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Most of the comments here are focused on the question of why you would prefer an app to calling. The author's point is a great one though, and something I've wo

Most of the comments here are focused on the question of why you would prefer an app to calling. The author's point is a great one though, and something I've wondered a lot. Why should I create an account to order a pizza? The app should reduce friction even from the very first order. Instead it adds, and adds for every order... Got to go look up coupon codes! On the phone I just ask the guy what their best deal is in a large cheese and garlic knots and he gives it to me. The app or website should make my life better but instead it's harder. Worse, the app pretends to be an unrelated party when something goes wrong. "Sorry, you need to call the store. Look up their number, it's on the website." For me it doesn't add anything to the transaction, it only takes away. The literal only reason I use the pizza app at all is for chains where I have no idea which store delivers to me. Rest of the time I've gone back to calling. Much faster that way.

jcelerier 5y ago
> On the phone I just ask the guy what their best deal is in a large cheese and garlic knots and he gives it to me damn, you're lucky. I remember a few phone calls a decade ago where some brand had a sale on burgers, but they had a policy of waiting for me to dictate the coupon code over the phone... ugh
duxup 5y ago
> Instead it adds, and adds for every order... Got to go look up coupon codes! I just stay logged in and several apps I have let me just browse and click on coupons.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
lostgame 5y ago
>> Why should I create an account to order a pizza? Most of the apps in my area (Toronto, Canada) absolutely do not require account creation and allow you to just use a ‘guest’ account; usually just requiring (reasonably) your phone number. As to why I’d want an account to order? Let’s say I have a local favourite pizza joint and a favourite pizza I like to order. Having my personal info and payment info already filled out and hitting ‘reorder’ makes ordering and paying a literal 5 second experience. Since it’s optional almost everywhere online and in app here; I don’t see the big fuss. I ordered from Jolibee last night and was happy to find out I didn’t need to make an account, since I don’t eat there often; unlike my local pizza joint. I used the guest system and my girlfriend just gave them my name and picked it up.
- jeffbee 5y ago
  Just FYI, this is something I really like about Google Maps integration with restaurant take-out ordering. They put the "Order Again" button front and center and let's face it, I'm not really planning to switch it up at my corner lunch spot. Obviously in that case I need an account, with Google, but I already had that and I trust them with my info more than I just some merchant's white-label mobile app.
  - capitalsigma 5y ago
    I had a restaurant screw up my order via Google's ordering platform and there was no one to ask for a refund -- the Google platform doesn't accept complaints about the merchant, and there's no way to contact the merchant through the Google platform after your order is complete. They forgot an item in my order and so overcharged me by like 40%. YMMV
    - jeffbee 5y ago
      As far as I could determine the ordering button on Google works entirely via third parties. I get a receipt by email from e.g. postmates when I use it. I do agree that the site which is closest to the customer should be providing the support.
dustingetz 5y ago
because this kind of app gets built cheaply by a freelancer agency copy pasting the last app they did which followed a e-commerce template app that includes account creation
oxplot 5y ago
I use Uber Eats for ordering food exclusively exactly because when there is a screw up and I receive the wrong item or none at all, I get refunded immediately by Uber with a few taps.
- mvid 5y ago
  Uber Eats sent my order to restaurants that were absolutely not open. After two times, and two refunds, they stopped refunding me because of a “pattern of suspicious behavior”. No way to escalate review to a human. None at all. So maybe be aware of your choice
  - nxmnxm99 5y ago
    Why is there no way to escalate review to a human? I've never had trouble getting through to Uber customer support and having my issue dealt with
    - mvid 5y ago
      Not sure. They must operate differently in Spain. I had photos, timestamps, everything.
  - axlee 5y ago
    I have probably used Uber Eats for 100+ times over the past two (pandemic) years, and I've maybe have my orders being messed up 3-5 times, each time refunded within the next ten minutes. YMMV.
    - cromka 5y ago
      That’s because you were refunded automatically without human intervention. This is what the author of the comment pointed out: once you do that too often in a short period of time, the bot assumes you’re scamming them and there’s no way to escalate that.
      - hilbert42 5y ago
PaulHoule 5y ago
A lot of times with food apps I don't immediately see how to set the pickup time or don't have a lot of faith that it really is going to be ready when I want it. When I talk to somebody on the phone I feel a lot more sure. I worked at a place near Union Square, NYC and was in the habit of ordering food for pickup from sweetgreen because I knew it all worked. I have thought about ordering from restaurants in Collegetown, Ithaca from the web but just haven't gotten in the habit because I don't feel the certainty.
- jbmny 5y ago
  Without talking to somebody on the phone, often I don't have a lot of faith that the order will even be received. Sometimes the place closes but the app happily continues to take orders. Other times the order simply gets lost in the ether. After a while, you learn which places are not worth the risk of ordering from online.
  - PaulHoule 5y ago
    I remember a long time ago when food apps were really new putting in an online order at a sub shop which is a well oiled machine. (The kind of place they'd write a business school case study about.) A restaurant with absolutely excellent process for handling walk-in traffic can fail entirely faced with an occasional online order. In their case they made the sub half an hour before I requested it be ready and stuffed it in some corner where they couldn't find it. In the last two years I've seen the small facilities run by Cornell Dining go from handling almost all in-person order to handling a large fraction (between 1/3 and 2/3) of online orders. In-person orders are handled by Kanban-style process where the people making the food take orders at they clear work-in-progress. I'm not really sure how they handle online orders that aren't gated by this. I suspect there are many indirect effects, for instance, I think because the traffic patterns are more complicated it would be easier to walk out without paying for your food. (On the other hand, I'm a member of a cohort of middle-aged people who complicate traffic flows by going into line to pay for food before it is ready because that's efficient.) Anyhow, once I know a place is good for handling online orders I'm inclined to do so. But if I'm not sure I'm much more inclined to go in and do things the old fashioned way.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
rustandstardust 5y ago
The author's point isn't a good one. You have an "account" regardless. Putting in your name and e-mail is near irrelevant since he indicated it might be reasonable to provide a credit card. Unless he can say, "Large Pizza for Pickup, I have a CC", which is usually the case. The only thing better about calling or app is dependent on when and how you want to pay.
- bryanrasmussen 5y ago
  >You have an "account" regardless. I think this might differ if you're in the U.S or out, here in Europe often it is like this: In the app/website you have an "account" that you get by entering data into form fields which takes a while, and which then gets stored into a database and is saved forever unless you go through some extra steps to make sure it doesn't which will be complicated by how well the app / website has been programmed to handle these potential extra steps (if at all) On the phone you have an address that the guy writes down on the piece of paper for the delivery guy and is thrown out afterwards.
  - astura 5y ago
    In the US a few places I order from when you call they associate your phone number with an "account" on their POS system, which comes up automatically when you call. It gets created automatically the first time you call/order. It stores your name, address (if you get delivery), order history, and credit card number (if you pay by card).
  - rustandstardust 5y ago
    You're right, I was thinking US-centric. Here in the US any pizza place you give your name and number to has an account for you, from my experience.
    - kritiko 5y ago
      My local in NYC does a booming cash business (they offer a hugely popular cash special on Tuesdays & if you pay cash, tax is “included” - I think charging tax on card orders is to cover their transaction fees? But maybe a bunch of this is unreported.) They’re on apps, but they write your order on a paper ticket if you are a phone, pickup order and only take your name.
helsinkiandrew 5y ago
Exactly, Just like going to a restaurant you visit regularly and the staff know you, you'll get better service and quicker food if you have a relationship with the people taking the order, and making and delivering the food. Use an app for discovering new places and seeing what they offer and order direct by phone.
- Nextgrid 5y ago
  The problem with ordering direct by phone is that delivery companies have monopolized the market and make it unprofitable for restaurants to have their own delivery staff, so a lot of them no longer do.
  - brokenmachine 5y ago
    As a customer I have the right to not order if it's crappy Uber delivery which IMO has way too many problems, and I exercise that right and let the restaurant know. When I call the restaurant I ask them if they have their own delivery person, or if it's Uber. If it's Uber, I politely decline to order from them.
ajuc 5y ago
In my country there's a website that works in every major city and their suburbs that aggregates basically all restaurants, pizzerias, pierogarnias etc. And you don't have to have an account, the address and payment details are filled in by the browser autocomplete. So the friction is - click on the menu, click "order", type in the wireless transfer code. Also - almost nobody orders "pick up" pizza here, so phone requires you to specify the address every time which is significantly more friction.
- tedmiston 5y ago
  > So the friction is - click on the menu, click "order", type in the wireless transfer code. What is this wireless transfer code? Like some sort of payment system?
  - j_4 5y ago
    Yep - https://blik.com/en https://blik.com/en
- ricardobayes 5y ago
  Chat, or message apps might be the best way yet. They don't need signup but easy to get your point across precisely. I ordered pickup through an app because I don't speak the local language but I had a flat tire so I needed to coordinate the delivery through phone (again, in a language I barely speak). They couldn't understand my address so we switched to whatsapp and could send them the coordinates. Twenty minutes later the person was there with a still hot pizza. In another case I just texted the local pizza guy on whatsapp what I wanted and he replied 'where to deliver it?', and then 10 minutes later it arrived.
  - ratww 5y ago
    This is also a very cheap solution for merchants: only requires a mobile phone and a free app that almost everyone has in some countries. If push comes to shove, install Signal/Telegram or accept SMS.
- sdfhbdf 5y ago
walty8 5y ago
> The app or website should make my life better but instead it's harder. This is the sub-goal, but not ultimate goal. The ultimate goal is to maximize the profit, with accounts created, all the analytics will work out, and they could do all kinds of promotions or targeted ads. I guess that's the same reason why you are asked to install a mobile app whenever you visit Reddit mobile WEBSITE. It does not attempt to make your life better. At least it's not the ultimate goal of ecosystem.
- tedmiston 5y ago
  > I guess that's the same reason why you are asked to install a mobile app whenever you visit Reddit mobile WEBSITE. Yeah, Reddit's approach to making so difficult to access the mobile on a whim, especially in an ephemeral browser, is a straight up UX dark pattern. I use Reddit less on mobile because of it... I want to stay in the browser where I have things like ad blockers and can open a bunch of tabs at once and bounce around easily, etc.
- b112 5y ago
  Yet here there is more pressure to not scare customers away. To not make their life troublesome. Woe to the pizza company who thinks "we don't need to care about customer retention, our pizza is just too good." I have dozens of pizza places to order from, all within delivery distance. Make ordering difficult, and as long as the competition is pretty much as tasty, I'll move on.
brnt 5y ago
Apps and accounts are used for two things: to facilitate tracking and outsource administrative duties. I do not install apps or create accounts.
op00to 5y ago
I’ve literally never bargained with the pizza joint, and I would get smacked in the face and thrown out on my ass if I did it in person. Are you kidding me? As far as when there’s a problem, with the major food delivery app I use, I am refunded merely for asking. I’ve used it heavily during the pandemic and literally every problem was solved through the app.
michaelcampbell 5y ago
This is 100% backward from my experience. Having an account is a 1-time cost, and not only a small one, but one I do for hundreds of other things every day. Logging in is a keystroke that has my password manager auto type my username and password; again something I repeat daily. With the situation in the US at least, trying to get anyone on the phone is an exercise in frustration. The app (for me, so far) has always been up. The employees don't have to stop making the product to take an order. They don't know the specials, or don't care to look them up which might be changing on an HOURLY basis. The app knows. On the phone I have to go through my order painstakingly each time; the app knows what I've ordered and I can single-click repeat it. And honestly, all they're doing is taking my order and putting it into probably an admin version OF THE SAME APP. It's LITERALLY the old game of "telephone", but for something I want to buy.
- boring_twenties 5y ago
  A sandwich chain with a location near me requires a 3-step captcha to be solved every time you want to log into the account.
- tjoff 5y ago
  In theory you have a point. But installing a user hostile app is a total dealbreaker. And I guarantee that the eula is not only illegal but an absolute shitshow of trying to exploit paying customers so that the library of whatever third party module required to view an image could earn a sixteenth of a cent per pizza. And that is always the case. Just call instead. Unfortunately you can't do that for everything. Just today I was practically forced to install and give away "my" phone number to the worst app you can ever imagine, just to be able to park.
  - michaelcampbell 5y ago
    I will say that when I say "app", I mean web app. I don't use the phone app, although most of my post is still relevant there. My reasons for that are mainly that I'm at home on my big screen with a real keyboard 99% of the time that I'm ordering pizza and it's just easier. So the hostility is perhaps less there.
aaron695 5y ago

jcelerier 5y ago

> On the phone I just ask the guy what their best deal is in a large cheese and garlic knots and he gives it to me damn, you're lucky. I remember a few phone calls a decade ago where some brand had a sale on burgers, but they had a policy of waiting for me to dictate the coupon code over the phone... ugh

duxup 5y ago

> Instead it adds, and adds for every order... Got to go look up coupon codes! I just stay logged in and several apps I have let me just browse and click on coupons.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]

lostgame 5y ago

>> Why should I create an account to order a pizza? Most of the apps in my area (Toronto, Canada) absolutely do not require account creation and allow you to just use a ‘guest’ account; usually just requiring (reasonably) your phone number. As to why I’d want an account to order? Let’s say I have a local favourite pizza joint and a favourite pizza I like to order. Having my personal info and payment info already filled out and hitting ‘reorder’ makes ordering and paying a literal 5 second experience. Since it’s optional almost everywhere online and in app here; I don’t see the big fuss. I ordered from Jolibee last night and was happy to find out I didn’t need to make an account, since I don’t eat there often; unlike my local pizza joint. I used the guest system and my girlfriend just gave them my name and picked it up.

jeffbee 5y ago
Just FYI, this is something I really like about Google Maps integration with restaurant take-out ordering. They put the "Order Again" button front and center and let's face it, I'm not really planning to switch it up at my corner lunch spot. Obviously in that case I need an account, with Google, but I already had that and I trust them with my info more than I just some merchant's white-label mobile app.
- capitalsigma 5y ago
  I had a restaurant screw up my order via Google's ordering platform and there was no one to ask for a refund -- the Google platform doesn't accept complaints about the merchant, and there's no way to contact the merchant through the Google platform after your order is complete. They forgot an item in my order and so overcharged me by like 40%. YMMV
  - jeffbee 5y ago
    As far as I could determine the ordering button on Google works entirely via third parties. I get a receipt by email from e.g. postmates when I use it. I do agree that the site which is closest to the customer should be providing the support.

dustingetz 5y ago

because this kind of app gets built cheaply by a freelancer agency copy pasting the last app they did which followed a e-commerce template app that includes account creation

oxplot 5y ago

I use Uber Eats for ordering food exclusively exactly because when there is a screw up and I receive the wrong item or none at all, I get refunded immediately by Uber with a few taps.

mvid 5y ago
Uber Eats sent my order to restaurants that were absolutely not open. After two times, and two refunds, they stopped refunding me because of a “pattern of suspicious behavior”. No way to escalate review to a human. None at all. So maybe be aware of your choice
- nxmnxm99 5y ago
  Why is there no way to escalate review to a human? I've never had trouble getting through to Uber customer support and having my issue dealt with
  - mvid 5y ago
    Not sure. They must operate differently in Spain. I had photos, timestamps, everything.
- axlee 5y ago
  I have probably used Uber Eats for 100+ times over the past two (pandemic) years, and I've maybe have my orders being messed up 3-5 times, each time refunded within the next ten minutes. YMMV.
  - cromka 5y ago
    That’s because you were refunded automatically without human intervention. This is what the author of the comment pointed out: once you do that too often in a short period of time, the bot assumes you’re scamming them and there’s no way to escalate that.
    - hilbert42 5y ago

PaulHoule 5y ago

A lot of times with food apps I don't immediately see how to set the pickup time or don't have a lot of faith that it really is going to be ready when I want it. When I talk to somebody on the phone I feel a lot more sure. I worked at a place near Union Square, NYC and was in the habit of ordering food for pickup from sweetgreen because I knew it all worked. I have thought about ordering from restaurants in Collegetown, Ithaca from the web but just haven't gotten in the habit because I don't feel the certainty.

jbmny 5y ago
Without talking to somebody on the phone, often I don't have a lot of faith that the order will even be received. Sometimes the place closes but the app happily continues to take orders. Other times the order simply gets lost in the ether. After a while, you learn which places are not worth the risk of ordering from online.
- PaulHoule 5y ago
  I remember a long time ago when food apps were really new putting in an online order at a sub shop which is a well oiled machine. (The kind of place they'd write a business school case study about.) A restaurant with absolutely excellent process for handling walk-in traffic can fail entirely faced with an occasional online order. In their case they made the sub half an hour before I requested it be ready and stuffed it in some corner where they couldn't find it. In the last two years I've seen the small facilities run by Cornell Dining go from handling almost all in-person order to handling a large fraction (between 1/3 and 2/3) of online orders. In-person orders are handled by Kanban-style process where the people making the food take orders at they clear work-in-progress. I'm not really sure how they handle online orders that aren't gated by this. I suspect there are many indirect effects, for instance, I think because the traffic patterns are more complicated it would be easier to walk out without paying for your food. (On the other hand, I'm a member of a cohort of middle-aged people who complicate traffic flows by going into line to pay for food before it is ready because that's efficient.) Anyhow, once I know a place is good for handling online orders I'm inclined to do so. But if I'm not sure I'm much more inclined to go in and do things the old fashioned way.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

rustandstardust 5y ago

The author's point isn't a good one. You have an "account" regardless. Putting in your name and e-mail is near irrelevant since he indicated it might be reasonable to provide a credit card. Unless he can say, "Large Pizza for Pickup, I have a CC", which is usually the case. The only thing better about calling or app is dependent on when and how you want to pay.

bryanrasmussen 5y ago
>You have an "account" regardless. I think this might differ if you're in the U.S or out, here in Europe often it is like this: In the app/website you have an "account" that you get by entering data into form fields which takes a while, and which then gets stored into a database and is saved forever unless you go through some extra steps to make sure it doesn't which will be complicated by how well the app / website has been programmed to handle these potential extra steps (if at all) On the phone you have an address that the guy writes down on the piece of paper for the delivery guy and is thrown out afterwards.
- astura 5y ago
  In the US a few places I order from when you call they associate your phone number with an "account" on their POS system, which comes up automatically when you call. It gets created automatically the first time you call/order. It stores your name, address (if you get delivery), order history, and credit card number (if you pay by card).
- rustandstardust 5y ago
  You're right, I was thinking US-centric. Here in the US any pizza place you give your name and number to has an account for you, from my experience.
  - kritiko 5y ago
    My local in NYC does a booming cash business (they offer a hugely popular cash special on Tuesdays & if you pay cash, tax is “included” - I think charging tax on card orders is to cover their transaction fees? But maybe a bunch of this is unreported.) They’re on apps, but they write your order on a paper ticket if you are a phone, pickup order and only take your name.

helsinkiandrew 5y ago

Exactly, Just like going to a restaurant you visit regularly and the staff know you, you'll get better service and quicker food if you have a relationship with the people taking the order, and making and delivering the food. Use an app for discovering new places and seeing what they offer and order direct by phone.

Nextgrid 5y ago
The problem with ordering direct by phone is that delivery companies have monopolized the market and make it unprofitable for restaurants to have their own delivery staff, so a lot of them no longer do.
- brokenmachine 5y ago
  As a customer I have the right to not order if it's crappy Uber delivery which IMO has way too many problems, and I exercise that right and let the restaurant know. When I call the restaurant I ask them if they have their own delivery person, or if it's Uber. If it's Uber, I politely decline to order from them.

ajuc 5y ago

In my country there's a website that works in every major city and their suburbs that aggregates basically all restaurants, pizzerias, pierogarnias etc. And you don't have to have an account, the address and payment details are filled in by the browser autocomplete. So the friction is - click on the menu, click "order", type in the wireless transfer code. Also - almost nobody orders "pick up" pizza here, so phone requires you to specify the address every time which is significantly more friction.

tedmiston 5y ago
> So the friction is - click on the menu, click "order", type in the wireless transfer code. What is this wireless transfer code? Like some sort of payment system?
- j_4 5y ago
  Yep - https://blik.com/en https://blik.com/en
ricardobayes 5y ago
Chat, or message apps might be the best way yet. They don't need signup but easy to get your point across precisely. I ordered pickup through an app because I don't speak the local language but I had a flat tire so I needed to coordinate the delivery through phone (again, in a language I barely speak). They couldn't understand my address so we switched to whatsapp and could send them the coordinates. Twenty minutes later the person was there with a still hot pizza. In another case I just texted the local pizza guy on whatsapp what I wanted and he replied 'where to deliver it?', and then 10 minutes later it arrived.
- ratww 5y ago
  This is also a very cheap solution for merchants: only requires a mobile phone and a free app that almost everyone has in some countries. If push comes to shove, install Signal/Telegram or accept SMS.
sdfhbdf 5y ago

walty8 5y ago

> The app or website should make my life better but instead it's harder. This is the sub-goal, but not ultimate goal. The ultimate goal is to maximize the profit, with accounts created, all the analytics will work out, and they could do all kinds of promotions or targeted ads. I guess that's the same reason why you are asked to install a mobile app whenever you visit Reddit mobile WEBSITE. It does not attempt to make your life better. At least it's not the ultimate goal of ecosystem.

tedmiston 5y ago
> I guess that's the same reason why you are asked to install a mobile app whenever you visit Reddit mobile WEBSITE. Yeah, Reddit's approach to making so difficult to access the mobile on a whim, especially in an ephemeral browser, is a straight up UX dark pattern. I use Reddit less on mobile because of it... I want to stay in the browser where I have things like ad blockers and can open a bunch of tabs at once and bounce around easily, etc.
b112 5y ago
Yet here there is more pressure to not scare customers away. To not make their life troublesome. Woe to the pizza company who thinks "we don't need to care about customer retention, our pizza is just too good." I have dozens of pizza places to order from, all within delivery distance. Make ordering difficult, and as long as the competition is pretty much as tasty, I'll move on.

brnt 5y ago

Apps and accounts are used for two things: to facilitate tracking and outsource administrative duties. I do not install apps or create accounts.

op00to 5y ago

I’ve literally never bargained with the pizza joint, and I would get smacked in the face and thrown out on my ass if I did it in person. Are you kidding me? As far as when there’s a problem, with the major food delivery app I use, I am refunded merely for asking. I’ve used it heavily during the pandemic and literally every problem was solved through the app.

michaelcampbell 5y ago

This is 100% backward from my experience. Having an account is a 1-time cost, and not only a small one, but one I do for hundreds of other things every day. Logging in is a keystroke that has my password manager auto type my username and password; again something I repeat daily. With the situation in the US at least, trying to get anyone on the phone is an exercise in frustration. The app (for me, so far) has always been up. The employees don't have to stop making the product to take an order. They don't know the specials, or don't care to look them up which might be changing on an HOURLY basis. The app knows. On the phone I have to go through my order painstakingly each time; the app knows what I've ordered and I can single-click repeat it. And honestly, all they're doing is taking my order and putting it into probably an admin version OF THE SAME APP. It's LITERALLY the old game of "telephone", but for something I want to buy.

boring_twenties 5y ago
A sandwich chain with a location near me requires a 3-step captcha to be solved every time you want to log into the account.
tjoff 5y ago
In theory you have a point. But installing a user hostile app is a total dealbreaker. And I guarantee that the eula is not only illegal but an absolute shitshow of trying to exploit paying customers so that the library of whatever third party module required to view an image could earn a sixteenth of a cent per pizza. And that is always the case. Just call instead. Unfortunately you can't do that for everything. Just today I was practically forced to install and give away "my" phone number to the worst app you can ever imagine, just to be able to park.
- michaelcampbell 5y ago
  I will say that when I say "app", I mean web app. I don't use the phone app, although most of my post is still relevant there. My reasons for that are mainly that I'm at home on my big screen with a real keyboard 99% of the time that I'm ordering pizza and it's just easier. So the hostility is perhaps less there.

aaron695 5y ago