LinkedIn confession exposes the human cost of the gig economy in India

A LinkedIn post has gone viral in India after Anjali Kelkar, a customer of Urban Company, shared her late-night massage booking – and the heartbreaking confession that followed.

Anjali had booked a late-evening spa appointment through Urban Company, an Indian service provider that connects individuals with professionals for home services like beauty and wellness or home repairs.

The masseuse, given the pseudonym “Nisa” to protect her identity, notified Anjali that she would be 15-20 minutes late due to a crammed schedule. She also added that she hadn’t eaten all day.

When she finally arrived, an hour late, a teary Nisa revealed to Anjali that she didn’t have the right to decline appointments and various other shortcomings of Urban Company, most notably:

• Service pros can’t decline bookings – even if they’re sick or burned out, or just human.
• Three cancellations – and your profile’s suspended, income paused for days. That’s the rule. No exceptions.
• In a city like Mumbai, 3 km can take 40+ minutes – but delays still hurt your ratings.
• No built-in breaks, no buffer time – just back-to-back sessions, even for intense physical work.
• They lug heavy massage tables around – Nisa’s now dealing with a hernia from the strain.

The reaction on LinkedIn was strong. One user called out the hypocrisy of booking the wellness treatment and adding to Nisa’s woes, despite commending Anjali for alerting the public:

“It would have been more humane if you could have denied the massage, especially after seeing her crying. However, it is actually good that you have flagged this!”

Another HR worker pointed out the discrimination gig workers face, based on their religion:

“I heard a horror story from someone that clients also harass them on the basis of their religion. And they don’t have the option to refuse a job, even if the client is abusive as Urban Clap doesn’t allow them to refuse and always takes the side of the client!”

A perceptive comparison was made to Uber drivers, who are at least able to decline gigs based on personal circumstances. For Nisa, cancellations simply weren’t an option.

Urban Company replied to the viral post, thanking Kelkar for her empathy and promising to improve their system. They shared a visual of their earnings index and issued a standard corporate response:

“We are constantly working to improve the systems that govern bookings, schedules, and partner wellbeing to minimize travel overload and burnout.”

An Urban Company representative on LinkedIn.

It’s quite often the case that platform-driven economies cause high levels of burnout and stress, as workers are at “the beck and call” of customers.

At the time of writing, Anjali’s post has almost 600 comments, and the conversation regarding the rights of gig workers is rising to the surface of LinkedIn.

Nisa’s quiet confession has become a national conversation – and a stark reminder of the human cost behind our convenience.