DoorDash to implement new fee amid frustrations with Seattle City Council

DoorDash is implementing an additional $1.99 fee on certain long-distance orders, the company announced via a news release on Wednesday. In addition, DoorDash said it is implementing a $1.99 minimum service fee for orders from DashPass subscribers. DoorDash said the fees are needed because the Seattle City Council (SCC) has yet to compromise on new minimum wage increases in effect.

The new fees will start on August 1. The extra money will go toward orders that require more effort to complete, according to DoorDash. It will also help offset the costs of expensive deliveries under the City of Seattle’s minimum payment ordinance.

The ordinance went into effect in January and gives app-based workers the right to minimum pay based on the time worked and miles traveled for each offer, the right to upfront disclosures of offer information and the right to receipt and payment records. It also gives workers the right to access the network platform without limitations, the right to not be penalized for limiting availability or refusing offers and the right to cancel an offer with cause, according to the City of Seattle’s website.

With the ordinance, companies either have to pay a minimum per-minute amount of $0.44 and a minimum per-mile amount of $0.74 or pay a minimum per-offer amount of $5.

More on DoorDash: Under pressure from cities, DoorDash steps up efforts to ensure its drivers don’t break traffic laws

The company said a coalition of local drivers has offered three solutions to remove or reduce delivery fees in Seattle and still allow drivers to earn more than the city’s minimum wage. However, members of the council rejected the proposals without further negotiations.

DoorDash sent a statement to KIRO Newsradio that reads:

Due to Seattle’s broken delivery pay law, DoorDash continues to lose money in the market despite instituting a regulatory response fee. Despite this, we have held off on further increasing fees for the last six months while the council debated a compromise bill to reduce costs of facilitating delivery and still guarantee workers earn at least minimum wage plus additional pay for expenses.

Unfortunately, certain members of the council have let us know that they are unwilling to compromise, and have rejected legislation that would have drastically reduced costs, eliminated the $4.99 regulatory response fee, and helped increase earnings for Dashers and local businesses.

This inaction has left us no choice but to implement additional small fees on certain orders in the Seattle market to to remain operationally sustainable in Seattle. It is our sincere hope that as local Dashers, businesses and consumers continue to struggle under this ill-conceived law, these councilmembers will reconsider their commitment to total inaction.”

The Seattle Times reported in June that companies were frustrated with the SCC’s seeming lack of urgency to vote on a lower pay standard for delivery drivers.

“Tens of thousands of workers are like, what’s happening?” Hannah Sabio-Howell, communications director for Working Washington, told The Seattle Times in June. “It’s a weird and obscure purgatory we’re in right now. We’d like to be collaborative, and we’d like to be helpful.”

More coverage: Will the minimum wage for delivery drivers in Seattle be lowered?

Director for Working Washington: ‘DoorDash is extorting Seattle’

However, on Tuesday, Sabio-Howell told KIRO 7 that DoorDash is extorting Seattle and has never shown numbers to explain why the fees are necessary.

“(DoorDash) undermines its own credibility when it tries to say things like this new $2 fee, that previous $5 fee, are necessary for operational costs,” Sabio-Howell told KIRO 7. “I think it’s more than obvious that these corporations can pay their workers a living wage, and it’s a political choice not to.”

KIRO 7 reached out to the SCC for comment, which told them on Tuesday, “At this time the council members are passing on interview requests because they have no substantive updates to share. Procedurally the legislation is in a holding pattern.”

Contributing: KIRO 7

Julia Dallas is a content editor at MyNorthwest. You can read her stories here. Follow Julia on X here and email her here.

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