Urban Company — Service Partner Enablement
Urban Company’s mission is to empower a million service professionals to deliver services at home like never experienced before. At the heart of our mission statement is service partner empowerment — Ensuring our service partners make middle class living wages (And not just minimum wages), have access to free life, accidental and health insurance coverage, are provided free training, upskilling and certification, are provided access to world-class tools and products at discounted prices, have access to formal credit, and are offered a career path which ensures a dignified, respectful living. We encapsulate these enablement efforts through our Partner Success Program.
This document provides key details of the Partner Success Program, including the above mentioned enablement efforts. Additionally, it also talks about two key aspects of our Customer Experience Guarantee — Ensuring Quality of Service (And associated minimum ratings threshold for service partners) and On-Time Order Fulfillment (And how we balance this promise while offering flexibility to service partners). We take feedback received from customers and service partners very seriously, and constantly strive towards building a high quality marketplace network for customers, while ensuring a balanced, fair, and supportive work environment for our service partners.
Partner Success Program: Ensuring holistic service partner well-being
Middle-class earnings:
- According to Urban Company’s latest Earnings Index, average monthly net earnings of service partners delivering >30 services in a month was INR 33,469. Further, the average monthly earnings of the top 20% of Urban Company service partners is INR 42,792, net of all commissions, fees, travel, and product costs. This data was audited by an independent and reputed audit firm — JC Bhalla & Company.
- An analysis of the hourly earnings of the service partners for H2 CY23 showed that female partners earn 23% per hour more than their male counterparts on the platform. The average hourly earnings of female partners net of all commissions, fees, travel and product costs is INR 363, while the same for male partners is INR 294.
- As per a recent third party research by PGA Labs, it was found that UC salon service partners earn hourly net average earnings of ~INR 320, which is 4 times the net hourly earnings (~INR 80) of offline beauticians (those working in a salon/parlor or providing at-home services).
- We have published six editions of our partner earnings index, the previous five editions can be accessed here — Earnings Index H1 CY2023 | Earnings Index H2 2022 | Earnings Index H1 2022 | Earnings Index Q2 FY22 | Earnings Index Q3 FY22
- To the best of our knowledge, we are the first, and likely amongst very few companies in the gig economy globally, to transparently publish the earnings of our gig workers.
Social protection benefits
Insurance cover: Urban Company voluntarily provides life insurance cover worth INR 6 lacs, disability cover worth INR 6 lacs, accidental hospitalization and more.
All our service providers have a health insurance plan which provides a cover of INR 1 lac, with up to 12 free medical consultations per year for self, along with the existing benefits of the Group Life and Accidental Insurance cover. For top-performing partners, the policy also provides family medical insurance for spouse and two children and up to 12 free medical consultations per year.
- In FY24, over 1800 service partners benefitted from these insurance covers
- Claims disbursal of over INR 6.29 crores in FY24
- Claims disbursal of close to INR 9.8 crores to date
Apart from this, if there is any emergency support needed that is not covered under the insurance program, we utilize Suraksha Fund, created in partnership with Srinidhi Trust, an NGO, through proceeds from UC employees, management, and other well-wishers.
Access to formal credit
We also disbursed INR 37.2 crores worth of loans, including personal loans and service kit loans, to Urban Company service partners via third-party non-banking financial corporations (NBFCs) in FY24. This is crucial as it allows our service partners to be part of a formal economic environment that protects them from getting into debt traps with third parties.
Covid-19 support
For our partners, we had launched Project Kavach — a certification training programme to help them protect themselves and take necessary safety precautions as they resumed their daily lives, vocations and routines. Our Kavach certification program trained partners on personal safety and hygiene standards, PPE usage and service SOPs through a staggered 7-day virtual training program.
- 100% vaccination for two doses for all partners and their families for free
- INR 60 Cr invested in purchase of PPE kits
- INR 2 Cr disbursed under Covid-19 insurance to partners
- 1.8 Cr face masks purchased and distributed
- INR 41 Lacs disbursed as a part of sick leave package to partners who tested positive
- INR 32 Lac disbursed as bereavement support to families of deceased partners
- INR 13 Lac disbursed among partners who needed emergency medical treatment
- Additional weekly income grant of INR 2,000 to partners who needed to self-quarantine. This was to ensure that our partners can get well without having to worry about loss of income.
We purchased insurance cover for any partner infected with the disease, covering any hospitalization expenses and a per-day allowance.
Training & Skilling
Our comprehensive training program equips our service partners with the skills and certifications they need to excel. Our service partners are Skill India-certified and members of the Skill India portal under our MoU with the National Skill Development Council, affiliated with the Govt. of India.
Key stats about our training program:
- Permanent 321k sq ft of space for 175+ training rooms across 14 cities
- Over 280 trainers on board to impart training across all 17 categories
- In FY2024, we trained and upskilled 35,000 partners
- 150+ training centers and a 200+ training team
- Invested INR 138 Cr. in training over FY24 and overall investments of up to INR 524 Cr.
Partner Stock Option Program
As part of our wealth creation initiative for service partners, we launched an industry-first Partner Stock Option Program (PSOP). To date, over 513 Urban Company service partners have benefited from this program.
Partner Safety
Partners at Urban Company might come across a number of risks in the course of their work, including accidents and injuries, harmful materials, and crime and violence. Urban Company as a platform tries its best to first eliminate such risks through product innovation, SOP adherence checks etc. We invest heavily in educating our partners on how to safeguard themselves against such risks and take appropriate measures to mitigate these risks during onboarding and then reinforce the same regularly post going live on the platform. As part of our SafeSteps initiative, we provide extensive safety-related support ranging from equipment to helplines:
- Dedicated training module on safety protocols while onboarding partners
- Category-specific risks: To ensure partners’ safety, we have given free safety harnesses to our AC Service and Repair Professionals.
- Trust and Safety desk: New Policy to ensure Partners’ safety on the Urban Company platform
- SOS button on the app for any emergency support
- 24x7 Partner Helpline
- Dedicated Women-only helpline for Safety, Powered by the SOS feature
Other Initiatives
- Support for Service Professionals Facing Domestic Violence: We have also introduced Project Nidar to support our service professionals facing domestic violence and abuse. This project encompasses all active service partners on the platform, providing them with awareness, assistance, and resources during challenging times. In collaboration with the Invisible Scars Foundation, an NGO dedicated to aiding survivors of gender-based violence, Urban Company will offer counseling, legal aid, and emergency lodging support to affected service partners. Additionally, the company will extend medical support beyond the existing insurance cover of Rs 1 lakh and provide financial assistance of up to Rs 50,000 to those seeking help. This policy applies to all active service partners across Urban Company’s platform in India.
- Celebrating partners’ success through Project Milaap: We host partners and their families in our city offices, acknowledging their hard work and contribution.
- CDR Nishant Singh Scholarship Program: To celebrate the outstanding academic achievements of the children of our partner fleet, Urban Company launched the Commander Nishant Singh Scholarship Program in 2023. Under this program, the company will recognise and provide financial assistance to those children who excel academically and/or secure admissions into prestigious educational institutes or military academies across the country.
At Urban Company, we believe that small steps can make a big difference. The Customer Service Guarantee and calendar marking are our steps towards a more efficient, balanced, and customer-centric service model. We look forward to seeing the positive impact of these initiatives and continuing to serve our customers with excellence.
Customer Experience Guarantee
To succeed in the marketplace, and ensure that our service partners enjoy the benefits outlined above, Urban Company has to offer a platform which provides unmatched service experiences to customers. Underscoring this customer promise are two key aspects — Providing the highest quality of service, and ensuring on-time fulfillment.
Highest Quality of Service
Several efforts are undertaken by Urban Company to ensure excellence in service quality — Including careful SOP design, training and handholding partners in these SOPs, providing state of the art tools and equipment, leveraging technology to support partners in service delivery, and offering an empathetic grievance redress mechanism, backed by warranty programs. We allow both customers and partners to rate each other at the end of each service, and provide feedback. These ratings are taken very seriously by the platform, and we go to great lengths to ensure that we maintain a fair and transparent ratings & review system.
In CY23 and CY24 (to date), the average ratings for service partners on the UC platform have been 4.83/5.00. While these might appear to be very high, most customers end up giving a 5 star rating for a job done satisfactorily. Depending upon the category, we have defined minimum ratings threshold between 4.5 to 4.7 out of 5.0, which are often well-below the averages. To the layperson, a rating of 4.5/5.0 might also appear very high. However, on our marketplace, a rating of 4.5–4.6/5.0 represents a negative Net Promoter Score (Experiences leading to more detractors than promoters).
We also go to great lengths to ensure that partners do not fall below the minimum ratings threshold, with adequate feedback through the partner application, and re-training programs which provide them an opportunity to improve their ratings. These re-training programs are free for the service partner and fully paid for by Urban Company. However, occasionally partners fall below the ratings threshold despite our best efforts to re-train and handhold them more than two or three times , leading to the unfortunate decision to counsel them to leave the marketplace to maintain the quality standards on the platform. Given the earnings opportunities with Urban Company, which are often significantly higher than other offline opportunities, such decisions understandably lead to dissatisfaction among impacted partners. We are working hard to ensure that our re-trainings, hand-holding and partner enablement efforts help all partners provide good quality of service, and we don’t have to part ways with any service partner. Our platform spends a significant amount of time, and monetary resources to train and retrain service partners, and it is a business loss for us each time a service partner parts ways with us, whether voluntarily or otherwise.
On-time Fulfilment and Partner Flexibility
Prior to 2023, service partners indicated the times they were available for delivering services on the UC Partner Application. For indicated available time slots by partners, Urban Company would take orders on their behalf from customers and assign these orders to them. However, we also gave them the additional flexibility to accept or reject these orders, sent to them in their indicated available time slots. This model had two fundamental issues — A meaningful percentage of customer orders did not get accepted by any service partner, leading to a no-show. Additionally, service partners had to constantly check their partner application, even while on customer orders, so as not to “miss out” on any bookings, leading to some anxiety.
Starting 2023, we slowly rolled out a new order scheduling system, designed to enhance the customer experience and provide our service partners with greater control and predictability over their schedules, leading to a healthier work-life balance. The system was simple — Partners would convey to us the time-slots they were willing to work in, and we would auto-assign customer orders to them in their indicated available time slots. By conveying their available time slots, our service partners essentially convey their availability for service delivery, including short term and long term periods of absence. . This ensures that we do not disturb them when they are offline and assign them service requests only for the times they have marked themselves available. We also developed a system of 3 emergency passes per month for last minute emergencies.
- Work Availability: Service partners have the autonomy to convey their available time slots for delivering services on the platform as well as periods of non-availability (short term and long term). This system ensures they are not disturbed when offline and receive service requests only during their chosen availability.
- Enhanced Work-Life Balance: Partners can set their schedules, and take days off from the platform as per their preferences, including long periods of absence, allowing them to balance their professional and personal lives effectively, boosting their morale and performance.
- 3 emergency passes for last minute availability issues: Service partners are provided with 3 emergency passes each month, allowing them to cancel bookings assigned in their indicated available time slots without any penalization. These emergency passes cater to unforeseen situations, and can be utilized without explanation by service partners.
- Earnings Promise: For partners adhering to platform standards of quality and availability, Urban company offers incentives to offset any downside risk of the platform not being able to send them adequate orders. This incentive program has been rolled out across several categories, and offers income protection in line with platform earnings.
- Additional flexibility for women partners: We recognize that our women partners have unique demands of balancing work while managing family and responsibilities at home. Several of them are single mothers and/or sole breadwinners of their families. To support them better, we typically offer greater flexibility to them, including offering a “flexi-partner model” which allows a sizable percentage of our women partners to operate without the above restrictions.
The above model is not unique to Urban Company, and is the model adopted globally by leading gig economy players in ride-hailing, food delivery and e-commerce sectors. With this change, we have now simply aligned our processes with the globally accepted practice of offering flexibility to choose service delivery hours, while ensuring that customer experience does not suffer. We understand that change in process may be accompanied with adoption challenges and require adjustment, which we are addressing by engaging in constant dialogue with our partner fleet across cities through in-person townhalls, virtual meetings and focus group discussions.
Building a Trusted and Balanced Marketplace
To build a trusted marketplace for our partners, we regularly take feedback from our partners for every service provided by them to a customer. Whenever a partner gives a negative rating to a customer, UC ensures that the said customer is not allocated to the impacted service provider again. If a customer consistently receives poor ratings and feedback, Urban Company analyses the feedback provided by the partners to determine whether the customer poses threat to the safety and well-being of the professionals. If yes, we block such customers from the platform.
Our role as a technology marketplace is to provide the highest quality of experiences to our customers, while ensuring respectful, middle class livelihood for our service partners. For our service partners to earn meaningfully higher wages than their offline counterparts, and enjoy a host of UC benefits (Free training & upskilling; free insurance covers; access to formal credit, career progression etc.), it is paramount that our customers get reliable and high-quality service experiences. In the long run, there is no misalignment in incentives between our customers, service partners and the marketplace. In the short to medium run, we may make changes to our operating model to improve the quality of service and the fulfillment reliability. Change is the only constant — If we fail to embrace change, improve for the better and grow, we run the risk of stagnating and eventually get disrupted like the platforms we set out to disrupt a decade back. Continuous improvement, embracing change and keeping customer satisfaction above all else, is the only way Urban Company can survive, thrive, and fulfill its commitment towards the service partner community. This role of operating a balanced marketplace, of doing right by all stakeholders, is one we take seriously and are sincerely committed towards.
Partner Impact Stories:
Our partners get a plethora of opportunities at Urban Company when it comes to training, skilling and upskilling.
Anil used to work as a security guard where he used to do a 12-hour shift everyday. Even then he was just earning just ₹15,000 per month and found it difficult to make ends meet. He joined Urban Company in 2019 in the Cleaning category, after which his monthly earnings have doubled to at least ₹30,000-₹40,000 per month. Not only that, Anil has also been able to buy himself a bike and feels that he no longer has to worry about small, daily household expenses that used to keep him awake earlier.
Rekha used to work at a salon where she would earn ₹15,000-₹17,000 per month with incentives. She would even work overtime without extra compensation. Due to this, her husband had to quit his job to look after their baby. However, things changed completely when Rekha joined Urban Company in the Salon category. She now earns up to ₹50,000-₹60,000 every month. Even when there are less jobs, she is able to earn about ₹40,000 on a monthly basis. Today, Rekha is an exceptional 5 star-rated professional who says that she does not have to worry about small expenses anymore. More importantly, Rekha has been able to enroll her child in a good school. And as she can now choose her work hours, her husband has picked up a job and they are now a double income family.
Brundha joined Urban Company in 2019 after shutting down her own salon where she was spending all her time but was not able to make much profit. After joining UC, her monthly earnings rose to ₹1L-₹1.5L and she feels like she’s running her own business, but with even more flexibility. Brundha has now booked an apartment for her family and feels proud to be a UC partner.
Ekta joined Urban Company in 2019. She used to work at a parlour, where she was only earning ₹10,000 per month and had to spend the whole day at the salon, even though there wasn’t much work. At UC, Ekta’s earnings have grown four times to at least ₹40,000 per month and she is happier than ever. Ekta has even bought a new apartment for her family and feels proud to be independent and working by her own will.
Elisian used to work as a spa professional at a resort, where she was earning ₹35,000 per month at the time. When she heard good stories about Urban Company from her peers, she decided that she too wanted to improve her way of life and wanted to grow in her chosen field as a professional. And so, she joined UC in 2019. Elisian is one of the top performers here at UC, with a rating of 4.95. Today, she earns around ₹90,000-₹1L on a monthly basis.
Julie’s growth story has been phenomenal. Before joining UC, she actually worked as a hairdresser, earning ₹15,000 monthly. However, she was unable to manage her household due to the long work hours and had to eventually leave. Even though she approached UC to join a different field — that of spa & massage — she was confident that she wanted to join the platform because she would get to choose her own timings here. The best part is that UC welcomed Julie into its fold, training her thoroughly in various spa techniques. She eventually joined UC in January 2021 and in a matter of a year, is a top performer with a 4.93 rating. Her monthly earnings have also risen phenomenally to around ₹90,000-₹1L.
Parvez has been an Urban Company professional for a stellar 6 years! Before joining UC, Parvez used to run his own repair business, where he had a group of technicians working along with him. He was able to make a profit of around ₹1L every month but due to some problems, his business eventually shut down. At UC, Parvez earns around ₹60,000- ₹70,000 monthly. As per him, it’s still like running his own business but without having to foot major business expenses like office rent etc.
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