma. Janina Pineda, leader of a group of Grab driver-partners, illustrated during the dialogue how much each one of them is earning per day.

In general, a Grab driver makes a gross income of P18,000 every six-day work week for 100 to 120 trips, she said.

However, a Grab driver-operator would usually take home only P655 per day after working for a minimum of 18 hours due to expenses incurred during the weekly operations.

Driver-partners would also have to pay a P500 boundary, leaving them with only P155 per day.

“After working 18 hours per day for six days, it turns out that the real commission of Grab is not 20 percent but more like 48 percent or higher,” Nograles claimed.

“Pwede nang manalo ng Guinness Book of World Records ang Grab as the most expensive ‘barker’ in the world,” he said.Nograles noted if drivers were required to work only eight hours day they will not be able to turn a profit.

"Grab is taking advantage of this situation by incentivizing drivers to drive 18 hours per day to turn a profit. That is immoral,” the lawmaker alleged.

It is actually the driver-partner who does the hard work and pay for the expenses, he said.

“The only thing that Grab facilitated was the booking of the ride through their smart phone app. To me, Grab only deserves a commission from a booking fee. All other fees, including the fare, should all go to the driver,” he said.

Nograles said he would only support the driver-partners’ plea to restore the P2 per minute travel charge if the company would forego the 20 percent commission and take only a share of the base fare.

“They desperately need the P2 per minute charge to augment their shrinking earnings. They are the ones who are killing themselves on the road, yet they hardly take home a decent pay while making Grab Philippines richer,” he said.

“I will definitely back up the driver’s petition to implement the fair charges on the condition that Grab Philippines forego any commission from this charge. Ibigay na nila lahat sa mga driver nila kung gusto talaga ng management na makatulong sa kanila.” —VDS, GMA News