Stage 01
The first stage serves as a checklist and roadmap for addressing documented precarities surrounding data workers. The standards make recommendations on how data workers’ contracts are arranged, workers’ freedom to pursue aid and redressal as per regulations, their ability to earn, the design of their working environments, required safety measures, and termination processes. Compliance with local regulations and this first stage of standards will create basic safety and stability for workers involved in data generation and enrichment.
Decent contracts
Contracts’ designs can create risks and strain for workers. These problems arise from contractual practices like short contract durations, excessive non-disclosure measures, and inadequate information on topics like workflows, the downstream use of datasets, and the potential hazards for workers. Companies can design and administer contracts that inform workers about their roles, avoid potentially harmful constraints, and provide paid work for substantial periods of time.
Easy to understand
Contract contents should be written in a way that most people can understand and should be available in languages workers are proficient in.
Minimum contract duration
Companies' worker contracts cannot have engagement periods of less than three months.
Clear information in the contract
Workers' contracts should include key information about key topics like compensation calculation, the role’s requirements and processes, the metrics and information collected about them, the hazards and risks involved, and all policies related to termination, promotion, and social support and benefits.
Auxiliary standard: Companies managing data workers need to minimize vagueness and open-endedness surrounding worker’s roles, the workflows, and company expectations. As workers are introduced to new work and roles, they should be provided clear, updated contracts that explain the changes being made to their work.
Guaranteed freedoms
Governments provide requirements, entitlements and guidance that help define acceptable working conditions and labor well-being. Data workers can face resistance when they attempt to raise organizational issues or collectivise. Workers should not face impediments, intimidation or retaliation for availing any redressal or rights available to them. Wherever possible, companies should follow local regulations and respect workers’ rights.
Non-interference in rights and regulations
Workers' contracts should not ask or require workers to waive any of their labor rights, contract terms, or any other provisions and remedies available to them under local laws and regulations.
Freedom to raise issues
Companies should not, through contracts, business confidentiality measures, or any other means, stop and silence workers from raising issues and sharing information on any challenges or risks they face in their work.
For example, workers cannot be prevented from discussing their distress or problems freely with their families, doctors, lawyers, or mental health practitioners.
No penalisation for raising issues
No worker should be penalized, removed from work, or refused a contract renewal for raising issues with the company, management, or among one's fellow workers.
No retaliation for seeking recourse from outside the firm
No workers should be removed from work, refused a contract renewal, stopped, intimidated, coerced, prohibited, or penalized for pursuing legal remedies of any form, for associating with any worker-related collectivization or groups, or for attempting to initiate or engaging in collectivizing or unionizing activities.
Trustworthy payroll
In the gig-based roles like data work, the way earnings are calculated, managed, and delivered is critical to labor well-being. Issues like delays in payments, unpredictable availability of paid work, and low rates of remuneration make earning through data work a challenge. Companies need to ensure that data workers can earn substantially and on time, and that the systems governing pay are fair, predictable and transparent to workers.
Living and minimum wages
Companies should make arrangements to ensure that workers' take-home earnings exceed the minimum wage stipulated by local laws and regulations. In the regions where living wage figures are available, companies have to abide by living wages instead of minimum wages.
Payments for work-related labor beyond client tasks
Companies should remunerate the workers for the labor they complete in addition to their handling of data tasks. For example, a considerable amount of unpaid labor gets done in completing tests and eligibility related tasks.
Payments in local national currency
By default, workers' remuneration should be paid in official national currency. Companies cannot force workers to receive their earnings in alternative forms, such as cryptocurrency, gift cards, or digital currency.
This standard applies to any and all forms of money that is due to workers, including, but not limited to, salaries, per-task pay, overtime pay, and bonuses and incentives.
Fixed schedule of payments
Regardless of whether they earn on a salary or per-task basis, all workers are to receive their pay as per the schedule set by the organization. Changes to the schedule should be made after notifying all workers about the impending change.
Auxiliary standards:
Workers who earn on a per-task basis or on platforms should receive their accrued earnings periodically, based on a fixed schedule. For example, data workers’ earnings should be transferred to them at least once a week without fail.
Workers earning on a per-task basis or on platforms should be able to request the transfer of their accrued earnings before the scheduled payday. This provision should be available for use, at the very least, twice a month.
Unconditional transfer of wages
Under no circumstances can a company delay or refuse to transfer a worker’s pay for completed work. Sending people their earnings cannot be made conditional on things like surpassing metrics or adopting behaviours as dictated by company management.
This standard applies to any and all payments due to data workers, be it “base pay” or “bonus pay.”
Access to payment records
All workers should be provided with accurate, up-to-date, downloadable, and printable records that describe the work they have completed, the earnings due to them, and the status of past and pending payments. Workers receiving electronic records only should also have an option to opt-in for receiving printed records.
A tentative and non-exhaustive list of information that the design of payment records can consider including is provided below.
The data worker’s identification, featuring information like their full name, their designation, and company-issued ID numbers.
The bill’s date of issue, the company’s method of payment.
The number and type of tasks completed, the project being serviced, and the worker’s supervisor.
The per-task rate, and the earnings due.
Any deductions made from dues on the grounds of tax requirements, worker penalties, or company charges.
Auxiliary standard: Companies should design workers' receipt documents in ways that make them usable with the local tax authorities. The breakdown between any taxes deducted (including the rate of taxes), any commission collected by the company or third parties, and the amount left for the data worker should be clearly depicted.
Share information about calculations
Companies should make the task pay calculation formulae, metrics, and processes transparent to the workers. Changes to such systems should be indicated in the information provided to workers.
Payment monitoring and grievance redressal systems
Companies need dedicated personnel and resources to monitor remuneration processes and ensure timely and correct payments. Workers should be provided with a dependable way to reach these assistance services for help and to make inquiries.
Supportive workflows
Issues like inadequate specifications from clients, and insufficient training for completing tasks can make data workers’ operations harder. Companies need to provide data workers with relevant capacity-building, sufficient information on what they need to do, and reliable communication channels for support. Furthermore, workers should be able to expect a reasonable level of transparency on the purpose of their work and the clients they service, and their choices to accept or reject tasks should be respected.
Human involvement in communications
Companies should establish human-run communication channels where workers can directly interact with company management to raise concerns and seek solutions. Workers should be notified of the availability of such communication channels repeatedly, and they should be consulted to identify the format of communication most appropriate for them. This standard does not necessarily require workers and company personnel to be physically present in the same space.
Language choice in communications
All communications directed at a worker should, at the very least, be provided in their native language, or one that they have indicated. Companies should take the necessary steps to accommodate workers who have disabilities or difficulties.
This standard applies to the companies data workers work for, the clients they treat data for, and any supervisors, managers, or data-quality personnel overseeing workers.
Training for workers
Companies should provide adequate training to ensure workers have the required knowledge and skills to complete tasks efficiently. This training should be comprehensive enough to include information on topics like how the tasks need to be done, what kind of guidelines should be followed, and how to operate the tools (software and so on) involved in completing the work.
Dedicated and responsive support with tools, software, and platforms
Companies need to have a dedicated team for resolving issues and doubts data workers face with the digital tools and software needed to fulfill various aspects of their roles, such as team communications, treating and enriching data, submitting work, or anything else.
Auxiliary Standards: For any hardware or software tools companies require workers to install on their device, companies need to disclose to workers the functioning and usage of these tools, including any recording or tracking functions.
Preparing instructions for workers
Companies should work with the clients to develop clear instruction sets for workers' use. This involves companies directly working with clients to draft instructions and consulting workers to ensure such information's adequacy.
Clarity on clients and datasets’ purpose(s)
Workers should be provided enough information for them to be able to know what kind of work they are involved in, and for them to make informed decisions about their engagement with the role. To this end, companies should at least share information with workers about the purpose of the data work they do, who the client is, and what the data might be used for.
Auxiliary standard: Whenever a worker is assigned to a new project or client, they should be briefed on the nature of the data and content they will handle, and any harms they could be exposed to in the process.
Setting reasonable quotas and targets, and allowing breaks
Companies’ project management and distribution of tasks must not put workers at risk of adverse effects like mental health problems, health distress, and burnout.
The quotas for completing tasks need to be set such that workers should be able to meet their targets while being able to take breaks that allow a sufficient amount of mental and physical recovery. Companies should develop role-specific targets after consulting data workers involved in different kinds of tasks.
Further guidance on setting quotas and targets can be found in Standard 3 in “Lasting Collaboration" under Stage 03.
Reasonable time periods for task completion
Companies should provide workers with an adequate time frame within which they need to complete the tasks assigned to them before management diverts the tasks elsewhere. Companies should build systems that alert workers about deadlines and impending redirection of tasks.
Regularizing working hours
Companies should follow national regulation on working hours, and in the absence of such regulations, have working days that are no longer than 6 hours.
Auxiliary standards for all models involving the handling of disturbing content: All workers who handle data that contains disturbing content, should be given periodic breaks to recover from the potential toll of the work. Taking these breaks should not affect the workers’ performance evaluation or pay calculation in any way.
Companies should also conduct some form of check-ins that ask workers about their well-being, and offer options for support, breaks from the work, and, if available, long-term or temporary transfers to other projects or work assignments.
Auxiliary standard : All workers that work on a purely task basis, without fixed hours or fixed shifts, can stop and resume working as they see fit. Businesses cannot penalize workers for being flexible with their working hours and engagement with the platform.
Explanations for rejected tasks
All workers should receive communication on why their submitted task was rejected or flagged as "incorrect." Furthermore, they should be provided assistance and guidance on meeting clients’ and validators’ requirements.
Opportunity to correct rejected tasks and earn
Workers who earn on a per-task basis should receive a chance to retry rejected tasks at least once. Companies should pay full amount to the workers on correctly completing the task in the second attempt.
Abstaining from tasks and projects
Workers can refuse to work on a particular project or for a client on the grounds of the content of the data they will handle. Companies should not penalize workers for such decisions.
Critical protections
Workers need assurances and protections that allow them to derive a decent living from their work. It is possible for data workers to run into adverse circumstances, like contracting a serious illness, or to suffer work-related injuries or trauma. Such events can have severe impacts, such as diminishing people’s savings or hindering their ability to work and earn. Unpredictability in the availability of paid work can disrupt earnings and their ability to care for themselves and their household. Thus, companies need to arrange measures that act as safety nets, worker care for hazardous work, and as guarantees on earnings.
Identify workers’ risks and harms
Companies need to assess the kinds of risks and harms data workers shoulder. Such assessments should be driven by extensive interactions with workers across the different data work roles across the company. This information should feed the development of policies and care measures (discussed in Standard 2 and 3 in “Comprehensive Care” under Stage 02) that provide assistance and support to workers in forms like hazard pay, insurance policies, and access to wellness services like counselling.
Companies that lack policies and measures of worker care must, at the very least, observe strict redlines that prohibit the organization’s involvement in projects requiring data workers to handle disturbing content.
Further guidance on care measures for data workers can be found in Standards 2, 3, and 4 in “Comprehensive Care” under Stage 02.
Providing care measures for at-risk workers
Companies must provide data workers immediate and unconditional access to care measures should their role involve disturbing content. These measures must be adequately equipped to aid workers, and responsive to risks and distress.
Auxiliary standard: Data workers needing mental health care should be able to opt for external services rather than have to engage with company-affiliated practitioners and programmes. There should be no restrictions on data workers’ ability to discuss things with the mental health service provider.
Further guidance on care measures for data workers can be found in Standard 3 in “Comprehensive Care” under Stage 02.
Workers’ choice to work longer hours
No worker can be forcibly signed on to work for more than 8 hours a day, including breaks without overtime pay. A worker can refuse overtime, and should not be penalized for their decision.
Periodic breaks for active workers
All workers that work on a shift basis, or are monitored on metrics like time spent working, should be entitled to 1 hour long lunch break and 15 minutes of break for every 2 hours of work.
This standard’s recommendation of providing breaktime relative to the hours of work done is tentative. Companies should engage workers, unions, and relevant labor institutions to understand good practices, and set their policies accordingly.
Workers’ leaves
All workers that work on a shift basis, or are monitored as they work, are entitled to paid time off, and to sick leaves, commensurate with the local regulations.
Minimum earning opportunities for workers
In situations where workers do not earn fixed salaries, and/or they are required to meet periodic company-mandated quotas, they should have a minimum workload available to them every week. This minimum workload represents the minimum amount of earnings accessible to workers, and is, at the very least, equivalent to 1 week's worth of the local minimum wage. If living wage rates exist for the area, then they must be applied instead of minimum wage numbers.
Auxiliary standard: Companies should introduce and maintain channels that provide workers with information about projects and opportunities within the organization. The onus to locate and apply for earnings opportunities should not be solely on workers.
Ensuring substantial periods of work
Companies need to ensure that they assign people work on as constant a basis as possible.
For example, workers should not be benched for weeks or months at a time, only to receive a tiny amount of work for a few days, before they are left without paid work again.
Limiting unpaid time for workers and offering basic support
Workers should not be benched for more than three weeks at a time. Should benching exceed 21 days, then workers should get paid the minimum workload amount's worth to them for every additional week they spend benched.
Advance warning of unpaid waiting periods
Companies should strive to notify workers no less than 14 days in advance of getting benched. This notice should also indicate the estimated duration for the benching. Companies must inform workers whenever they are about to have their benching extended.
Minimizing workers’ involvement in production costs
Companies should not require workers to absorb the material costs of accessing data work and completing tasks. Companies should take ownership of workers' operating costs and work-related expenses in one of two possible ways.
First, companies develop a reimbursement or financial assistance system based on discussions with workers and observing the expenditure they incur to complete tasks.
For example, through discussions with workers, companies could pilot an internet access allowance, providing active workers with a money transfer sufficient to pay for a net pack for downloading and submitting work.
Second, companies interact with workers to identify key points of operational spending for them, and then find some way to provide these services or assets to workers.
For example, workers who complete data work using their personal SIMs may be losing substantial amounts of their income to purchasing data packs. Companies can equip ground-level staff with internet hotspot devices that they can visit workers with, reducing the operational burden on workers.
Some areas of coverage to consider on include, but are not limited to the following:
Damages and subsequent repairs for work-related equipment like phones and computers.
Internet connectivity packages needed to fulfill work requirements.
Travel services for the workers who must travel to a designated company workplace and cover long distances.
Travel services for night shift workers.
Procurement of assistive devices like microphones and headphones for workers handling audio and speech data related tasks.
Contestable termination
Opaque termination causes data workers to lose their source of income without a chance to adjust to clients and companies’ needs, to defend themselves, or to appeal such decisions. Termination has been discussed as a format for intimidation and retaliation against workers attempting to raise issues or take action. Termination practices need to be transparent, justifiable,and should allow appeals and redressal for workers. Companies also need to ensure that exiting workers are paid and their exit entitlements are fulfilled.
Termination policy governing removal of workers
Companies should provide a termination policy to workers that outlines the possible grounds for termination and the notice period. No worker can be removed from the company for reasons outside the termination policy's contents.
Informing workers of impending termination
All workers should be given written notice about reasons and decisions related to their termination or non-renewal of contracts in advance. This advance period should, at the very least, exceed 14 days. In addition to writing, such notices should be communicated in additional formats that help the worker be informed about decisions regarding their continued engagement with the company.
Discussing termination and non-renewal with workers
Every worker should be able to have an interaction about decisions and reasons regarding possible termination or non-renewal of contracts with human members of management. Such interactions can be in-person, or via some technological means that is amenable to the worker.
Clearing payment dues with workers
Workers who have been asked to leave should be promptly paid any outstanding dues, including any form of incentives or bonuses, for the work they have done till that point. Non-payment should carry some form of penalty, such as companies having to pay 5% interest on the amount due for every day overdue. Workers should receive updates and clear records of these processes.
Auxiliary Standards: Companies with exit-related measures, such as severance or gratuity or any other contribution-based measures, must ensure that such dues are also paid in a timely manner.
Human-mediation in termination processes
No workers can be terminated, or be rejected from contract renewal, at the sole discretion of algorithmic, automated systems. A human being should oversee all decisions pertaining to workers' termination and/or non-renewal of their contracts, and appeals processes.
Appeals process for termination decisions
All workers who are facing termination or non-renewal are entitled to an appeals process. Such appeals should involve the worker meeting company personnel who make termination and non-renewal decisions. Workers are entitled to having assistive figures present, like labor representatives, legal counsel, and any other form of aid local laws and regulations allow.