During these times when it’s safer to stay home, you might be tempted to just have your food delivered to your door through services like Foodpanda. Please don’t make the same mistake that I did. Avoid them like the plague because Foodpanda is a thief. This is my review.
By the way, I met the Foodpanda CEO in Singapore, when I was invited by Foodpanda themselves to a blogger event. I had fun at that event so I am extremely disappointed that I would have to sever my relationship to the company this way.
So on to my review. This afternoon, I ordered some groceries from the Foodpanda Mart and was told it would arrive in 20 minutes or so.
I kept the Foodpanda app open on my phone which I put in front of me, and put on a mask so I could immediately go down once the delivery guy contacted me to say that he had arrived. Our building has a new policy that all deliveries could only be done to our reception at the first floor, as a Covid prevention measure.
To my surprise, instead of a message or a call stating that the delivery man had arrived, I got an app notification that my order had been cancelled, along with this email from Foodpanda:
At first I thought, okay, maybe I should just reorder. Then I reread the email and this part jumped out:
A refund can’t be provided in this case.
Well that was when I saw red.
How is it justifiable for them to just steal my money from me through no fault of my own?!?
But even if, let’s say, it really was my fault – though in this case it was not – is it fair to keep the full amount? If they kept the delivery fee – sure, maybe I could have let that slide – BUT THE FULL AMOUNT?!?
THIEF.
There is just no other way to describe Foodpanda.
I tried to go back to my order in the Foodpanda app and see if there was a way to lodge a complaint, but there was no appeal option or whatever, or if there was, it’s not something you can easily find. It’s like they want to discourage you from seeking justice.
So I decided to lodge my complaint through my own channel.
Goodbye, Foodpanda. And good riddance.
UPDATE:
I finally got a response from Foodpanda. I couldn’t find a way to email them about this so I requested to cancel my account. Someone reached out to me asking why, so I explained my concern and even linked them to this post. Below was the response, which I received 5 days after the incident.
While I am grateful to get the refund, their insistence that I had been contacted twice and that this was an exception still doesn’t sit right with me. How can I use them again when there is a possibility that this will happen again and then they will not refund me when it does?
They need to fix their policy. Deduct a minimum fee, the way Uber does – this makes more sense. I bought groceries – this could have easily been returned to the store and not cause any loss.
And besides, a lot of friends informed me that they too had issues with Foodpanda. I think it’s best to move on.