Always on across time zones: Invisible schedules in the online gig economy

This study investigates work schedules in online labour markets, operating in 24/7 mode across spatial borders and time zones. Focusing on largely hidden and invisible work of freelancers such as searching for jobs and communicating with clients, the study documents how platforms put pressures and constraints on freelancers' time through the mechanism of task allocation. We use data on 241,582 timestamped messages posted by 29,759 unique users in 4082 contests on a leading Russian-language freelance platform to reveal how freelancers' efforts to get a job make them work nonstandard hours, including evenings, nights and weekends. Freelancers have to be responsive and adapt their schedules to clients' needs. Freelancers who live in time zones which differ from their clients are particularly disadvantaged, working a greater proportion of nonstandard hours. The findings emerging from the study contribute to current debates on the gig economy and a new time-work discipline.