Amazon Driver Makes A Request To The 'Same Houses' Who Receive Packages 'Every Day' — 'I Just Wanted To Enlighten You Guys On What We Deal With'
Do customers owe it to delivery drivers to lighten their load?
metamorworks There is no doubt about it — being a delivery driver is hard, often dangerous work, and very few people realize it. We're so used to packages just magically, seamlessly arriving on our doorsteps every day that most of us assume the job of getting them there is seamless too.
But one driver on TikTok gave a glimpse into the realities of the job, and she's asking regular customers to help lighten the load with a request that some feel is out of line.
The delivery driver says people who get daily Amazon packages should make drivers' jobs easier with 'kind gestures.'
Nikki is an Amazon driver in Texas. She recently gave a pretty startling glimpse into what being an Amazon delivery driver is really like.
"I've been delivering to the same houses every day," she said in a TikTok, dropping off packages to people who clearly have a very deep online shopping habit.
But it's not the repetition that Nikki says it's the problem — it's the way this neverending tidal wave of packages is managed and loaded onto the truck.
"Let me just show y'all what our van looks like," she said before taking her camera into the back of the van to show a disorganized, inscrutable mess of giant boxes strewn around and bins full of smaller items buried in the back.
"I only have 138 stops," she explained, "but since I have so much [stuff] in my van, it's still gonna take me just as long as I had if I had 170 stops" because of how much digging through the mess she'll have to do.
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Situations like that may result in repercussions for Nikki. Amazon has become notorious for its working conditions — in a survey of drivers, one described the job as "pure hell," with punitive delivery time and volume demands that workers say leave no time even for bathroom breaks. Working conditions have also resulted in state-level regulatory investigations about worker safety.
An effort to unionize Amazon drivers to improve these conditions is ongoing but has been met with retaliation from Amazon.
The Amazon driver says that tips or things like snacks and water are greatly appreciated.
"All I'm saying is if you order from Amazon every day, and I'm the same delivery driver that comes and delivers your packages, you know, it would be nice if you could leave, like, a tip or some snacks," she said.
Many homeowners do, in fact, do this for delivery drivers, especially during heat waves when their work can become not just stressful but downright dangerous.
Nikki says these customers are her "favorites," and that "little gestures like that, like, literally will make our day." She asked Amazon shoppers to "take into consideration" the difference these gestures can make.
"This [job] is not for the weak," she went on to say. "I'm not complaining. I love my job, I love what I do. I just wanted to enlighten you guys on what we have to deal with, because if you had to deliver this much [stuff], like, I'm sure you would quit."
The driver received plenty of backlash for her suggestions, but many others felt customers should step up.
Especially in America's increasingly absurd tipping culture, where even self-checkout machines are now asking for handouts, Nikki's suggestion didn't go over well with many people online. Some expressed astonishment that an Amazon driver would ask for something extra.
"A tip?" one angry commenter wrote. "Y'all be throwing [stuff], breaking [stuff], dropping [stuff] off at the wrong address; what do you mean tip?" Nikki responded, in a since-deleted video, by showing screenshots of the consistently glowing reviews she gets from her customers to prove that not all drivers are undeserving.
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Others felt — quite rightly — that Nikki shouldn't be in a position in which she needs to ask for extras from customers in the first place. "Still looks like something your job should be paying you more for," one person wrote, "not the people who buy off Amazon."
Which is true. But with all due respect to any Amazon higher-ups who might be reading this, we all know Bezos and Company are never, ever going to do that.
Much like how complaining about restaurant tipping doesn't pay a server's bills, complaining that Amazon is exploiting workers doesn't make the back-breaking work they have to do for you to never have to go to the store for yourself any easier.
If you can't afford to do extra for your drivers or just don't want to, then don't. But as Nikki says, a little generosity goes a long way.
Most of us are subject to the same corporate indifference to treating us fairly no matter what our jobs are. The idea of solidarity and taking care of each other — especially those working hard to make our lives easier — shouldn't be controversial.
John Sundholm is a news and entertainment writer who covers pop culture, social justice and human interest topics.