麻豆传媒

The use of a service connecting companies with workers seeking side jobs via an online app is spreading in Sapporo and its outlying areas.

The number of businesses and job seekers registering for the service has been on the rise against the backdrop of an increasingly severe manpower shortage, rising prices and more firms allowing their employees to work multiple jobs on the side, as cases of people working a few hours in between their main jobs increases.

Hokkaido Logi Service, a distribution subsidiary of Coop Sapporo based in Ebetsu, Hokkaido, has been securing staff by recruiting between 10 and 50 workers almost every day since October 2021 through Tokyo-based part-time job matching app operator Timee.

People are recruited for one-off jobs which basically last around 4 to 6 hours, engaging mainly in sorting items according to home delivery orders from customers and shipping orders from stores.

Workers include housewives and part-timers. Some company employees work on the side at night.

Describing the merit of the app, Kyohei Fujitsuka, 36, head of the company’s planning management division, says, “We can gather the necessary number of people when we need them, at a time when the amount of tasks is increasing with demand rising among people staying at home amid the COVID-19 pandemic.”

So far, around 20 people managed to shift to long-term employment after working part-time, according to the company.

Timee’s intermediary service in principle allows job seekers to apply for jobs by using a smartphone app or other devices and choosing at what time and which locations they want to work.

Applicants are not required to submit resumes or go to interviews, and employers can hire workers they are looking for by setting recruiting conditions including the skills they need.

Companies can post recruitment information on the app free of charge and pay the agency the workers’ wages plus commission fees. Wages are paid to workers on the day.

Timee began the service nationwide in August 2018 and set up a branch office in Sapporo in January last year.

The number of firms across the country registered with the service as of last summer rose 10 times from 2019.

Some 60% of the registered firms are distribution and warehouse businesses, with another 20% being made up of restaurants.

In recent years, the service is increasingly used by industries having difficulty hiring full-time workers and long-term part-timers as the labor shortage becomes more serious.

The number of registered firms in Hokkaido is not disclosed, but the agency says registrations are rising mainly by companies based in Sapporo and surrounding areas.

Meanwhile, the number of registered job seekers nationwide as of last summer more than quadrupled from 2019.

Company employees occupy 40% of the registrations, followed by part-time workers with 20% and students with 10%.

The figure indicates the fact that there is a certain number of side hustlers amid rising prices and declining income due to the spread of COVID-19 infections.

Mari Asai, 36, of Sapporo’s Higashi Ward, works as a competitive pole-dancer and coach while using the service to moonlight.

She works at a warehouse late at night, sorting items and engaging in other tasks once a week before dancing contests when she needs to concentrate on practicing, and works three times a week during off-competition periods.

“It was difficult working part-time at the same time as preparing for contests,” Asai said. “I appreciate the fact that (now) there is a lot of flexibility and I can work at my own convenience.”

More agencies are offering a similar service.

Forking, an Osaka-based web design company which has a branch office in Sapporo, started a full operation of a job matching app specifically for restaurants in the Hokkaido capital in April last year.

Currently, roughly 150 restaurants are registered.

Shinya Ichimonji, 37, a Forking official in charge of business in Sapporo, said the service “is taken favorably by restaurants who said it helped them secure staff.”

“We hope to eventually expand the service to areas other than Sapporo.”

This section features topics and issues from Hokkaido covered by the , the largest newspaper in the prefecture. The original article was published Jan. 20.