JUST EAT hideous charges

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  • shortcrust
    shortcrust Posts: 2,697
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    Thanks friends for price info :)

    Here comes the spam.
  • TRT
    TRT Posts: 33
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    I'm having a really bad time with their Price Promise.
    I used to order from our favourite Indian with them and got the standard 20% off the whole order when ordering online/takeaway/delivery that the restaurant offered. The Restaurant's own website didn't have an e-commerce section at the time I started using Just-East so JE made it easy to reorder the same selection time and again. When the restaurant finally updated their website with an e-commerce solution, JE was only about 10p more on the charges side so I stuck with the JE app for a year or two.
    Then I took a year off from eating takeout for health reasons, but when I went back to ordering again, I ended up paying full price for the meal - I was expecting the 20% discount to apply at the next step in the payment process, but it never materialised.
    I checked the restaurant's own website and lo! they offered the same discount that they always had done. The order was £7.50 less ordering directly from the restaurant's own website.

    I didn't care about the double the difference thing, I just thought it was unfair that I paid full price when I shouldn't have and have never had to pay in the past - there's no lack of mechanism on the Just Eat payment system for encoding that form of discount because they'd done it for a few years beforehand. Checked the exclusions as listed in the thread above... price promise didn't apply to "delivery and or any service or other fees, special offers, collection and dine in orders", but this was a discount, not a special offer, so I submitted a claim with all the evidence requested. After a week they got back to me and said the claim was rejected because the promise excluded "discounts", with a reference to their T&Cs which say "Just Eat Price Promise Claims may only be submitted against Menu Items that you have ordered on the Just Eat website and will not be valid in respect of delivery charges, special offers or discounts offered by restaurants."

    Now this wording is somewhat different to the headline article... the promise implies that you won't pay more for your food by using Just Eat, but what this clause in their T&Cs says is that you won't pay more for MENU ITEMS. That is to say that so long as each menu item has been priced the same on both Just Eat and the restaurant website, then the price promise won't apply. Most people would, I think, say that "not paying more for your food" means "not paying more for the food in your order".

    I've now taken to using Resolver to follow this up, but the process is unbelievably painful - they always respond by asking for more information even though it's included in the email chain already, they always ask for authentication details of the account, and they are now responding that the case has been escalated to a higher authority team who have responded and that therefore they can't do anything. It's like pulling teeth!
     
    I've written to the ASA to complain that their Price Promise is misleading, so we will see where that goes, but I've given up using Just Eat now. I go to the restaurant direct.

  • HappyUser said:
    Hello,


    I noticed that Just Eat in my area introduced several food shops that traditionally never had delivery facilities.


    These shops come with a hefty cost of £2 for delivery. A bit pricey considering they do e.g. 20 deliveries in an hour, but hey, you can say it's alright.


    However, the poor consumers do not know what is really going on. Just Eat charges every food item of the shop, at least £1.75 more than the prices you pay at the shop!


    Isn't this the most disgusting thing that a delivery company can do?


    So, the poor customer orders like a couple of burger meals and they end up paying £5-6 more for the delivery!


    That's absolutely a steal, is there any organisation to complain about these hideous practices?


    They cannot overcharge the same thing, it should be illegal! They charge for delivery, which is fair, but they also inflate heavily the prices!!!


    This company is really the most horrendous company ever. They made money out of nothing and now they heavily rip off people!
    I can’t see what the issue is here. If it’s worth the cost to have your food delivered then you can use the service, and if not then you don’t.

    No-one’s being ripped off here, a charge is just being made for a service.
  • zzyzx1221
    zzyzx1221 Posts: 188
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    TRT said:
    I'm having a really bad time with their Price Promise.
    I used to order from our favourite Indian with them and got the standard 20% off the whole order when ordering online/takeaway/delivery that the restaurant offered. The Restaurant's own website didn't have an e-commerce section at the time I started using Just-East so JE made it easy to reorder the same selection time and again. When the restaurant finally updated their website with an e-commerce solution, JE was only about 10p more on the charges side so I stuck with the JE app for a year or two.
    Then I took a year off from eating takeout for health reasons, but when I went back to ordering again, I ended up paying full price for the meal - I was expecting the 20% discount to apply at the next step in the payment process, but it never materialised.
    I checked the restaurant's own website and lo! they offered the same discount that they always had done. The order was £7.50 less ordering directly from the restaurant's own website.

    I didn't care about the double the difference thing, I just thought it was unfair that I paid full price when I shouldn't have and have never had to pay in the past - there's no lack of mechanism on the Just Eat payment system for encoding that form of discount because they'd done it for a few years beforehand. Checked the exclusions as listed in the thread above... price promise didn't apply to "delivery and or any service or other fees, special offers, collection and dine in orders", but this was a discount, not a special offer, so I submitted a claim with all the evidence requested. After a week they got back to me and said the claim was rejected because the promise excluded "discounts", with a reference to their T&Cs which say "Just Eat Price Promise Claims may only be submitted against Menu Items that you have ordered on the Just Eat website and will not be valid in respect of delivery charges, special offers or discounts offered by restaurants."

    Now this wording is somewhat different to the headline article... the promise implies that you won't pay more for your food by using Just Eat, but what this clause in their T&Cs says is that you won't pay more for MENU ITEMS. That is to say that so long as each menu item has been priced the same on both Just Eat and the restaurant website, then the price promise won't apply. Most people would, I think, say that "not paying more for your food" means "not paying more for the food in your order".

    I've now taken to using Resolver to follow this up, but the process is unbelievably painful - they always respond by asking for more information even though it's included in the email chain already, they always ask for authentication details of the account, and they are now responding that the case has been escalated to a higher authority team who have responded and that therefore they can't do anything. It's like pulling teeth!
     
    I've written to the ASA to complain that their Price Promise is misleading, so we will see where that goes, but I've given up using Just Eat now. I go to the restaurant direct.

    I'm not sure why you're specifically bringing up the price of the menu items as a reason or your complaint when it says "and will not be valid in respect of delivery charges, special offers or discounts offered by restaurants"

    The restaurant is offering a discount on orders from their site, and JE specifically says they won't match discounts, which seems fair enough to me.  Plenty of price matching promises have a variety of exclusions and have for years, I think if you're going to the ASA with this you'll fail.  This is the same ASA that allowed broadband providers to advertise Unlimited* broadband (*fair use policy applies) on all their advertising so the fact that there is clearly a list of exclusions on the Price Promise page....  Well, I don't see this going anywhere.
  • TRT
    TRT Posts: 33
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    edited 18 March 2021 at 2:57PM
    Ah, but the list of exclusions on their Price Promise page is not the same as their list of exclusions in the Terms and Conditions.
    The reason I mention the promise actually applying to menu items is over the misleading terminology used on their website. I quote: 
    "We offer a guarantee that if you pay more for a delivery meal when ordering from Just Eat than from the restaurant direct we will give you twice the difference.
    So, if your order from Just Eat is advertised by the restaurant for less on its own website then we’ll send you double the difference in the form of a Just Eat voucher.
    That’s our Price Promise to you.
    * Excludes delivery and or any service or other fees, special offers, collection and dine in orders (if you place a collection order on Just Eat or order directly with the restaurant and collect your order from the restaurant or eat/dine in at the restaurant). Price Promise claims must be made within 14 days of the date of the relevant order."

    You'll see it says "...pay more for a delivery meal..." and then on the exclusions line it does not mention discounts. And they continue to use the term 'order' throughout the statement. Then they repeat the phrase "That's our Price Promise to you." It's all very reassuring, but in reality it ONLY covers mistakes or variations in the price data for meal items on the Just Eat website. The key thing is that the asterisked exclusions on the Promise page vary from the exclusions in the terms and conditions. The example of the "*fair use policy applies" isn't comparable because it uses vague terminology that invites the customer to investigate further what restrictions might apply. Further, the ASA guidance where they say "It should be acceptable to describe an aspect of a service as “unlimited” [...] despite the existence of a fair-use policy, [...], providing the policy’s existence is stated in the ad. Other significant conditions associated with an unlimited service [...] should also be stated. Including those statements in a footnote is likely to be acceptable." was made in 2010 and has subsequently been superseded by the OFCOM guidance from 2016 which states "The use of the term unlimited is only permitted where the service in question has no usage caps through a ‘fair usage policy’ or similar." Further in 2020 the ASA ruled that Vodaphone had to change their advertising to make it absolutely clear that their 'unlimited' data package would impose a speed restriction in order to police "fair use" and protect the service from abuses in the interests of other customers. So we will have to see what the ASA say.

  • Thrugelmir
    Thrugelmir Posts: 89,546
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    JE employees have to be paid for. Better than most of the gig economy. 
  • MalMonroe
    MalMonroe Posts: 5,783
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    I really don't care. If I'm ordering food to be delivered to my doorstep and it means that I don't have to cook, I'll pay the price and I ALWAYS tip the deliverers as well. They are out in all hours, in all weather and most of them, wherever they are from, are cheerful and friendly (at a safe distance, of course!) 

    We all have choices. We can either use the food delivery service or not. If we don't like the prices we can move along to the next service. I really don't understand what's being complained about here.

    Cook the food, bring it to me and I'll give you whatever you want. Plus tip. I'm one grateful and satisfied customer. (Not wealthy, no, just grateful.)
    Please note - taken from the Forum Rules and amended for my own personal use (with thanks) : It is up to you to investigate, check, double-check and check yet again before you make any decisions or take any action based on any information you glean from any of my posts. Although I do carry out careful research before posting and never intend to mislead or supply out-of-date or incorrect information, please do not rely 100% on what you are reading. Verify everything in order to protect yourself as you are responsible for any action you consequently take.
  • nyermen
    nyermen Posts: 1,086
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    The "gig economy" is a big question mark for me - I want to support workers, but worry I'm encouraging more of the same behaviour.  I was about to reply to the comment "No-one's being ripped off here" with "except the poor delivery drivers", but then I saw the reply above that says JE pay them okay, which is something good to hear?

    So I would really like more transparency on who are the good and bad players.  From Uber, to JE, to "last mile couriers / delivery drivers", and many more, I want to use services that pay properly, but don't then rip off the retailer (eg. the poor curry house who may only break even on the sale).

    Peter

    Debt free - finally finished paying off £20k + Interest.
  • 2021BJ
    2021BJ Posts: 307
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    TRT said:
    Ah, but the list of exclusions on their Price Promise page is not the same as their list of exclusions in the Terms and Conditions.
    The reason I mention the promise actually applying to menu items is over the misleading terminology used on their website. I quote: 
    "We offer a guarantee that if you pay more for a delivery meal when ordering from Just Eat than from the restaurant direct we will give you twice the difference.
    So, if your order from Just Eat is advertised by the restaurant for less on its own website then we’ll send you double the difference in the form of a Just Eat voucher.
    That’s our Price Promise to you.
    * Excludes delivery and or any service or other fees, special offers, collection and dine in orders (if you place a collection order on Just Eat or order directly with the restaurant and collect your order from the restaurant or eat/dine in at the restaurant). Price Promise claims must be made within 14 days of the date of the relevant order."

    You'll see it says "...pay more for a delivery meal..." and then on the exclusions line it does not mention discounts. 

    I'd say a discount is a special offer.
  • HappyUser said:
    Hello,


    I noticed that Just Eat in my area introduced several food shops that traditionally never had delivery facilities.


    These shops come with a hefty cost of £2 for delivery. A bit pricey considering they do e.g. 20 deliveries in an hour, but hey, you can say it's alright.


    However, the poor consumers do not know what is really going on. Just Eat charges every food item of the shop, at least £1.75 more than the prices you pay at the shop!


    Isn't this the most disgusting thing that a delivery company can do?


    So, the poor customer orders like a couple of burger meals and they end up paying £5-6 more for the delivery!


    That's absolutely a steal, is there any organisation to complain about these hideous practices?


    They cannot overcharge the same thing, it should be illegal! They charge for delivery, which is fair, but they also inflate heavily the prices!!!


    This company is really the most horrendous company ever. They made money out of nothing and now they heavily rip off people!
    So how do you expect the self employed delivery drivers to get paid a fair price for delivering your food, using their time, motor vehicle, fuel, motor and delivery driver insurance, vehicle depreciation and servicing, as well as paying tax and national insurance for a “hefty cost of £2”?

    I’ve been working part time as a driver with Just Eat for a few weeks since being made redundant.

    To give an example of the area I’m serving, in seven hours yesterday I delivered 15 orders, at an average of 4.2 miles per order.

    I covered 64 miles yesterday.

    Do you think £30 would be fair recompense for that work?🤔

    The fact is that people want the convenience of ordering food through an app, and having it delivered to their door.

    No one forces them.

    If someone wants to order a coffee from a restaurant and I earn a worthwhile sum for delivering it then I’m happy to do it.


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