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Being on the other end of this sucks hard though. It’s super frustrating to order food and have it turn up with half the order missing. One of the problems is

Being on the other end of this sucks hard though. It’s super frustrating to order food and have it turn up with half the order missing. One of the problems is because the delivery company is a complete middle man that takes on zero accountability for the order. For example, if an Uber eats or Deliveroo driver turns up with the wrong order, they can do literally nothing about it. If a company that employees it’s own delivery staff (eg Domino’s, supermarket chains, independents restaurants etc.) shows up with a bad order, they will go back and fix it, because it’s cheaper for everyone to do that. Outsourcing delivery to another company works for restaurants that have limited delivery orders and no marketing channel, but is it really sustainable? If they have consistent volume it would certainly be easier for them to have their own drivers, as has been the case since the telephone was invented.

panorama 6y ago
There have also been documented cases where delivery drivers for 3rd parties will eat part of your meal. There are many potential nodes of failure throughout this entire chain. [0] https://www.businessinsider.com/uber-eats-delivery-drivers-eating-food-2019-7 https://www.businessinsider.com/uber-eats-delivery-drivers-e... [1] https://losangeles.cbslocal.com/2019/10/31/uber-eats-grubhub-postmates-delivery-driver-eating-food/ https://losangeles.cbslocal.com/2019/10/31/uber-eats-grubhub...
- PurpleFoxy 6y ago
  The whole food delivery sector looks like it’s on the verge of collapse. Incredibly unsustainable for everyone.
  - sjg007 6y ago
    It never was sustainable except for pizza and maybe Chinese food.
- jack_pp 6y ago
  In Bucharest all my delivery bags are stapled so it would be impossible to open non-destructively and consume the food
  - throwaway_kufu 6y ago
    I imagine stapled bags are a fairly standard practice. And if a driver is willing to eat people’s food, I wouldn’t put it past them to buy a staple remover and stapler and purposely target those orders for the plausible deniability
    - tinus_hn 6y ago
      More likely they will eat the food from another restaurant that’s not stapling their bags. You don’t need to be running faster than the bear, just faster than the other guy it’s also chasing.
  - imtringued 6y ago
    The driver values the food more than the delivery. Why would he care about opening the bags non-destructively?
cgriswald 6y ago
My favorite part of the process is that they only refund you for the part of the meal that is missing as if they didn’t just ruin your entire meal by leaving out your kid’s cheeseburger. On that note, we had a driver eat our entire meal and not deliver it at all. The sad part was we’ve ordered some nice meals and this one was just fast food. We had to contact them to find out why our food wasn’t arriving. We’ve watched drivers clearly go about their own business and show up whenever they feel like it and then our food is cold. These delivery companies have all this data and yet there are still constant shenanigans...
- mrweasel 6y ago
  Maybe the delivery companies should datamine the drivers and not the customer. Or someone should start a service that supply delivery companies with stable drivers and charge them 30% of their 30%? Seriously, why aren’t the resturants demanding some level of insurance from the apps who take the order? E.g if more than 3% are fraud, the app company has to pay 75% of the cost of all the fraud above those 3%. There needs to be an insentive to the apps to reduce fraud.
  - Nextgrid 6y ago
    I assume the restaurants often don’t have any choice (it costs the platform near nothing to drop a restaurant unless it’s a major nationwide chain, on the other hand a restaurant not on the platform will get out-competed by those who are). This problem is big enough that some consumer protection agencies should take action - at the end of the day the platforms are most likely breaking some laws by blaming restaurants for issues that are outside of their control.
  - bobthepanda 6y ago
    Right now during COVID delivery apps may be their lifeline. That being said, I imagine that once indoor dining operates normally again, and consumers are willing to eat outside, we are going to see a stampede off these platforms. The margins aren't very enticing.
- sgt101 6y ago
rsj_hn 6y ago
> For example, if an Uber eats or Deliveroo driver turns up with the wrong order, they can do literally nothing about it. No, I would blame the people comitting the fraud rather than the app. The driver can't turn up with the wrong order as the order is faxed to the restauraunt from the app, and when the restaurant is done with the order, then the driver shows up and is given an order id to pick up. The driver can't change the order the restaurant was given. What could go wrong in this process: * The app sends the wrong order to the restaurant (highly unlikely. You are talking cosmic ray bitflips or DB corruption) * The restaurant fails to update an order that is no longer available -- in this case, the consumer is notified that the order is cancelled * The delivery driver picks up an order not belonging to them, in which case the restaurant should check the order id with the order id the driver asks for. It is very unlikely that drivers will ask for the wrong order * The driver picks up two orders, and switches them, delivering them to the wrong address. In this case, Uber eats the refund, not the restaurant. * The restaurant fulfills the wrong order. This does ocassionally happen, as anyone knows who dined at a restaurant when their order was gotten wrong. But it shouldn't happen in the quantities described. Then the restaurant eats the cost. * The driver fails to deliver the order. One time, I got an order and when I looked inside I saw a strange bottle of juice and a plastic container with a rice dish. Not at all the sushi I ordered. I called the driver and he showed up and apologized. He was fasting during Ramadan and carried food with him to eat after sunset, and he gave me his own food bag instead of the bag he picked up. We exchanged foodbags and everything was fine. * The restaurant gets the order right and the customer lies about it -- e.g. commits fraud to get a free meal. Hence why this article calls it "dine and dash". This boils down to a dispute between the restaurant and the customer. Here, Uber could start cutting people off the platform if they dispute too many orders, but then you will have a lot of outraged complaints that during a pandemic people are not being allowed to eat, etc. Basically those stealing are putting everyone else into a difficult position as by definition whenever you steal, someone needs to bear a cost that they shouldn't have to bear.

panorama 6y ago

There have also been documented cases where delivery drivers for 3rd parties will eat part of your meal. There are many potential nodes of failure throughout this entire chain. [0] https://www.businessinsider.com/uber-eats-delivery-drivers-eating-food-2019-7 https://www.businessinsider.com/uber-eats-delivery-drivers-e... [1] https://losangeles.cbslocal.com/2019/10/31/uber-eats-grubhub-postmates-delivery-driver-eating-food/ https://losangeles.cbslocal.com/2019/10/31/uber-eats-grubhub...

PurpleFoxy 6y ago
The whole food delivery sector looks like it’s on the verge of collapse. Incredibly unsustainable for everyone.
- sjg007 6y ago
  It never was sustainable except for pizza and maybe Chinese food.
jack_pp 6y ago
In Bucharest all my delivery bags are stapled so it would be impossible to open non-destructively and consume the food
- throwaway_kufu 6y ago
  I imagine stapled bags are a fairly standard practice. And if a driver is willing to eat people’s food, I wouldn’t put it past them to buy a staple remover and stapler and purposely target those orders for the plausible deniability
  - tinus_hn 6y ago
    More likely they will eat the food from another restaurant that’s not stapling their bags. You don’t need to be running faster than the bear, just faster than the other guy it’s also chasing.
- imtringued 6y ago
  The driver values the food more than the delivery. Why would he care about opening the bags non-destructively?

cgriswald 6y ago

My favorite part of the process is that they only refund you for the part of the meal that is missing as if they didn’t just ruin your entire meal by leaving out your kid’s cheeseburger. On that note, we had a driver eat our entire meal and not deliver it at all. The sad part was we’ve ordered some nice meals and this one was just fast food. We had to contact them to find out why our food wasn’t arriving. We’ve watched drivers clearly go about their own business and show up whenever they feel like it and then our food is cold. These delivery companies have all this data and yet there are still constant shenanigans...

mrweasel 6y ago
Maybe the delivery companies should datamine the drivers and not the customer. Or someone should start a service that supply delivery companies with stable drivers and charge them 30% of their 30%? Seriously, why aren’t the resturants demanding some level of insurance from the apps who take the order? E.g if more than 3% are fraud, the app company has to pay 75% of the cost of all the fraud above those 3%. There needs to be an insentive to the apps to reduce fraud.
- Nextgrid 6y ago
  I assume the restaurants often don’t have any choice (it costs the platform near nothing to drop a restaurant unless it’s a major nationwide chain, on the other hand a restaurant not on the platform will get out-competed by those who are). This problem is big enough that some consumer protection agencies should take action - at the end of the day the platforms are most likely breaking some laws by blaming restaurants for issues that are outside of their control.
- bobthepanda 6y ago
  Right now during COVID delivery apps may be their lifeline. That being said, I imagine that once indoor dining operates normally again, and consumers are willing to eat outside, we are going to see a stampede off these platforms. The margins aren't very enticing.
sgt101 6y ago

rsj_hn 6y ago

> For example, if an Uber eats or Deliveroo driver turns up with the wrong order, they can do literally nothing about it. No, I would blame the people comitting the fraud rather than the app. The driver can't turn up with the wrong order as the order is faxed to the restauraunt from the app, and when the restaurant is done with the order, then the driver shows up and is given an order id to pick up. The driver can't change the order the restaurant was given. What could go wrong in this process: * The app sends the wrong order to the restaurant (highly unlikely. You are talking cosmic ray bitflips or DB corruption) * The restaurant fails to update an order that is no longer available -- in this case, the consumer is notified that the order is cancelled * The delivery driver picks up an order not belonging to them, in which case the restaurant should check the order id with the order id the driver asks for. It is very unlikely that drivers will ask for the wrong order * The driver picks up two orders, and switches them, delivering them to the wrong address. In this case, Uber eats the refund, not the restaurant. * The restaurant fulfills the wrong order. This does ocassionally happen, as anyone knows who dined at a restaurant when their order was gotten wrong. But it shouldn't happen in the quantities described. Then the restaurant eats the cost. * The driver fails to deliver the order. One time, I got an order and when I looked inside I saw a strange bottle of juice and a plastic container with a rice dish. Not at all the sushi I ordered. I called the driver and he showed up and apologized. He was fasting during Ramadan and carried food with him to eat after sunset, and he gave me his own food bag instead of the bag he picked up. We exchanged foodbags and everything was fine. * The restaurant gets the order right and the customer lies about it -- e.g. commits fraud to get a free meal. Hence why this article calls it "dine and dash". This boils down to a dispute between the restaurant and the customer. Here, Uber could start cutting people off the platform if they dispute too many orders, but then you will have a lot of outraged complaints that during a pandemic people are not being allowed to eat, etc. Basically those stealing are putting everyone else into a difficult position as by definition whenever you steal, someone needs to bear a cost that they shouldn't have to bear.