DonRocks Posted February 11, 2016 Share Posted February 11, 2016 I recently discovered that a restaurant close to my house that I enjoy delivers, with only a $15 minimum and no delivery charges. Great! But then I noticed that there were two separate menus - one for dine-in, and the other for delivery, and the delivery menu was 10-15% higher across-the-board. So this "free delivery" actually costs you at least a couple bucks, if not substantially more. Has anyone else come across this dubious tactic? I don't want to call out the restaurant, because I like them, and I'm not even sure this is unethical, but at the minimum, it causes me to raise an eyebrow (and not order from them!) I would council anyone ordering online to beware of "free delivery charges," and to compare prices with the dine-in menu. The same holds true with delivery-service companies, which can charge anything they want - it's sort of like hotels.com, which I'm finding less-and-less to have the "lowest available prices" (which they claim to have). What's so hard about saying, "We charge a $1 delivery fee [which would cover materials], and require a 20% tip for our driver?" They're still making the same amount per order, and assuming a 33% food cost, why would they want to lose an order over something like this? This situation is a variation of the one described in Joe H's post about buying airline tickets, Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DonRocks Posted February 14, 2016 Author Share Posted February 14, 2016 I recently discovered that a restaurant close to my house that I enjoy delivers, with only a $15 minimum and no delivery charges. Great! But then I noticed that there were two separate menus - one for dine-in, and the other for delivery, and the delivery menu was 10-15% higher across-the-board. Tonight, it would have been worth it. I spent 10-15 minutes typing in my order, all off my information, and then I got to the very last screen - this is the one *after* you type in your credit-card details and email address, and is the absolute-final confirmation - the one that says "Are you absolutely sure you're ready to place this order?" or something to that effect. This restaurant uses orderaheadapp.com: Caveat Emptor! Read on ... Then, and only then, did I notice that, not only was my $9.50 appetizer $10.65 and my $18 entree $20.20 (which I knew about, and mentioned up above), not only did I leave the driver a full 20% tip (which I generally do, but the "20% button" calculated the tip *after tax* on *already-inflated* prices), not only did I write a polite note in one of the item's "Special Requests" box, saying that I understand it's Valentine's Day, and they may not be delivering, and I could always use my payment for a future visit, and if they *are* delivering, it's okay if they're running late, because I understand that they might be busy because of Valentine's Day, so please don't feel rushed, not only did I leave detailed directions which included a description of the house, the cross-streets, where to park, and a suggested route to take, not only did I enter my credit-card information, my address, and my email, not only all of that ... ... but as if they were battering a forsaken corpse, long-dead, whose flesh had grown cold in the winter wind, right as I was about to click on that confirmation screen's "OK" button, I happened to notice, in small typeface, as a line item, and with no announcement elsewhere, a bone-chilling $6 delivery fee: My $27.50 meal now carried a $46.73 pricetag. The king is hurt: Fall, sire! And brewed is sipped is tea This VD-nanobe ire, one-hundred months woe me The corpse deserted Sat,an alerted: cent mois ... sans moi. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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