DoorDash To Pay $131.5M To Settle Wage Theft Affecting 260,000
New York City officials announced a record $131.5 million settlement with the app-based delivery company DoorDash on Tuesday, saying the delivery company illegally underpaid more than 260,000 workers.
The settlement includes more than $115 million in payments to workers and more than $16 million in civil penalties and costs. Officials said it was the largest worker settlement in the history of both the city and the state.
“For years, DoorDash failed to count every hour worked by delivery workers,” Mayor Zohran Mamdani said at the Sept. 22 press conference. “This was not a rounding error or an accidental mistake.”
The settlement covers workers who were underpaid between April 22, 2022, and June 28, 2026. Workers will not have to file a claim or submit evidence to receive payments.
The city said it identified workers who are owed money through its analysis of DoorDash’s records and expects to send notices to the affected workers in late October.
Under the settlement, workers who were not paid at all will receive roughly three times the amount they were owed, while those who were paid late will receive roughly twice the amount, officials said.
'We messed up'
Rosendo Tacam, a DoorDash delivery worker and leader of Los Deliveristas Unidos, an organization that advocates for tens of thousands of delivery workers, said he joined the organizing effort after DoorDash deactivated him from the app and wouldn't pay him.
“For many years, we delivery workers have been out here every day, working more than 80 hours a week, delivering food and medicine to keep New York City moving,” said Tacam. “I gave DoorDash everything I had, and then they deactivated me and didn’t pay me for my last week of work."
"I felt angry and disrespected," Tacam added. "When I joined Los Deliveristas Unidos, I realized I was not alone."
Officials with the city's Department of Consumer and Worker Protection said DoorDash had excluded certain categories of trip and on-call time when calculating workers’ hours, even after the company began paying the city’s legally mandated minimum rate in December 2023. Investigators analyzed more than 152 million individual payment transactions and 110 million working hours from the company’s records.
"We messed up," DoorDash said in a statement posted on its social media accounts. "Our mistakes meant that some NYC Dashers were underpaid or paid late. That's unacceptable, and we're deeply sorry to the Dashers we let down."
Investigation began after workers approached DCWP
The investigation began after dozens of delivery workers like Tacam reported missing or late payments to DCWP, with assistance from Workers Justice Project, the parent organization of Los Deliveristas Unidos. The agency expanded the investigation using DoorDash’s pay data and found additional violations of the city’s minimum pay rate for delivery workers.
“They stepped forward despite the risks to themselves, despite the constant threat of deactivation, and despite the cynicism so many people understandably feel about whether the government can actually deliver for them,” DCWP Commissioner Samuel Levine said at the Tuesday press conference.
DCWP officials said DoorDash had excluded certain categories of trip and on-call time when calculating workers’ hours, even after the company began paying the city’s legally mandated minimum rate in December 2023. Investigators analyzed more than 152 million individual payment transactions and 110 million working hours from the company’s records.
The settlement between the city and DoorDash also creates a three-year monitoring program intended to detect violations faster. Under that program DoorDash will have to submit detailed data to the city each month.
Workers Justice Project and the Workers’ Algorithm Observatory will develop software allowing workers to share information about their trips and pay directly with DCWP, officials said.
‘Workers can still prevail against concentrated corporate power’
DoorDash will also be required to make software changes to ensure workers’ time is properly recorded and maintain records showing that it is complying.
Ligia Guallpa, executive director of Workers Justice Project, said the settlement was the result of years of organizing by delivery workers.
“This settlement puts money back in workers’ pockets and holds DoorDash accountable,” Guallpa said. “We celebrate this victory, but the fight continues: we will keep organizing for job security, safer working conditions, higher pay and respect.”
Workers are expected to receive their first payments this fall. A second round of payments is planned for early 2027 for a smaller group of workers affected by remaining problems with DoorDash’s time calculations.
“This case shows that in New York City, the collective power of workers can still prevail against concentrated corporate power,” Levine said.