I occasionally deliver for DoorDash and Uber Eats, and I just wanted to pass along a suggestion for those who use these services: Have the driver mark the order as picked up on their app in view of someone at the restaurant.
Here's why: On the app for these services, a driver is presented with an order. They can accept it or decline it. If they decline, it's then offered to another driver. If they accept, they'll go to the restaurant, pick up the food, and mark it as picked up in the app. At that point they'll be presented with directions to the customer's house.
Before marking the order as picked up, though, drivers can cancel the order and pass it on to another driver. I might do that, for example, if the order was from a fast food place and I get there to see a line at the drive-thru that's 30 cars long. It's not worth waiting an hour for a delivery that might pay $7.
What seems to be happening is that some drivers are pickup up an order and instead of marking it as picked up, they're canceling the order. That driver keeps the food, another driver shows up looking for it, and the customer calls to complain about not having received their order.
I received an order for a restaurant the other day. I just happened to be less than a block away, and when I got there another driver was waiting for a double order. I asked the hostess for mine, and she pointed to the other driver and said "He already picked it up." I asked him if he had my order, and he fumbled with his phone and said, "I had it but they must have taken it away." I'm 100% convinced he canceled the order and intended to keep the food. He just didn't expect another driver to show up before he left.
I've noticed a few restaurants that are asking drivers to mark orders as picked up in view of staff because of this. Others have done away with the pickup shelf where drivers can just come in and grab orders.
Drivers can only cancel so many orders before getting deactivated, but it seems to be a growing problem. I guess there's always some jerk looking to exploit the weakness in any system.