New Delhi: India’s largest home service market urban company has found itself in a dispute with over a hundred female beauticians registering protests against alleged “unfair work practices”, prompting the company to immediately promise significant programs to boost the earnings of its partners .

Several beauty partners said they would not take orders from customers in protest of the alleged high commissions collected by the company and poor safety working conditions. Dozens of beauticians took to social media over the weekend to protest “unfair working conditions”, including late night shifts.

Urban Company (formerly urbanclap)
in a blogpost acknowledged on Sunday that it is “not perfect” and that it may have made mistakes in its journey. The company said it would announce significant programs to boost partners’ earnings in the coming weeks.

The controversy comes on the eve of the festive season when beauty services are in high demand.

Home-based Salon Urban is the company’s largest business vertical. The beauty and wellness segment contributed 55% to its revenue in FY15, the company had declared in its annual earnings.

In one of the videos that went viral, a beautician alleged that the urban company has overstated the commission she receives by 30%, which has reduced her salary significantly. One of the videos shared screen shots that said Urban Company would “take strict police action against any other fellow who stops going to work”.

In a video that has gone viral, a beautician has alleged that the urban company has exceeded the commission she receives by 30%, which has significantly reduced her salary. One of the videos shared screen shots alleging that UC will “take strict police action against anyone who prevents other partners from going to work”.

In response to ET’s query, Urban Company shared its blog post asking whether it will shy away from doing what is right for its stakeholders “under any circumstances”.

“Over the past few days, concerns have been expressed by some of our partners and other noble voices regarding the earnings and well-being of our service partners. We hear from you, and, in the spirit of transparency, would like to highlight some important facts and data points through this blogpost,” it said.

Urban Company also dismissed a partner’s tweet that it earned Rs 67 for four orders as “misrepresentation of facts”, saying the screenshot shown is not of its earnings page, but of a bank transfer. Compromise account.

“The partner accepted cash payment for two orders and online payment for the remaining two. His net earnings after UC commission and other charges were Rs 1,941 for four orders placed between October 1 and 3,” the company said. Separately, in a tweet referring to the issue, UC said, “…after removing the cost of travel and product, he earned Rs 1,141 for four jobs.”

In its blogpost, the company said, “We are not perfect, and acknowledge that we may have made mistakes in our journey so far. In the coming weeks, we will be announcing some important programs that we believe will increase the earnings and prosperity of our partner ecosystem. We will publish an update on this blogpost in late October with revised data. We estimate that service professionals in the offline world earn an average of Rs 12,000-15,000 per month.

Earlier on Sunday, the Indian Federation of App-Based Transport Workers, an organization representing app-based transport and delivery workers, said it stands in solidarity against the app-based service company’s “exploitative practices of women workers of UC “.

IFAT posted on its handle, “Women activists have been trying to negotiate with the UC management for the last three months, but the discussions have not yielded any acceptable result.” “The women’s demands include a rate of 20% for each job claimed by the UC, an allowance of five emergency cancellations a month for the partners and no penalty imposed for these cancellations, and to the UC There is no automatic deduction from earnings to be reinstated. products and effective grievance redressal system. ”

Its partners earn a net average of Rs 280-300 per hour, net of commissions, fees and related costs, and the top quartile of service partners earn up to Rs 36,000 per month overall, Urban Company said in its blogpost. Commissions, fees, travel and cost of the product. It said service partners have access to life and accidental insurance cover and during the pandemic, it had given interest-free loans of Rs 10 crore to beauty partners in closed areas.

Urban Company cofounder Abhiraj Singh Bhal tweeted late Sunday that the platform takes pride in providing “much better than offline earnings, and other benefits like training, insurance, financing, protection, vaccinations, and more.”

In June this year,
Urban Company closes $255 million funding round From investors led by Prosus Ventures (formerly Naspers), the company’s valuation more than doubled to $2 billion.

Last month, a gig worker association
had contacted Supreme Court seeks social security benefits from food delivery and cab aggregators Zomato, Swiggy, Ola and Uber.

The association, IFAT, filed a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) in the apex court, seeking inclusion of employees as ‘unorganized or wage workers’, alleging that they were denied social security due to forced labor. through exploitation.