What do you hate about food delivery?

Low quality, high prices. That about sums it up.

95% of the time delivered cold, practically inedible. It’s worth it to me to make the drive and get it faster.

Geez, where do you guys get your food? I am always pleased with delivery in my area. I tip the drivers very well, maybe that helps.
The only thing I hate about it is that these days it’ so necessary, I prefer to eat in the restaurant.

I also hate the cutlery. It can barely pick up food without bending. I always use my own.

I don’t mind tipping, and I don’t mind service charges, but I don’t like both on the same tab. And I want to make sure the restaurant gets paid, so because of the ambiguities, I prefer to pick up myself.

@prettyduck Not being able to check the expiration dates. Referring to
grocery delivery.

@si3tech How do you check expiration dates in a restaurant?

I don’t like the wasted packaging and I don’t like when it’s cold but those are minor inconveniences when you’re shut in and want some variety in your meals. I try my best to avoid restaurants that don’t do their own delivery because I know the others are being forced to give up a lot of their income to the delivery services. And like @canidmajor I do tip the delivery person well.

To add a bit – when I order for delivery, I will not use third party services like Doordash.

First, they treat their employees like shit.

Second, they underpay the restaurants to the point of making it economically tenuous for the restaurants to survive.

Third, because of the business model (pick up from a lot of places, deliver to a lot of people) you are almost guaranteed a long wait with cold food.

Maybe in an urban location, where distances are smaller, this approach works. But out in the burbs, Doordash and its sister companies suck.

Yeah, like @janbb and @elbanditoroso I only use the ones that don’t do third party delivery.

Regarding restaurants I have only done pizza or Chinese in the past, and both were fine. I can see how other restaurants would be a ton of packaging that winds up in landfills, because when I do take-out from those places there is often huge styrofoam containers, too big for the food, and the food often gets cold by the time it’s at my house. Some foods reheat ok, some not.

Grocery delivery or even curbside pick-up I don’t like that Walmart does not have a paper bag option. At Publix (a grocery store here) I can specify paper bags, which I save and use to throw out yard waste.

I agree about not being able to check how close something is to the expiration date being a problem for foods that quickly perish. I order keeping in mind the food might be only a day or two away from the date. Luckily, my stores near me are very high volume so food does not sit long on the shelves and the staff here is good. When I lived in Raleigh there was expired food on the shelves constantly. I once filled my cart with about 30 items and brought it to the customer service. I am not exaggerating.

Also, produce sometimes is not as fresh as I would like or is damaged. I’d rather not get the item at all than have a bruised apple or a soft green pepper.

I’ve never used third party delivery. I have used Instacart for curbside pick-up, but these are people at that one store packing orders all day.

The cutlery is trash, otherwise I have no complaints.

Like @elbanditoroso I never use a third party, just direct local delivery or pick up.

Too cold.

@KNOWITALL When I’ve done pick up, I tell them not to put the plastic cutlery in. I hate the waste and I don’t want to use the plastic.

That’s four of us now who won’t use delivery services.

I’ve never had to have my food delivered to me. Not necessary at this time. I’m still able go out and get it for myself.

@janbb Yes I love that more people are using their daily transactions in a more politically aware way now.

@gondwanalon I love the convenience of having a meal delivered to me on a cold winter night. I don’t have groceries delivered ever.

I hate that it’s cold, sometimes not what I actually ordered and takes forever to receive.
I have not used food delivery in years. I go pick it up. Saves me the aggravation.
Also, I have never used the pick up service at the grocery store. In my mind, I’ll be at that place physically in a few years, so I want to do everything for myself while I can.

Basically everything everyone has said above. It’s expensive, third party delivery apps rip off restaurants, the food may be cold, if something’s wrong you can’t do anything about it except get a $0.20 refund. It’s only a convenience up to a certain point. I’ve tried to stop having deliveries made and pick up food instead.

@chyna A lot of people do curbside because of covid. That’s the main reason most of my friends and I use the service. I’ll probably still use it now and then going forward, because of the convenience, but not to the extent I do now.

NOTHING bums me out like shoveling over money for cold food. This isn’t just a covid generated phobia. Prior to the pandemic, my wife regarded my aversion to lukewarm or worse entrees as downright neurotic. I will interrupt a bowl or mug of soup served scalding hot, if the temperature falls to warm before I can finish it. Unless I am reasonably sure that my order will be promptly delivered, I will ALWAYS hazard driving to pick it up.

@JLeslie Yes, I’m aware of why some people do it. I just choose to wear my mask in and choose my own fruit and vegetables and check expiration dates.

Yeah, @chyna, I’m with you. I’d rather not have potentially infected people doing extra touching of my food. I have noticed that people adjust their masks with bare fingers a lot.

@canidmajor You mean the staff that is pulling the food for the curbside?

@chyna certain items I want to pick for myself also, I get it. I didn’t think I would like curbside, but now I love it. When I go in the stores I try to go late at night so it isn’t so busy.

I went to my neighborhood Walmart for my vaccination at 2:00 in the afternoon and it was CROWDED. I did a little shopping after the shot, but too crowded for me. This is the store I do most of my curbside, I found out they do 7 curbside pick-ups per hour and they deliver also. I just keep thinking what if all of those people were in the store. It’s a fairly small store. Do they control how many people can be in your stores?

They used to have a person outside counting the people going in, but stopped that about 3 months ago. I go to Kroger’s early on Saturday morning and there’s not many people in there at that time.

@chyna They never controlled how many in the store here. They recently opened two new supermarkets, which has helped reduce the crowds in the stores, but it’s peak season in Florida, so lots of people here; two more weeks to go and some return north. Plus, they continue to sell 200 new homes every month in The Villages.

@JLeslie Yes, and just about everybody. It’s automatic now for most people. I see it when the staff shoppers are going around with the carts and boxes/bags, and regular shoppers, and I know I’ve done it. Most of us do it unconsciously to scratch our noses or adjust our masks.

@canidmajor Believe me I’ve thought about it. Lol. There is no good solution. Either I risk random shoppers breathing on and touching the packages, or if the one staff person pulling the food has covid then the virus is all over all of my items. I still wipe down cold items with alcohol wipes and leave pantry items sit at least 24 hours before putting them away. Fresh produce I rinse well. I’m not perfect about it, but I figure I reduce the risk.

I don’t order delivered food very often but the last time ordered pizza I was very disappointed. It was a bit overpriced I thought and it had lost its fresh zing. It will be a while before I do that again. I’ve had more success with Indian food but as others have said there are massive amounts of packaging to deal with.

At home, I only have ever done delivery for pizza. We sometimes sit at the lake that I live on, my daughter and her friends come for swimming in the summer, and I will order a pizza or two for us all. I order from a place that does its own service, so I just tip the driver and all is well.

One thing that’s annoying to me with pizza parlors is that their napkins are the small crappy ones. I am a person who will use several napkins when I eat, and the small ones that are in napkin dispensers in many pizza parlors just don’t do it for me. I also get annoyed when they don’t send paper plates. Yes, I like to eat my pizza on a paper plate.

One time, at home, I was going to order from a restaurant that’s about a mile away, just for myself. They had a $25 minimum, $5 delivery fee and I figured between the minimum, the fee, the tax and the tip it would be $40 which was way more than I wanted to spend just for a dinner for myself, so I didn’t do it.

At work, if we order lunch delivery, we order from places that are local and do their own delivery.

That there is not a single one that offers fresh Gagh.

The last time someone brought food from a restaurant, it was so hot it had melted the bottom of the styrofoam take-out box. I figured that out AFTER I had eaten the food. Ick!

The total price. I would prefer to give more tip to the delivery person but can’t afford it.

The price of the food itself it seems to me is only suited for rich people. Two Burger King meals for 35 dollars?

From our favorite chicken place, what we buy for 25 bucks dine-in is now 45 bucks when delivered…and I don’t think the delivery person gets his or her just share from the profit.

@JeffreyRobinson Great question. I don’t ever get food delivery from the actual stores I go there myself, but like actual restaurants, I use doordash- which has never disappointed me in any way. Outdated food? Never. But I did have a jar of jelly once.. It was still good and up to date, but somehow- mold got into it? No one could explain that unless the company who made It didn’t ceil it correctly or put the incorrect date? But hey- I’m not judging anyone. Let me assume in peace. -idktimmyturner