Novi Sindikat
Mobilising Croatian trade unions so AI-driven platforms recognise gig workers as employees and improve working conditions
Since more food delivery platforms entered the Croatian market in 2019, it’s become clear that their AI-driven management systems are worsening working conditions for gig workers, impacting their livelihoods and mental health.
With help from the European AI & Society Fund, Novi Sindikat mobilised fellow Croatian trade unions to understand the plight of gig workers and join a pan-European campaign to implement the EU Platform Workers Directive.
Successfully enacted in 2024, in Croatia this means that gig workers no longer have to declare themselves as self-employed or rely on contracts from dodgy intermediary organisations. They are employees by default, making it easier for them to hold AI-powered platforms – their employers – accountable and fight for better working conditions.
The challenge
With the number of platform workers in the EU rising by 52% since 2022, it’s important to challenge unaccountable exploitation by AI-driven gig economy platforms. These platforms – such as Glovo, Deliveroo, Bolt and Uber – rely on AI to make crucial HR decisions including hiring, firing, setting delivery times, and paying riders. But these are often opaque, leading to unequal and low wages, job insecurity, and unreachable targets. This threatens workers’ wellbeing, mental health and livelihoods. As gig workers aren’t recognised as employees, they are unable to challenge these AI-powered systems.
In Croatia, holding food delivery platforms accountable was even more complex as around 80% of gig workers were ‘employed’ by intermediary organisations known as ‘aggregates’. This effectively frees platforms, the actual employers, from any kind of responsibility for the working conditions and rights of the workers, leading to further exploitation and lack of job security for those in the gig economy.
Aggregates were first introduced by Uber to make it easier for Croatian workers to join the gig economy, without the burden of becoming self-employed through the government and minimising their tax contributions.
These intermediary organisations usually take 5-10% of wages, and pay minimal tax contributions by hiring workers for minimum required hour, sometimes without contracts. Many of them exploit workers, paying them late or not at all. They are essentially shell umbrella companies that can be created and dissolved very easily without any accountability or ramifications.
Not recognised as platform employees, nor protected by aggregates, Croatian gig workers were finding it impossible to hold their ‘employer’ accountable and fight for their rights.
The action
Prompted by emerging concerns about the mental health impacts of AI-driven systems, Croatian trade union Novi Sindikat conducted a study on algorithmic anxiety among food delivery riders, revealing that riders have limited understanding of the algorithms governing their work, few opportunities to negotiate collective agreements, and that workplace safety measures are often ignored. They used these findings to develop a toolkit on AI Awareness and Data Rights for Trade Unions to equip them with the necessary knowledge and digital literacy skills to effectively navigate the complexities of AI applications in workplaces. For example, they explored issues related to data recovery to reverse current power imbalances at work.
Through this work, Novi Sindikat developed collaboration between fellow trade unions advocating for and supporting the implementation of the EU Platform Workers Directive – empowering them to engage in collective bargaining in the AI-driven world of work and effectively protects workers’ rights. The Directive was successfully implemented in October 2024 and states that all gig workers are recognised as employees unless proven otherwise by platforms.
In Croatia, this means that gig workers no longer need to declare themselves as self-employed or contract through aggregates to work on platforms. Instead, the power dynamic has shifted, making workers employees by default, and making it easier for them to hold AI-powered platforms accountable for working conditions.
How the European AI & Society Fund helped
In July 2023, trade union Novi Sindikat and the Initiative for Workers’ Labor Law supported Wolt, Bolt and Glovo delivery riders and drivers to demand better working conditions from the platforms and to be recognised as employees. The European AI & Society Fund awarded a €30,000 grant to Novi Sindikat in September to educate and empower trade unions on the implications of AI on mental health and gig workers’ wellbeing further.
The campaign helped trade unions better understand how AI-driven platforms intersect with workers’ rights, feeding into a wider network across Europe. Novi Sindikat has also joined the Digital Platform Observatory where trade unions record and map protests and legal challenges against platforms across Europe, and also share their initiatives and campaigns to advance platform workers’ rights.
The European AI & Society Fund also connected Novi Sindikat to other grantee partners in our network focused on workers’ rights, such as Observatorio de Trabajo, Algoritmo y Sociedad (TAS) in Spain, Superrr Lab in Germany, and INTERET A AGIR in France.