Customer role perception in ridesharing platform labour governance

Abstract

This study investigates how customers perceive and enact their role within algorithmically managed ridesharing platforms in South Africa. While customer ratings are structurally central to platform labour governance and can materially affect driver livelihoods, limited research has examined how customers themselves understand and perform this evaluative role. To address this gap, the study adopted a qualitative, interpretivist design. Seventeen semi-structured interviews were conducted with South African based ridesharing users. Interview data was analysed inductively using thematic analysis supported by Atlas.ti, with iterative coding and cross-case comparison to identify recurring patterns. The findings show that participants primarily frame their role in transactional, consumer-first terms, with evaluative authority acknowledged only conditionally. In the South African context of high unemployment and driver precarity, awareness of livelihood consequences was often present but unevenly internalised. Rating behaviour is typically threshold based, with five star ratings functioning as default affirmation and downgrading reserved mainly for serious breaches, particularly safety concerns. Moral reasoning, empathy and uncertainty about algorithmic consequences frequently moderate punitive evaluation. Platform design further shapes participation by embedding rating as routine, limiting visibility of outcomes or consequences, and making escalation more effortful. Overall, customer governance within ridesharing platforms emerges as situational, morally mediated and shaped by sociotechnical design.