Democratic Party of Korea Rep. Yeom Tae-young is in talks with Coupang CEO Harold Rogers to visit overnight delivery workers' workplace to experience a night shift together.
According to Yeom's office, arrangements are being made to visit a Coupang Logistics Service facility to get a sense of what it is like to do delivery jobs overnight with Rogers, with March 19 being one of the options, though the schedule has yet to be fixed.
Other liberal party lawmakers may accompany Yeom and Rogers. The visit could potentially involve the monitoring of their health conditions through wearable devices, but nothing has been determined so far.
The talks follow Yeom's proposal to Rogers during a parliamentary hearing on Dec. 31, 2025, to zero in on Coupang's massive consumer data leak involving some 30 million people, as well as other controversies surrounding Coupang with the overwork-related deaths of delivery workers among them.
A month later, Yeom said on Facebook in late January that Rogers had declined Yeom's proposal due to a scheduling conflict with Rogers' appearance for questioning by South Korean police. Instead, Yeom vowed to go ahead with a one-day experience with fellow lawmakers Reps. Kim Young-bae and Kim Nam-geun in February.
Later on Feb. 12, Yeom announced that Rogers was willing to join him for the workplace experience in March, leading him to postpone his Coupang delivery facility visit in February.
Yeom's initial proposal was based on the premise that Coupang delivery workers are prone to overwork during the overnight shifts that enable Coupang's signature "Rocket Delivery" system on its e-commerce platform.
Pointing to Coupang's failure to keep its delivery workers' 60-hour workweek as agreed between the logistics industry and the parliament, Yeom raised suspicions that overnight delivery workers' extra work of transporting and distributing goods to be delivered before loading cargo trucks is not being counted toward working hours.
He added that Coupang delivery workers clock in at work once they begin loading items in the cargo truck, with the time spent collecting and cleaning the reusable packaging used for fresh food items was not being reflected in their pay.
At the time, Rogers denied the speculation.
"Those representations are not my understanding of how the system works," Rogers said. "My understanding is that, for Coupang employees, they are paid for every moment they work."
In response, Yeom proposed to visit a delivery workers' facility and experience their work together. Rogers replied: "I'd love to deliver with you."
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