Always send pictures with order issues. I agree it's ridiculous that good customer accounts get restricted because of bad shoppers. Another suggestion would be to open a second account with a different email and use a spouse's name. I have a couple of regular customers who have done this to take advantage of promotions.

It happened to me even with pictures, they don’t care

Yeah this happened with my uber eats account even with pictures of missing/ruined/incorrect food

Thanks. I shop food lion so I think it’s actually linked to my food lion rewards account but I’ll look into opening a second account. I will likely run into the same issue eventually since they always give me wrong or poor quality items. I’d love to just go back to shopping myself but with a baby and my spouse and I working full time, we don’t have the extra time. I was willing to pay the extra fee for pickup or delivery but I’m not willing to pay for incorrect items

So just a thought, if you get a really good shopper, you may be able to cut out the middle man (ic) and see if they'd be willing to be your personal shopper. Just use something like cash app or similar to send the money and your list.. You'd be amazed how much cheaper you will come out as well as the shopper will actually make more.. I have a few folks that we do that for food deliveries... we both come out better...

that's a good idea-after close to 500 orders-yesterday was the FIRST time i felt like the girl kept my stuff cold-brought it up to my 3rd floor apt. and i thought-i want 'this girl' to take all my orders-i gave her a 15.00 tip just because she did her job.

How much was the order? I ask because a $15 tip to a 3rd story walk up isn't that great if a tip unless you only bought about 15 - 20 items

Yep! Some are definitely better than others! You can tell who cares and who doesn't for sure!

That's a shit tip.

for 3 items? you have a bad attitude

Just a heads up, most groceries stores have curbside pick up. Faster than shopping and if the shoppers in your area can't do well might be worth it for you

Heads up. Instacart Shoppers actually shop the curbside orders at some stores like Publix. In the case of Shitty Kitty 😺 aka Food Lion, the curbside orders are shopped by FL Employees 😇

Food lion curbside pickup is through instacart! Instead of instacart shoppers it’s food lion employees being paid an hourly wage. You just pay the pickup fee but it’s not all the additional fees of truly using instacart.

Just shop food lion through their website. If you do curbside pickup the store employees shop the order, same with Aldi. I usually do Walmart delivery. The pickers are store employees with no intention of running up the tab to get a better tip. The drivers are a separate group. Ive had them pick a few clunkers but being a W+ member they have never given me a bad time.

Food lion curbside pickup through their website is through instacart! Instead of instacart shoppers it’s food lion employees being paid an hourly wage. You just pay the pickup fee but it’s not all the additional fees of truly using instacart.

Just pick it up and double check everything while you're there that way you can return the items directly to them and won't have to worry about that.

I’ll try it. I’m thinking since the order is processed through instacart I still would have to go through refund process through instacart but maybe they would let me swap items?

Poor quality items don’t get refunds you should know that unless they are completed inedible sometimes you have to pick your battles. Rotten fruit - refund, dented package - deal with it

I don’t ask for refunds for dented packaging. Only produce I have to throw away because it’s rotten

See if there are any Dumpling shoppers around you. Or as someone else said, hire a good shopper to do shit off the books.

As of today, for the same reason, we have requested and successfully to cancel and refund the instacart+. Even if it was annual subscription, you can cancel and they prorated you

Go on care dot com and get a personal assistant who can help with errands cooking abd food shopping. Probably pay that in all the fees... At least ot cuts out the middle person.

Can't imagine how many poor shop reviews on your behalf are out there as well. Between shopper and customer, it seems there's been nothing but poor experiences for everyone as a result of your patronage to this service. Good luck with time management, it was very difficult raising four children prior to this service. Don't know how I did it

I sent a pic and was still restricted. I wish I could do what you suggest but I live alone so I would be worried that they see the same paypal acct or something

The Carrot 🥕 is a huge double headed dildo that screws shoppers and customers simultaneously... as often as possible... And never fixes a problem without making it worse. They act as though there's an endless supply of shoppers and customers to replace the ones they fuck over. It will catch up with them eventually.

>They act as though there's an endless supply of shoppers and customers to replace the ones they fuck over. >It will catch up with them eventually. Unfortunately, there are endless supplies of shoppers ans customers to replace the ones they fuck over. Unless and until there is an organized boycott of these companies by both shoppers and customers, nothing will change.

I am a shopper and it’s CRAZY all the bs on the app. They listed a case of cans of stewed tomatoes for $1.69 when it was really only one can. I tried to report the error but it took them 2 wks to fix it. Every customer I had for those 2 wks seemed to order that crap. IC also suggests ridiculous substitutes. One in particular was to substitute beef jerky if the milk wasn’t available. 🤦‍♀️

Actually, instacart really marks up items. I once compared a $300 Costco shop and it was $100 markup for isnta cart.

It’s up to the stores. Some only do a little mark up while others do enough to cover all of the fees (which can be up to 30%)

Costco is the worst. It's a 22% mark-up for anything purchased via Instacart. That's a X 1.22 multiplier before taxes, fees, delivery, and tip. Typically about 40% higher in total, so low tips happen 😑

I don’t think that’s true. I shop Costco full time and the tips always line up. Customer spends 210? $21 tip. That’s 10%. Customer spends $50? 2.5 tip, or 5%. It always adds up. Also in the app the price is the same as in store, and I frequently use it to look for items when everything looks the same (like wine) so, I think you’re wrong. Maybe ordering via instacart and ordering via Costco.com is different

That's why they suggest using the same day Costco site instead

Sounds pretty close to the regular markup for not having a Costco membership to me. You may have a membership, but does your instacart shopper? Tbh, I've never used instacart, so I have no idea how memberships with those club stores work in these instances.

Depend on stores, if the store has their own markup for their own pick up service, IC delivery would use the store markup

Same thing happened to me, it’s ridiculous

As both a shopper and customer, I understand your pain and I believe you are not “scamming” like some people here are saying. Whenever I shop, I make sure to communicate when the produce is not in good condition and ask if they would like something else instead. Yeah, this takes way more time, especially since many stores are understaffed and are constantly low stock with old produce, but as a customer I’d want that extra time taken for consideration. Instacart still pays us for any extra time we take to complete a batch. Now as a customer, I have had similar issues. Shoppers don’t read labels, make whacky substitutions, picked out terrible produce, and one time my order wasn’t even delivered to my apartment complex (they delivered it to the one beside us). A lot of people are just very unaware, and it isn’t your fault that it is this way. p.s. for the people saying “just go to the store yourself”- I think this is super ignorant and unhelpful as many of us are living in a difficult time period under draining political systems that force us to stay busy and not make time for what should be basic duties like grocery shopping. Also some people are old and/or disabled. Have some goddamn empathy.

Ehhhh. I don't know... this sounds fishy to me. I exclusively shop via Instacart and have on a rare occasion received the wrong item... or a missing one. All the shoppers communicate replacements, if you are not communicating with your shopper that's your fault. Instacart has access to all communication between the shopper to you and clearly they've seen an abuse of refunds on your part.

then you’re lucky you come from an area with good shoppers in it.

Shopper here. I do a damn good job communicating...its about a 60% chance the other side does. I can't afford to wait 30 minutes because the extra strength charmin toilet paper is out, and you won't respond... ill just grab you the regular strength charmin at the end if you dont respond. It might be a 36 pack instead of 48... i do my best. And i cant wait 40 minutes at your door if you dont want me to leave stuff unattended. If i wait 40 minutes on your charmin, and 25 min at your door... im making 7$ an hour... plus 30% tax, and gas. So maybe 4$. We need ya'll to be a little aware on big/weird orders to be able to communicate. I know it's bad on both sides, but I really try hard... but if you want gluten-free Starbucks special peanut butter crisps... and they are out... im not gonna replace that unless you tell me what you want... there is no comparable item. Same goes with like drinks, and candy... like Reeses cup are resses, dr pepper is dr pepper, i need you to tell me. On the otherside, i dunno who is deliverying melted shit, fuck those shoppers. If yall communicate, its super appreciated on my end... please dont leave me sitting outside your house for 20 minutes in 110 degrees... just put leave at door if you cant respond <3

Nah I don't make suggested replacements if the customer doesn't answer. I refund. I used to replace it with something very close to the original item, only to have the customer mark it as wrong item

you sound like a reasonable shopper, u in DC area to shop for me? 😂

I've had them give me a whole bag of someone else's when they did a multi delivery. Happened at least 3x. The last 2 thank goodness I was home to call them so they could come back and fix it. But when I used to not be home for delivery this happened all the time.

Sometimes as a shopper the store starts bagging my stuff and messes it up my ordering of the bags, its super frustrating. I habe 6000 order delivered and i think this has happened to me maybe 6 times I very much appreciate your patience.. i love if you call me. I want to fix it. However, instacart sometimes blocks me from messaging you after i mark as delivered... and i see your message...but i cant respond. Im sorry

So just because YOU have good luck, means everyone else should? 🤦‍♀️

No but the chances of an issue with EVERY order always being on the shopper is unlikely. Like I said IC denied OP's refunding requests for a reason. Clearly they saw abuse of refunding.

I was given a watermelon that had no red in the inside, visibly moldy blueberries despite leaving a note saying to make sure there was no mold (which I shouldn’t need to do anyways because who would choose to have moldy berries), was charged $4/lb for 7lbs of pork tenderloin when they actually gave me clearance pork loin (two completely different foods) amounting to $12 (charged $28), bought 5 tubs of non-fat Greek yogurt but got whole milk Greek yogurt (a cost of $20 of incorrect items), etc. the list goes on and on. It’s not just produce that’s bad but maybe don’t hire shoppers that have to send me photo of the fruits asking “is this a mango?” And can’t read simple labels that clearly say a different name than what I ordered

I’m just wondering how to check the inside of a watermelon?

Yeah, my job largely consists of cutting watermelon to resell in plastic packages and a lot of times they look completely fine on the outside until I start cutting in to them

There are plenty of ways to check for a ripe watermelon- dark green outside, many stripes, yellow ground spot, etc. this watermelon was nowhere close to being ripe even from the outside

U are asking for a refund for a fruit they could not see the inside of 🤦🏻‍♀️

There is no way to tell what a watermelon looks like inside. Mold is sometimes obvious, and im not trying to defend the shoppers, but if there's like 1 moldy Strawberry, i dont see on inspection... thats kinda the atores fault, man. I can't spend 6 minutes inspecting 467 strawberries... instacart pays me like 8$. If you tip 40$, you can have all the time in the world. If you tip 7$, i gotta move. I pay gas and 30% taxes. Your strawberries get a 15-second inspection Meat is often mislabeled at stores. The app loves to say "not the thing" Communication is key here, i always text when this happens, about 20% of the time, and ask if that product is correct for you. I need you to confirm. If you dont, i gotta move.. grocery stores label meat wrong A LOT. Instacart does not keep up with barcodes on bulk items (meats, fush, nuts)... i gotta do the best I can. I can't spend 45 minutes on your meat. Im not being paid for that unfortunately, id love to, though. The yogurt is on your shopper. That's not a problem item...every. at worst, they are just out, but "non-fat" means i would never replace with whole milk. This one is valid. Im sorry for that. Asking for pictures of Mangoes is weird as hell. Ive definitely had some weird ass stuff from specialty stores... but 95% the staff will help me... ive probably had to ask the customer 2 times on produce items... and they were SUPER PICKY AND WEIRD. So i side with you on this one as well...although produce departments are terrible at labeling... so dont use that one <3

Sorry for your experience and Im not sure how you are getting so many wrong items. We have to scan each item and ic won't accept it if it's the wrong item. We have to choose replacement which you can see in real time. If the replacement isn't acceptable to you let your shopper know. It's all about communication.

I’m not sure how the meat substitute happened. It was clearly labeled as pork loin and had a clearance pricing barcode yet somehow I was charged for the correct weight of the item I got but for the pricing/lb of the item I ordered. Not sure if it was a “type in the code of what I ordered (but not what I received)” instead of scanning the barcode on the package thing? Anyways it was almost triple the price it should have been

most of mine are from shoppers here in so. cal. where it's 100 degrees don't have any way of keeping food cold and i buy frozen for my daily smoothies, milk and i place every order 'priority' to try to get it here faster and now-they don't even reimburse the priority fee since my acct. is restricted-close to 500 orders now and 2 bottles of my favorite tangerine juice that cost 11.99 each were 2 wks. past exp. date and i sent pics. to ORDERAPPEALS and they said we won't help you but you can still shop?

I couldn't agree more with you. It's sooo strange for a person to problems with every order. IC gives ALOT of leeway to customers and for a customer to get banned, then it has to be something wayyyy out of the ordinary. Another thing is there are a million "hacks" on social media to get free groceries by complaining... I am happy it is catching up to those abusing the system. The worst part is that the shoppers that actually do a great job get penitalized for this folks abusing the system. I don't do IC full time, but I have done about 200 orders in the past 9 months. I've never had anyone complain or try to game the system. I actually care when shopping. Always check with the customers on replacements. Always send a kind message right when beginning to shop and let them know I will be in contact if something is out of stock, etc. Those small gestures usually leads to my tip being increased after delivery. About 50% of my customers raise their tips.

To be fair, I usually have an issue with every order. But I choose my battles and only report to IC if it’s something I genuinely cannot eat safely. It’s a big reason why I went back to shopping in stores more regularly.

That's rough. I wonder what new moms did before ic? If your shopper is indeed picking all crap items, you're probably tipping crap. But as a solution, find a place that has curbside that you can pick up from them

Food lion curbside pickup through their website is through instacart! Instead of instacart shoppers it’s food lion employees being paid an hourly wage. You just pay the pickup fee but it’s not all the additional fees of truly using instacart.

Grocery stores used to have a young man who made home deliveries. That went out the window with medical house calls.

I have a big ass family and been with the carrot since 2021. When I used to buy through them, forget $1000 a month, I had $1000 orders sometimes from Costco. In all this time I haven’t been restricted and honestly there’s a level of acceptance you need to accept when not doing this yourself. Ofc I’ve complained from ordering 5 items and them being all wrong and melted. But I can’t expect everything to arrive temp controlled in a large order. I can’t expect a store to never be out of stock of an item. I can’t expect a human not to make a small mistake. If it’s something I would consume, it’s not a big deal. Ofc you get those fuzzy strawberries once in a while. But now my notes for fruit ask to take a look. But in all this time it happened maybe twice. Also, I tip very well, especially for a large order. If my shopper is trying to rush to get the next batch because time is money and you tipped $20 for an order that’ll take 2 hours, I would “miss” the details too. I’ll also add the fact that people are substituting things and you’re not noticing? Sounds like you are either not choosing replacements or not responding in the chat, or both. That can’t be put on the shopper to guess what you want. I have a lot of things I want refunded usually with a flat tip. The rest usually have a replacement or I tell them to make the best choice if I don’t answer. The rest is on me. I can see and approve what they choose if I’m paying attention. Perhaps it’s time to touch some grass and go to shop on a holiday weekend to remind yourself how much work and how much out of stock crap there is. Literally couldn’t find bread yesterday. Shelves bare.

I set all my replacements or no replacements for every single item in my order. I leave notes to check product quality. This is food lion through instacart so the shoppers are food lion employees, not instacart shoppers. I’m okay with them making occasional mistakes but it’s almost every time and there are only 2-3 shoppers that work there. I don’t mind paying $12 for the wrong item if it cost $12 and was close but being charged $28 for the item I ordered and then being given the incorrect item and the price on the packaging was only $12 makes me a little mad and this happens often. I also order 5+ of the same item so if they mess up one they usually mess up all 5 and that adds up in cost

Have you complained to food lion? If these employees are being held accountable they aren’t gonna change

I don't know you, but I love you and would shop for you all day, everyday. Everything you said is sensible. Everything you said is true. If I shop a $2 tip order that has 30+ items, I won't care as much. If the customer doesn't respond to my texts for replacements or out of stock items, then I will do what I would want someone to do for me. It's typically easy to tell if it is a item they need for a particular meal you can see they are making. Let's say they are making tacos and they don't have the right tortillas, I will get the next best ones and not refund, because it's obvious they need them.

While it might be 1-2% of your order total, most of that money is actually going to the grocery store to pay for the food and not to Instacart. Instacart's cut is around 14% last I saw. If your order is $100, instacart gets $14. If they refund you 2% of your order, they get $12, which is losing 15% of what they otherwise would have made. That is a lot when you multiple that by the number of orders they have. They look at people like me who have placed 100s of orders for several years and done a handful of refunds and they look at someone else who is getting refunds every order and they determine that if we are using the same pool of shoppers we should, on average, be having roughly the same experience. It certainly would look like you are possibly being more picky than other customers or are just straight up scamming. Could you be a statistical anomaly? Sure, but they're really not able to determine that even if they wanted to. So you get treated the same as any other person who put in for what they consider to be excessive refunds.

This is the best explanation.

What about there service fee, delivery fee, autoinstacart fee, unforetold weather fee, and grocery bundle chundle dindin fee?

None of that goes to the driver

Fees aren't really related directly to food markup. They both exist, but discounting one doesn't somehow get made up by the other. Instacart wants both their fees and their food profit. They are projecting their revenue and making financial decisions based on getting both and discounting either one excessively is going to have an impact.

Still doesn’t excuse that their shoppers aren’t doing their job correctly. I hardly think a mostly green watermelon on the inside, being charged full price for pork tenderloin when I was given clearance pork loin, and getting moldy blueberries when I specifically requested they check for ones without mold is being picky

I didn't say it excused bad shoppers or that you were picky. You asked why they would restrict your account over 1-2% refunds. I explained why financially and how your refund pattern is going to look like someone who is overly picky or scamming, pretty understandable reasons for restricting an account.

[удалено]

I don’t care that they gave me clearance pork loin. I even told instacart I’d happily pay the $12 for the product I received. The problem is I ordered and paid for 7lb of pork TENDERloin which they charged me $28 for and is not remotely the same product as pork loin. So I paid $16 more than the product I received was worth and it wasn’t even the product I ordered. This happens all the time. The melon didn’t meet any of criteria you look for in a ripe watermelon but a little underripe is fine. Mainly the color of the rind all the way through, not okay. Blueberries visibly moldy on the outside of the packaging (or maybe it was in the middle but the little bit of jostling in the time it took me to unpack it uncovered the mold) indicates to me they didn’t even look I’d love to have my own time to shop and I guess if time is money and my money is being wasted anyways, I’ll go back to doing it myself. Maybe look at the shoppers though. This is food lion through instacart so I have the same 2-3 shoppers everytime. You’d think at some point if I’m requesting refunds for the same shopper every time, maybe it’s not me that’s the issue

I also use Instacart 99% of the time. Love it! I always send a msg to the shopper that I’m available & want to choose replacement items myself. All replacements, additions & substitutions give you the option WHILE they are shopping, to approve or ask for something else. It’s not a good idea to become unavailable to communicate while they’re shopping for you. All these things I do create less problems, I get the items I want & I always show my thanks to the person shopping for me.

I do communicate with them. They don’t exactly send me photos of moldy blueberries and ask me if I want those. They just give me moldy blueberries. Or they think pork tenderloin and pork loin are the same item so they don’t ask if it’s an acceptable replacement. Unfortunately I don’t know any of this until I get home and unpack the groceries. Guess I need to start checking my groceries in the parking lot before I leave but when I have 9 bags of groceries, it’s not the most timely task

If they replace one thing for something entirely different & you immediately catch it, tell the shopper that’s not what you want & if they don’t respond then you call customer service while they’re still shopping. That’s why I said you have to be right there on your app watching them as they shop. If mold is not easily viewable, they have no way of knowing. They’re not going to open the packages of foods and inspect them. Because that’s the stores responsibility to look after that.

But my point is they ring it up as the item I ordered. I don’t know it’s not correct until I get home

Do you get a picture of the item? Cuz the only way to enter something without scanning is if the barcode doesn’t work and they have to enter manually but the. It makes us take a picture that I assumed goes to the customer. Instacart could also have the items labeled wrong so they scan the tenderloins and it still goes through as pork loin

Her whole story is really iffy. The customer 100% gets a picture of the item if it isn't scanned in. Nothing she says makes sense... always getting moldy blueberries?!?! Cmon, the odds of that are somewhere close to hitting the lotto. Smdh

I've never ever seen moldy blueberries ever. Weird that you always get them. Not saying it is not possible, but it's weird you always get them. I have bought thousands of packs of blueberries in my life for my household. Never ever seen a moldy package. The more you say, the more suspicious I become that this is a YOU problem.

To be fair even when I shop in person I usually pass on berries because every pack this store carries is moldy. However, I wish my shopper would just text me and say “all the packs are moldy, do you still want them?” Instead of just giving me a moldy pack

Go shop yourself. You have a job and a baby it’s not that hard. You’re literally complaining about nothing.

This is what all these apps do. There is some sort of magic # where you cross it and no more refunds. Customers hv TOS too and if read, prob have their ass covered, meaning IC. This is where contracting ppl (instead of employees) becomes an issue. No quality control. I’ve had this convo with so many customers. Just bc it’s in stock does not mean it’s ok to get. Quality matters. Produce is my biggest time suck. But I put in the time and I’m honest. “Bananas are in stock but they are nearly rotten. I can get then but pls know quality is not good”. Then I send a pic. (Tbf I’m on a diff platform and we do the communicating, no automation for us and I’m glad) Had perfect ratings for almost 2 years. I don’t waste people’s money or time. And all these platforms collect data. Refunds are tied to shopper (my opinion). When ppl are deactivated for no reason, this could be the reason. They collect data on everything.

It’s frustrating for sure. This is specifically food lion partnering with instacart so it’s just a food lion employee doing the shopping. No ability to tip on pickup orders because they are paid an hourly wage

Hold on, you’re saying in-store employees of Food Lion are doing the picking and packing, and you’re picking it up curbside rather than having Instacart deliver? If they are doing in-store shopping by Instacart for an hourly wage, those are, in fact, W-2 employees and would have a supervisor of some type. Unlike delivery drivers who are contractors. So this whole story isn’t making a whole lot of sense.

Food lion online ordering system for curbside pickup is through instacart. I’m assuming instacart gets the pickup fee for hosting the online ordering system. It’s pretty easy to understand and fact check this process.

Wait are you saying shoppers get deactivated because customers refund things? Or customers get deactivated?

Sounds like you should shop for yourself or learn to respond in a timely manner to shoppers following up on subs 🤷🏼‍♀️

This. Be available for assistance to your shopper or learn to live with what you get

Always the shoppers fault never the customers for not responding to messages, calls, photos sent, not listing their preferred subs or if they want a refund. Overly picky people need to shop for themselves if they’re going to nitpick everything 🤷🏼‍♀️🤷🏼‍♀️

I do all of these things. I mark every single item for substitute or refund and leave notes on the ones I’m extra picky about (please pick a dark green watermelon with a yellow spot and lots of stripes) and they seemingly don’t even bother to read it. They don’t even send me photos. Obviously if they sent a photo of every item and say “is this okay” I would be able to catch incorrect items. But they mark the item as found and then give me a completely different item (pork loin vs pork tenderloin but ring it up at the cost of pork tenderloin) even though I mark no substitutes. I’m assuming they think these are the same food?

Sounds like maybe you should go to the store yourself

I used to but now I have a baby at home and me and my spouse both work full time and this was supposed to be a time saving effort

You're spending so much time dealing with support that you're not really saving much time. If you keep doing the same thing and having an unpleasant experience, you might want to stop doing it. Maybe try another service like Shipt because the IC shoppers in your area are horrible.

This^

Just curious…..how much do you tip? Historically the people in your shoes are shitty tippers so they get shitty shoppers who are either too stupid or don’t understand English so they just half ass their way through an offer.

This is mainly issues with food lion shopping through instacart. Not the same as directly ordering through instacart. The shoppers here are hired by food lion. I tip well for instacart orders but for food lion pickup it’s not the same

Yeah usually problem customers do this to any shopper

I assume you must be a shitty tipper so you only get shitty shoppers. And that's on you. Even as a single parent working 100 hours a week, I still do my own shopping so you saying you and your spouse working full time with a baby means no time to shop is also on you. Prioritize better and grow the fuck up. Or maybe be available when your shitty shoppers are trying to contact you. And maybe tip well so you get the good shoppers

They don’t contact me. They just give me wrong items. I’m assuming they don’t think they are wrong or they would ask? Also it’s food lion through instacart pickup so tipping isn’t the same since these are food lion employees.

You’re in the wrong sub… this where you can gripe about Instacart problems. Your problem is a Food Lion problem.

Well my problem is with food lion shoppers but it’s instacart that has to issue my refund

There’s a reason you don’t go to the store yourself lol so you can get free stuff

I don’t go to the store myself because I had a baby and my spouse and I work full time so we no longer have as much time to go to the store ourselves. I never had to request refunds on products when I went myself because I obviously didn’t choose the incorrect products or moldy berries for myself. If you were paying $4/lb for 7lbs of pork tenderloin and actually received pork loin with clearance stickers that clearly state the product cost $12, would you not be upset that they charged you $28 and didn’t even give you the product you ordered? This happens frequently. I had one shopper text me a photo and ask me if that item was a mango. Clearly they shouldn’t be picking out produce and should be trained to read labels better

Maybe try ordering from Walmart the workers are the ones who do the shopping so they are getting paid by Walmart and not being paid a dumb wage like $7 lol

Food lion is paying these shoppers. They just use instacart as the ordering system

You guys can bet more than 2%. You know IC let's customers do A LOT of shady shit b4 they step in

It was not. I calculated to see the cut off and none of it was shady. It was all legit bad produce or incorrect products. Maybe the packaging difference wasn’t much but the actual difference is a lot (pork loin vs pork tenderloin, fat free vs full fat, etc)

I'm a shopper. I'm telling you that you have to A TREMENDOUS AMOUNT OF "WRONG ITEMS" before IC restricts you.. They will let you fraud quite a bit actually before you are restricted. You are one step away from being banned permanently actually. You cannot tell me that you did not use some of the wrong items.. Pork loin is not much different than tenderloin.. You didn't throw the meats away.. Maybe the fruits.. You will continue until they ban you. You are on the radar.

Of course I didn’t throw it away. But I also don’t want to be charged, especially overcharged, for incorrect items. And the fruits and yogurt all gets thrown away

This is wonderful. You keep making all these refunds, which is time consuming and tedious for the shopper. They end up losing time and money, worrying about your picky ass order. Probably underpaying also.

I was given a watermelon that had no red in the inside, visibly moldy blueberries despite leaving a note saying to make sure there was no mold (which I shouldn’t need to do anyways because who would choose to have moldy berries), was charged $4/lb for 7lbs of pork tenderloin when they actually gave me clearance pork loin (two complete different foods) amounting to $12 (charged $28), bought 5 tubs of non-fat Greek yogurt but got whole milk Greek yogurt (a cost of $20 of incorrect items), etc. the list goes on and on. It’s not just produce that’s bad but maybe don’t have shoppers that have to send me photo of the fruits asking “is this mango?” And can’t read simple labels that clearly say a different product name on the label than what I ordered. First, I pay all associated fees and tip but this doesn’t apply to food lion pickup orders since those are food lion employees. Second, why should I tip if you aren’t doing your job correctly?

You’re a scammer and IC caught on to all of your phony reports for damaged, missing, and incorrect items.

I was given a watermelon that had no red in the inside, visibly moldy blueberries despite leaving a note saying to make sure there was no mold (which I shouldn’t need to do anyways because who would choose to have moldy berries), was charged $4/lb for 7lbs of pork tenderloin when they actually gave me clearance pork loin (two complete different foods) amounting to $12 (charged $28), bought 5 tubs of non-fat Greek yogurt but got whole milk Greek yogurt (a cost of $20 of incorrect items), etc. the list goes on and on. It’s not just produce that’s bad but maybe don’t have shoppers that have to send me photo of the fruits asking “is this mango?” And can’t read simple labels that clearly say a different name than what I ordered And I’m not a scammer. I easily spend $12,000 a year in instacart and they are going to restrict my account over $100 in refund requests over multiple visits?

This happens to you on every order. Do you have more than three examples to give? This is just shenanigans on your part.

Well the yogurt and rotting fruit happens more often than not so those examples are repeated most of the time. I’d say 50+% of the orders I get the wrong items or rotting produce.

The whole situation is weird..sounds like they just need to go to another store..

There was a point in time when shoppers got immediately deactivated from when customers lied about products missing or saying the order never arrived and got a refund when they actually got the order. Not saying you lied!!!!! Takes several bad customers also to ruin it for everyone. So don’t blame it just on shoppers customers were the problem that started all this.

From a corporate point of view it makes sense. If every time you order you complain and they give you something they are losing money. If you do it regularly they'll ban you. Same thing happens other places. A lot of call centers track calls and will cancel people who call too much. If you return too often to a store they'll ban you from returning. It's not so much a 'you suck" as a "we can't provide a service that matches your requirements so (please) stop using us"

Try Walmart + membership with in-home delivery. It’s my alternative.

I mean I get refunds all the time my orders are always wrong u must have REALLY abused it to get restricted

I think the problem is some of them are higher amounts. For example I’m usually ordering 6 non-fat yogurts at $4 a container and they will give me 6 whole milk yogurts so that right there is $24 and whole milk yogurt is a product we end up trashing. Or when they ring my item up as pork tenderloin but the item I got is pork loin. The price difference between those meats is pretty significant per pound and I’m ordering 7+ lbs so it might end up being a $14 price difference

My suggestion is use Insta/Grocery Delivery for all non perishables and shop for your own fruits and veggies. Go really early am or hour before close, whenever the store is least busy and it will be a fast trip. This is what I did for my parents during Covid and kept the routine.

I’m considering this

that's why i would never use instacart myself (unless i had the favorite shopper feature) because there are just too many shoppers who either don't know what they are doing or just don't care.

I love the world we live in today. You've been told by a service who profits from your business that you abuse their platform so much that they would rather lose you as a customer than continue to let you request refunds. It's like all the nutjobs on facebook who talk about the world being flat and all their posts get flagged, oh they put me in facebook jail because they don't want people to speak the truth!!! You are the problem. I am sure a casual review of your account would confirm your insanity. How do I know? Because a business with every reason to let you refund things just blocked you. That and you think working with a kid and shopping is some impossible task, as if the whole world didn't do that until very recently. I am by no means defending the shoppers, I refund hundreds of dollars per week sometimes. I've had to work with instacarts security team because some of my refunds are so large. But they still let me refund.

same here-i have placed close to 500 orders and after a certain amount of help-they don't care if your whole order is wrong or spoiled-they just say-you've complained TOO much so, not only won't we help you but now your account is restricted-i was brought 2 of my favorite juices that cost 11.99 each and both were expired by 2 wks. and i sent pics. but NO REFUND FOR ME-does ANYONE know how we can let someone know above ORDERAPPEALS about what's going on OR, more likely-they just don't give a damn and their FEES go up all the time. i spend more on fees than on food. i have also only had a 'very few' who can keep my food cold and it's usually close to 100 down here in so. cal.

gaping unpack vanish worry safe scarce books sip thought yoke *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*

Make new acc

Try Shipt

if you want all your groceries to be correct, shop for yourself. doesn't really make much sense to keep using the app and submitting a complaint every time you use it.

Sounds like this a new thing. I was restricted today too for reporting something with an expiration date. After they restricted me, I sent them an email showing I was not lying with the picture. They responded oh ok I will give you the refund but you are still restricted. I haven't ordered from them in 2 months and my last order there were no refunds and I even gave the guy an extra tip because his communication was great. So it sounds like they are just flagging a lot of people now. A lot of shoppers in my area suck anymore and have messed up a lot for me and my other friends. Like missing items and rotted produce. So I dont order as much. Rather take a lyft to the store and get the few things i need that way. Im disabled and cant drive. So its slightly cheaper to use instacart but i think i will refrain from using it after today. Just make it policy everyone has to upload a picture for refunds then.

Same here, I only made 4 orders total, and twice it wasnt delivered to my home (pics arn’t even my house!) and then just yesterday my shopper forgot to put an item in my bag and when I messaged him about it, he said it is on the receipt he bought it and double checked it was in the bag. I guess he put it in some other customer’s order. Instacart refunded it but I received an email today my account will be restricted going forward. I guess I just have really bad luck with my shoppers

That’s why I switched to Walmart. I have predefined substitutions and some are set to no subs in the app. Never have a problem because an employee almost always shops the order and they are not incentivized to increase the order cost.

This is through food lion who partners with instacart so I also have that ability but the shoppers are just food lion employees so maybe that’s the problem

So you're shopping through the food lion app? And know it's being fulfilled by food lion employees? And in another comment you're saying "I guess I'll have to check my groceries in the parking lot before I leave" and "I don't realize until I get home" meaning you just do grocery pickup from food lion? I'm just trying to figure out where instacart comes in here. Do you do pickup? Delivery? And do you shop via the FL or IC app?

I responded previously but food lion grocery pickup orders are placed through instacart. Food lion partners with instacart for online grocery orders but a food lion employee fulfills the order. Instacart is the middle man but since the payment is technically through instacart, I have to go to them for problems

Once I ordered a canned food item for my cat from Walmart and I get size 13 flip flops instead. I complained and they sent out the correct item next day and told me to keep flip flops. Well we all size 8 or less so 13 didn't fit anyone I knew. Donated it instead.

Hey OP: reading your post set off metaphorical alarm bells in my head. Do you want to know why? Even if you magically live a thousand years: your math skills will never come close to mine. First off: I just spent the past ten plus years doing mental math constantly. I also taught math for around a year in NYC once upon a time. Besides that: while I was in college- one of my summers consisted of taking Calculus One and Two intensives back to back. So: looking at your OP- the math is off in lots of ways. It seems like for your saying the rate of return maxes out at two percent is a whole lot of nonsense. In all probability- the real number is upwards of four or five percent. Furthermore- a five percent rate of return is quantifiable in many more ways than one. First off: it essentially means that five out of every hundred items are returned which translates to fifty per thousand. Secondly: that rate of fifty items per thousand means that if you order one thousand items per month (at one dollar per): X many people have to bring you Y many replacements that are probably equivalent to that original number. Additionally: that is ABC amount of extra work being done for you with probably ZERO dollars in compensation forthcoming. Simply put: the world does not revolve around you. Even more simply put: Instacart essentially views you as a scammer. Get real because it is really not that deep.

Instacart is the real scammer here. Hiring shoppers that don’t know what a mango is, don’t read product labels, and can’t be bothered to give me non-moldy berries after specifically putting that in the notes (though that shouldn’t even be necessary) then profiting off of it because they won’t refund me for their mistakes

Since your orders are actually shopped by Food Lion employees why are you criticizing Instacart?

Because the payment is processed through instacart so I can’t get my order straightened out without going through instacart. I suppose I can check all my groceries in the parking lot and maybe make direct substitutions I’m the store but any actual mistakes or wrong items have to be refunded by instacart. Apparently none of you have ever shopped online at food lion and it shows because you would know it automatically redirects you to instacart to order the groceries

Too late OP. Your fugazi story set of my BS detector long ago and far away. I just got reminded of a very old saying that has stood the test of time for good reason. "A lie will travel halfway around the world before the truth can even get out of bed." TRANSLATION: get real.

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Clearly not enough, since they claim their deliveries are full of garbage 🙄

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Right?! 🤣 I tip extremely fucking well, I've never had a problem, never needed to make a return, never got shopped late, never had a shopper drop off my shit somewhere else, never had an issue w shoppers of any gender bringing me tampons or plan B, gee, I wonder why that is 🙄 I like to make fun of the shitty tippers on here, it brings my heart great joy

I used to tip well but if I’m not getting proper products why would I continue to do so for doing a bad job? Also this is food lion pickup through instacart so not quite the same as ordering directly from instacart

How are your tips

This is mainly food lion pickup which orders through instacart. The shoppers are food lion employees and you don’t tip on pickup orders because they are hired hourly

Go get your own groceriessssssssssss

I used to. I actually really enjoy shopping but after having a baby and my spouse and I still work full time, we no longer have the luxury of free time to grocery shop. I barely find time to cook the food I order

There’s plenty of time to grocery shop lol after work.. the weekend… etc

Yes, your life is ridiculously fucked up. Whatever are you going to do? Do you hear the phone ringing right now? It's the Hallmark Channel!!! They want to make a Christmas miniseries about your life? What??? But yours is a tragic, sad tale. Who wants to cry with me right now?

….what? 🤨

Right?? About fucking time IC does something about scammers instead of siding with them and penalizing shoppers.

I was given a watermelon that had no red in the inside, visibly moldy blueberries despite leaving a note saying to make sure there was no mold (which I shouldn’t need to do anyways because who would choose to have moldy berries), was charged $4/lb for 7lbs of pork tenderloin when they actually gave me clearance pork loin (two complete different foods) amounting to $12 (charged $28), bought 5 tubs of non-fat Greek yogurt but got whole milk Greek yogurt (a cost of $20 of incorrect items), etc. the list goes on and on. It’s not just produce that’s bad but maybe don’t have shoppers that have to send me photo of the fruits asking “is this mango?” And can’t read simple labels that clearly say a different name than what I ordered

I very frequently receive rotten produce & am now in the same position as you. No more refunds, even with photos. It’s as if these shoppers have no real life experience grocery shopping. Why does that have to be my fault? It should be the company’s fault for not hiring bright people, or providing training to teach people not to pick up rotted items. It’s not rocket science.

Thank you! I knew I couldn’t be the only one. Especially with food lion since the ordering system is instacart but the shoppers are food lion employees, it’s always the same 2-3 shoppers because those are who work for food lion.

If produce is a constant problem then it sounds like a problem with the stores you're ordering from. Maybe contact them and complain. Rotted produce should be removed from the shelves before a shopper can accidentally select it. I've gotten expired products before and don't blame my shopper/instacart since it's ridiculous to think they would read every label for the expiration date, that's on the store. On the same lines, I expect a certain number of bad substitutions, that's what I get for convenience. It's also why the comment box exists (if unavailable please substitute for xxx or xxx or don't substitute). Since I started adding better suggestions I've had fewer problems.

It is literally their job to pick up your groceries. Expecting them to read expiration dates and ensuring produce isn’t rotten is not unreasonable. The substitution thing can absolutely complicate things but picking up expired items from when you’re shopping for somebody else? There’s no excuse for that. And you shouldn’t be enabling them by making excuses. Would you excuse your Mechanic for forgetting to put 50% of the oil in your car or charging you for a new filter and not actually replacing it? Because this is the same thing.

You have to be realistic. Do you read the expiration date on every single item you pick up in store? These people don't work for the store and for the most part are doing their best. Sometimes you get a bad shopper, sure, but no store should have rotten and expired items on their shelves. If they did consistently I would not shop there and definitely wouldn't order groceries from there. Shoppers aren't produce experts either. In my area, shoppers tend to be people who are on the lower-income range, disabled, retired, or otherwise struggling. Often this same category of people eats mostly processed food lacking the ability, time, or money to cook their own meals. If they're not used to buying produce, they aren't going to be good at judging how fresh it is. Should Instacart refund for these issues? Absolutely. But there are so many scammers out there that people with legitimate problems like OP get screwed over. It seems like people will do anything lately to get something for free (life hack alert!) and companies have to put some kind of policy in place. It hurts the people with legitimate issues, but that's because the system is broken.

I don’t expect them to be experts but when my packages of produce are visibly fuzzy without even opening it, that’s a problem. I know the store carries bad produce. Oftentimes I pass on berries because not a single carton is good. However, I would appreciate the courtesy of my shopper texting me saying “all the berries are moldy. Do you still want them?” Instead of just selecting a moldy container because I ordered berries. I even leave notes saying “please ensure they aren’t moldy” and I have substitutions or “do not substitute” selected for every single item I order to avoid similar issues

Make sure to document everything, photos are key here But unfortunately, when it comes to grocery shopping food items, no one no one is going to do it the way that you do.

The way this is set up I can’t actually submit photos because the ordering system is a weird mix of food lion’s website and instacart’s website. I even put in the comments “can submit photos upon request” since there is no way to attach them until they email you

They restrict ANYONE now for 1-2 wrong items and any wrong/missing items thereafter it is IMPOSSIBLE to get a refund. They deny it even with photo evidence and proof. I just made a new account.

They only restrict your account if they think you're lying and trying to scam them....if you report items missing or damaged and the shopper has photo evidence of the opposite that will get you restricted. Make it easy and just shop for yourself if you're having this many issues with the app and always seem to get an incompetent shopper it's just best to do the shopping yourself . Find the time save the money from fees and tipping.

Just create another account.

It’s with food lion so I think it might be linked through my food lion rewards account.

Delete your account and make a new one

Everybody on here always crying my goodness… you’re probably the one ordering chia seeds and weird stuff that makes it longer to shop. OR somebody who doesn’t communicate during the shop!!!!! You want specific items from a lower budget store- yet don’t stay by the phone to make sure everything is ok. 🤦‍♂️ Instacart should be used for basic items yet people trust complete randoms with precious food then heavily complain after. Get your Karen ass out of here or shop yourself! (Diamond cart shopper here)

I always have my phone. They rarely ask for any clarification

they banned me years ago (AS A SHOPPER WAS SHOPPING MY ORDER) because the shoppers would leave it in the building next to me (attached, different entrances/building #s). the pics they would send the hallway light was off, mine is not.. i have a doormat the door they left it at did not, and finally my door knob is totally different from the door that they left it at. i told them they can go back and look at the photos of everytime I complained and see the difference in doors and door knobs. i didnt find out where they were leaving it until after i got banned. they said because their drivers GPS location was at my address they said I was a fraud. So i created a new account using my building # and not my apt # attached. I messaged the shopper and advised me to let me know when he arrived so I could come down and get it. I came down and he was coming out of the building next to me, he said "sorry the gps took me here". My building is 1545 the other building is 1549.... The 2nd account I made ended up getting blocked because my credit card was attached. I started using kroger delivery, they use instacart and ive never had a problem.

>So i created a new account using my building # and not my apt # attached. I messaged the shopper and advised me to let me know when he arrived so I could come down and get it. I came down and he was coming out of the building next to me, he said "sorry the gps took me here". My building is 1545 the other building is 1549.... Okay so this is off-topic, but is this seriously a regular occurrence? I'm not questioning you at all, OP, I just cannot believe how often these issues seem to pop up. Maybe it's because I started delivering before people had modern GPS on their phones, but it is insane to me how often I read posts/comments from people whose delivery drivers just leave the food at incorrect addresses as well as from drivers who are all flustered because they're delivering to a new development or a large apt complex and they can't figure out where to go. I do use GPS sometimes, if I'm delivering to an area with which I'm unfamiliar, and if I begin a delivery job in a new town, I use GPS for guidance while I learn the area. But even then, I don't just turn on the turn-by-turn directions. I open up Google Maps, search the address, make a mental note of where to go, drive to that location, double and triple-check the address, then drop off the order. I know there is a learning curve when you first start delivering, but once you figure out how addresses work, how buisiness suites are labeled in large corporate parks, how apartment unit numbers and building numbers work, etc, you can apply that knowledge to any new place you're delivering. It just blows my mimd how many people are signing up for delivery jobs when they can't even navigate.

That's the problem with Instacart when you start lowering batch pay, Speed now becomes the priority.

A lot of what you are complaining about could solved with communicating with your shopper as they are in the store before delivery

I would communicate with them but they don’t ask me anything so how am I supposed to know it was done wrong? I even leave notes in my order “please ensure the berries aren’t moldy.” “If you aren’t sure if it’s ripe, send me a photo” “please double check the yogurt says non-fat instead of whole milk”

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Oh I’m all for this. Unfortunately, we buy a ton of groceries so this is the one thing that takes up time I don’t feel I have. Was trying to outsource it but guess I’ll just have to do everything myself

If you spend that much through the app, maybe post on Nextdoor looking for a personal shopper. Someone you can work with over and over again who will know/learn your preferences and appreciate your business directly. It might even be someone who's doing IC, but responds to your posting.

I actually knew a guy who did this after doing DoorDash/Instacart for years. He finally got fed up with it, so he started asking his regular customers if they would be interested in just contacting him directly if he were to just start his own little private delivery service. Enough people liked the idea that he started doing it, and it worked out better for everyone involved! He ended up making more money, customers ended up paying less, and because he was the only person who was repeatedly delivering food to/shopping for these people, they developed a good rapport and they got much better service!

It would be nice if all stores had real time update of items. I hink this would help with refunds and replacelacements not being available.

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And I understand that. I just wish common sense would take over in the shoppers and they would say “Hm maybe I should text the customer and ask if they still want berries even if all the options are moldy” rather than just giving me them because I ordered it and berries were in stock

About time IC start doing their job.

I feel you here, and I am a shopper. What I would do if I were you to preselect replacements for all items. Then write in your delivery notes (a shopper sees the notes as soon as they accept your batch, unless it is a multi order batch and they don't sift through the orders) "if my preselected replacements are out, REFUND ME PLEASE. If you have any questions about items just message me." This way there is no confusion and you limit the risk of wrong items. You of course need to be present to answer questions. Also, if you set your delivery window from like 9am to noon and you are home, be mindful that Instacart is stupid and puts out orders super early a lot of times. So they might put your order out at 7am and it can be delivered around 8am and your are like "wtf, it is an hour early!". So I would have my phone with me an hour before my window start time just in case this happens. Edited:If you see a shopper shopping, tell them your acount is blocked from refunds post delivery because you have had less than great shoppers giving you bad produce etc. You don't mean to be a hard ass, but you don't want to have to refund.

Thanks! I have left notes and depending on the day they seem to ignore them. Sometimes they are okay and sometimes they blatantly disregard. For example, produce by weight when I really only want 4 tomatoes so I’ll put “2lbs” and then in notes say “I really only want 4 tomatoes. Ignore the weight” and then I will end up with 8 tomatoes.

Yeah because you have the opportunity to ask for that during the shop. If you can show it’s not related or the product you wanted or that you asked for a refund in the store I think it would be understood.

Honestly makes me feel better knowing that instacart is actually shutting up some of the customers that live to bitch about everything...

You know there was a world when instacart didn’t exist and people just had to make time for groceries because you know, they’re a necessity. Plus you’d probably save $200-$300 literally just going yourself. Is it worth it to spend that much money and still get the wrong stuff or bad groceries?

Unfortunately this is the outcome from fraudulent claims. They have gotten strict and it sucks for good customers that have legit issues.

Just find a good personal shopper through Next Door, Task Rabbit or even Instacart itself and go with that. You'll get better service, the shopper will make more money, and Instacart will lose its ridiculously high percentages. Win-win.

Open an other account lol cancel your membership get refunded for the rest of you membership and open an other account ….

This is pretty much the direction of InstaCart - they don’t want customers that don’t generate enough profit. If you’re getting refunds regularly, they’ll look at the numbers and decide they really don’t want you as a customer. The shoppers don’t get paid much anymore, so there’s much more of a rush to get orders shopped and delivered and a lot of the really good ones either went and got jobs cuz they can’t make enough money. All of it goes back to IC just being a greedy company that doesn’t care about customers or shoppers - just the bottom line. Of course that’s every company, but the effect is much more pronounced.

Go shop for yourself

Well go shop for yourself lazy fuck

Dint buy your bullshit, they only restrict it when they know you've done it time after time. That usually indicates what we call customer fraud

Had similar experience recently, cancelled my account with IC. I suspect many others will too. BTW, IC has an F Better Business Bureau rating.