A video that captured a food delivery man's sneaky act of feasting on a customer's food before delivering it to its destination has gone viral in India.
The video shows the takeaway man who works for popular online delivery service Zomato, opening the plastic food containers, taking bites and then resealing them before placing them back in his delivery bag while sitting on his two-wheeler.
But while the video initially spawned memes mocking the delivery man's gall, it later turned into a sympathy wave after Zomato announced that he had been fired.
Driven by compassion for the unknown man, some netizens went on to question the wages and employment conditions of such delivery staffers.
In an official statement posted an apology on its website, Zomato confirmed that the man in the red T-shirt seen in the clip was their "delivery executive" from Madurai in southern India and he was indeed nibbling on food ordered by customers.
The service provider further said it was a "human error in judgement" on part of the delivery man and that he had been sacked in accordance with its "zero tolerance policy for tampering of food".
“Zomato maintains a zero tolerance policy for tampering of food. This particular incident, while unfortunate, only makes our commitment to fleet training, scheduling and process even stronger,” the service provider said in its statement.
The company also said that it would soon introduce tamper-proof tapes in to ensure an extra layer of food protection.
Meanwhile, in line with the company's decision to sack the delivery man, some reasoned that 'duty is duty' and there is no excuse for such behaviour.
Although the Zomato-like online food delivery services and cloud restaurants is a recent phenomenon in India, it has, however, become a recipe for success for many service providers suggesting that the model is both sustainable and scalable.
But the going isn’t easy. Experts suggest that in the age of social media established brands like Zomato need to clean up their act.
“This surely is going to create a lot of trouble for the brand. Moreover, people might start poking the brand and Zomato delivery boys with sarcasm and prefer to use the services of their competitors instead. But it is high time for all these brands to take food tampering and hygiene very seriously," brand expert, Gaurav Gulati told Exchange4media.
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