According to a former Instacart shopper, there’s a shady reason why the brand isn’t allowing delivery drivers to hand over receipts to customers—and it’s got everything to do with making more money. She says that unless customers absolutely have to get their groceries delivered via Instacart they are effectively “just wasting [their] money.”
If you’ve followed the Daily Dot’s previous coverage of Instacart, you may have seen that other shoppers have noticed glaring discrepancies between the amount they were charged on the store’s physical receipts and how much they were paying on the Instacart app itself.
@sophiakokolakis that was a little higher than expected but oh well im still lazy #instacart #instacartshopper #groceries #instacartcustomer #foodprices #foodcosts ♬ original sound – sophia koko
And while the TikTok above was uploaded by a customer, a recent TikTok video uploaded by Nicole Beckermeister (@nicccyb) looks at this phenomenon through the eyes of a shopper. According to the former Instacart employee, the app does this on purpose to keep customer gripes to a minimum and so that the business can ensure premiums on the items it lists on its app.
She posted about the practice in a viral TikTok clip that’s accrued over 1.6 million views and sparked various reactions from Instacart shoppers and customers.
@nicccyb #stitch with @sophia koko #instacartshopper #insta ♬ original sound – Nicole Beckermeister
Beckermeister begins her stitched clip in response to fellow TikTok user Sophia Koko, who stands in her kitchen, shockingly looking at the receipt a delivery driver mistakenly left in the bag. Beckermeister then jumps into her rant about the practice.
“I did Instacart as a shopper for two and a half years, and they would pretty much threaten to deactivate your account if you ever put the receipt in the bag,” she claims. “That’s because, which a lot of people know this but a lot of people also don’t, so, I’m just making people aware, they upcharge the sh*t out of you on every single item.”
Beckermeister says it is extremely “deceptive,” especially when the app claims there’s a “sale” going on.
“Sometimes, it’ll show me on the app on the customer’s end, an item’s $10 and it’s ‘on sale’ for $8.99 or $8 or $7,” she explains. “But in reality, the store’s charging like $5, so there’s really no sale going on, it’s very deceiving.”
Beckermeister continues to discuss another other grimy practice she says Instacart participated in: the “lie” of rush or priority delivery. Beckermeister states that shoppers on the app don’t see if a customer requested rush or priority delivery for their order.
“Also whatever priority fee you’re paying, like to have your groceries delivered at a certain time or like earlier or rushed…that is never visible to the person delivering your groceries. Like we have no clue that you paid that.”
Viewers were shocked to hear of the receipt gatekeeping policy. One person said that they delivered groceries through the app and thought that they were supposed to leave the bill of sale in the bag. “WAIT lmfao as an instacart delivery driver I thought the screen asking if we kept the receipt meant to keep it in their bags so they could see,” they wrote.
Someone else said that the fee upcharges really started mounting in the past few years, but the app wasn’t always like this when it came to exorbitant overage charges.
“I used to love Instacart as someone who has a disability and can’t drive but I’ve noticed a real change since 2020 and the fees are crazy,” they said.
Another Instacart shopper said they gladly flouted the no-receipt-in-bag policy. “I put the receipt in every bag,” they shared. “I didn’t care when I did Instacart.”
However, upcharging for items in the application itself doesn’t appear to be an issue unique to Instacart—another person in the comments section, wrote, “Doordash is like this too, I’ve noticed $4+ price differences.”
When it comes to prepared meal delivery apps like DoorDash, the phenomena of “premium” pricing is nothing new and something that The Motley Fool says restaurants do to offset the 30% fee DoorDash pockets. One Redditor also said that they’ve noticed products listed in Instacart’s application are around 25% higher than in the store. One way to avoid these premiums is to go to the store’s website directly and see if they offer delivery for either a cheaper cost or if there’s a minimum order amount to waive the fee entirely.
The Daily Dot has reached out to Instacart via email Beckermeister via TikTok comment.
