“Rover still tries to control my schedule by lowering my search rating when I don’t accept jobs that are within my preferences.”
John W., Rover worker
I’ve been a gig worker on Rover for two and a half years, and we need the PayUp policy.
As a Rover worker, I’m grateful for the level of control I have over my own schedule. But I think that it could be better.
Rover presents itself as just being a marketplace like Craigslist where customers can find walkers and sitters, and there is some truth to that. But the reality is that Rover exercises too much power over its workers to simply be considered a marketplace.
Rover still tries to control my schedule by lowering my search rating when I don’t accept jobs that are within my preferences.
That means I won’t be shown to potential clients as often, hurting my business. But the preferences that the app allows me to set are very primitive. I believe that updating the app to allow for more customization would fix some of these issues. But ultimately it will never be capable of factoring in all the nuances of whether a job is worth it to me, so I believe the search rating needs to be replaced with an unbiased system. The system could show sitters to clients randomly and allow the client to filter based on preferences that are important to them.
Being selective about which jobs I take allows me to make a decent amount of money per hour while still keeping things relatively affordable for the customer. This directly impacts the amount of work I’m able to squeeze in a given period of time, and the time I have outside of work to relax, spend time with my family, take classes, etc.
I believe a pay floor consistent with minimum wage needs to be established for Rover and other gig working apps to avoid pay being driven down over time. This needs to factor in the extra time and costs associated with being a contractor on each app.