Driverless Waymo cars are delivering Uber Eats orders!

The next time you order on Uber Eats, an autonomous Waymo car might deliver your order! Robot delivery is here, and some delivery workers are afraid that the robots are coming for our jobs sooner rather than later.

An Uber Eats user in Phoenix shared their experience with a driverless Waymo delivery. An autonomous car delivered their order, and all they had to do was meet the vehicle at the curb and press a button to access their order.

How autonomous Waymo delivery works on Uber Eats

In pilot markets, an Uber Eats delivery can be assigned to an autonomous Waymo vehicle instead of a human delivery worker. The vehicle will navigate to the restaurant or store to pick up the order then navigate to your location to deliver the order to you.

You’ll have to meet the vehicle at the curb and press a button in the Uber Eats app to unlock the vehicle’s trunk and pick up your order.

That means that you won’t get delivery to your door, which may be a problem for some customers who can’t go to the curb or prefer delivery to their door.

Waymo is cheaper: You don’t have to tip your robot driver!

Here’s one perk for customers, and bad news for human drivers: You don’t have to tip your autonomous Waymo car. If your order is assigned to a Waymo car, any tip you leave at checkout will be returned to you.

In this case, the Uber Eats customer tipped $6.80 at checkout, which was ultimately returned to them. Those savings will add up!

But that means a human delivery worker lost out on $6.80. Someone would have gotten that fairly generous tip if the order had been assigned to a human.

Potential problems with Waymo deliveries

As futuristic as Waymo deliveries sound, some problems with the delivery process might make it a less-than-perfect experience compared to human delivery.

No delivery to your door. You must meet the Waymo vehicle at the curb to pick up your order. That’s a problem for disabled people who need delivery to their door, and it’s an inconvenience for people who prefer delivery to their door for other reasons.

For many people, the entire point of delivery apps is to get no-contact delivery to your door, so a Waymo delivery will be a step backward.

Logistical problems: Parking and communication. Just ask any human driver: It can be hard to find some delivery locations and even harder to find a parking spot.

What will happen when a Waymo car can’t find legal parking? Customers might be asked to walk down the block to meet the vehicle, which isn’t exactly convenient.

Inconvenient for restaurant and store employees. Human delivery workers go inside restaurants and stores to pick up orders. With a Waymo car, workers will have to go outside to meet the vehicle. That’s not convenient or efficient for busy workers.

Drivers: Robots are finally taking our jobs?

For years, losing our jobs to robots has been a big fear in the rideshare and delivery industry. Technology that seemed to be years away is finally here. But will Waymo and other autonomous delivery services really replace humans?

For now, this Waymo service is just a pilot program in test markets. There are still many logistical problems with autonomous delivery that need to be worked out before large numbers of human workers are replaced.

Using an extremely expensive autonomous vehicle for low-paid deliveries might not be economical. There are cheaper options that may get the same work done without using a $200k+ vehicle.

The robots aren’t taking all of our jobs yet, but they will take some of them soon!