Rappi Delivery Workers Stage Street Fights While Waiting for Orders

Complaints about Rappi delivery workers in Bogota are frequent for different reasons. But in the last hours one became known that surprised because of how exotic it was: several of those delivery workers recorded around a fight with boxing gloves. Two of them faced each other in a park in the city, and were recorded in a video that went viral.

As on other occasions (such as when, at the beginning of April, a group of couriers chased the driver of a vehicle, assaulted him and destroyed his car) the company issued apologies, assured that this type of behavior does not represent it and announced that it would take measures.

The scene of the delivery workers facing each other in a boxing fight was recorded by Bogota councilman Juan David Quintero, who opened the public discussion with a question: “What do you think of this street fight? Have the ‘delivery workers’ gotten out of control?”

Immediately there was an avalanche of criticism against the company, since the delivery workers who work for it have also been seen in parks and streets of the city consuming drugs, playing cards or dice, or simply occupying public spaces while they wait for the call of a service.

In another video, Quintero spoke about the situation he denounced: “Street fights by delivery workers in broad daylight in Bogota? Has this crisis of lack of regulation and control over digital delivery platforms in Bogota reached that level? We have already made a call to Mayor Carlos Fernando Galan to sit down with Rappi and seek concrete solutions.”

But, as was to be expected, the event provoked divided opinions. On one hand, those who consider that it is a simple sports practice, a boxing match, but not a street fight. And others who do find negative traits in that activity, from the invasion of public space, which they believe should be reserved for children and the elderly.

Awaiting effective responses from Rappi and authorities

In any case, councilman Quintero assured that it is “urgent” that the mayor, Carlos Fernando Galan, “sit down and seek alternatives beyond blocking 2,300 delivery workers.”

“We have already made calls from the Council. The Secretariat of Mobility, we have knowledge that it has also sat down with these companies,” he added. “But really, if the mayor does not take charge of this situation, it will no longer be urban lynchings, street fights, but who knows how far we could go.”

For other people, what the Rappi couriers are doing is a “fight club,” something that is very far from being a sports practice or to pass the time in free spaces. The violence that the combat entails and the crowds around it configure a situation that provokes the rejection of the people who live in those places.

After the assault by several delivery workers on a driver at the beginning of April, Rappi assured that it activated its response protocols, blocked the involved delivery workers and offered support to the affected person. It also emphasized solidarity with the victim and reiterated its commitment to collaborate with the authorities in the process of investigation and resolution of the incident.

People who feel affected by the boxing fights also expect measures from the company and from the city authorities.