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Phone is still the best way to order pizza

dan.bulwinkle.net

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Re: Phone is still the best way to order pizza

#451

Post by brokenmachine »

Nextgrid wrote: post #385
helsinkiandrew wrote: post #271

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Exactly, Just like going to a restaurant you visit regularly and the staff know you, you'll get better service and quicker food if you have a relationship with the people taking the order, and making and delivering the food. Use an app for discovering new places and seeing what they offer and order direct by phone.

The problem with ordering direct by phone is that delivery companies have monopolized the market and make it unprofitable for restaurants to have their own delivery staff, so a lot of them no longer do.

As a customer I have the right to not order if it's crappy Uber delivery which IMO has way too many problems, and I exercise that right and let the restaurant know.

When I call the restaurant I ask them if they have their own delivery person, or if it's Uber. If it's Uber, I politely decline to order from them.

Re: Phone is still the best way to order pizza

#452

Post by Handytinge »

bee_rider wrote: post #185
kzrdude wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is wild, I didn't know such default pizzas existed (my context: scandinavia)

Cheese pizza must be the default, right? It is the lack of toppings. Although whether they follow up to clarify about toppings must depend on the place. In my experience, if the guy on the phone is rude and lets you mess up your order, they are much more likely to produce a good pizza. Places will only be polite (or offer lots of options) if they can't compete on quality.

In every country I've ordered pizza, there is no default. If I said "a large pizza", they'd say "ok, what type?".

Re: Phone is still the best way to order pizza

#453

Post by hilbert42 »

tedmiston wrote: post #419
hilbert42 wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Moreover, you can't even phone Uber Eats! I had a huge delivery of Chinese food left on my doorstep (it was still quite hot). Obviously, delivered to the wrong address. The bill was fully itemized and stapled to one of the Uber bags and it came to just short of $200 but there was no correct address and no telephone number to be found on it anywhere. Anyway, I did my best to contact Uber Eats to get the delivery perso…

> No way to escalate review to a human. None at all. > Moreover, you can't even phone Uber Eats! Uber Eats does have human phone support. https://gethuman.com/chat/UberEATS UberEATS Phone Number: 800-253-9377

OK, fair enough. Trouble is, at present I'm living outside the US, it seems those rules don't apply here. Apologies for not making that clear earlier.

Re: Phone is still the best way to order pizza

#454

Post by hilbert42 »

alexvoda wrote: post #440
FDSGSG wrote: post #403

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>therefore being unusable to certain portions of the population (old non-technical people, those who lost their phone, those who use an OS other than Android or iOS, dead battery and no charging cable, etc.) FWIW uber has had a web app for years now, and before that there were a plenty of unofficial clients. I remember calling Ubers from my laptop in 2016.

That dialogue happened at an early enough point in time when that was not the case. Glad to hear they have a web UI now. Even if I use the phone app, the web app is an important backup to have.

Not so outside the US where I live.

Re: Phone is still the best way to order pizza

#455

Post by Spooky23 »

Turing_Machine wrote: post #423
Spooky23 wrote: post #377

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No that’s very different as bakeries and flour mills add value to the commodity product. DoorDash pays the drivers well, so it’s using investor dollars to subsidize the service to entrench it and drive out competitive processes. Your argument was was the same as the Uber argument at the peak type period. When the Saudi sovereign wealth fund was kicking in $10-20 for each ride, the hype argument was we would not need…

> No that’s very different as bakeries and flour mills add value to the commodity product. Uber adds value by letting me call a ride by clicking on an app, and then telling me when it has arrived, rather than making me call the cab dispatch office, wait on hold, and then constantly look out the door to see if the cab is there. > Now, Uber costs more than the cabs did before. Not here, it doesn't. In virtually every c…

> Those medallions are still out there, by the way. If Uber is really charging more than a cab, then the cabs will come back and undercut them.

The cabs are gone in most places. Why would someone go through the risk of getting cars, insurance, etc when Uber will notice a dip in business in days and crush you with discounts?

The NYC scenario is very different because medallions were a control in place to limit congestion; NYC in general and Manhattan in particular is a unique place.

Re: Phone is still the best way to order pizza

#456

Post by pwdisswordfish9 »

Nextgrid wrote: post #378
pwdisswordfish9 wrote: post #328

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I’ve had food sitting at restaurants for over an hour before while Uber attempts to find a driver. If you're in a metro area ordering during ordinary hours and having this happen, it's almost certainly because the restaurant has developed a bad reputation and people refuse to work with them. The thing about Uber's intermediation is that if you had this sort of experience by ordering directly through the restaurant,…

> the restaurant has developed a bad reputation and people refuse to work with them Do you mean delivery drivers refuse to pick up from there? How is that a customer's problem? That's a potential breach of contract between Uber and the delivery drivers. Uber Eats positions itself as an end-to-end managed service where you pay money to receive delivered food, and charges hefty fees (on both sides of the transaction) f…

> Do you mean delivery drivers refuse to pick up from there? How is that a customer's problem?

It's not (necessarily), but it's not the drivers' problem, either. It's the restaurant's problem—just like it's their problem if no customers want to do business with them because their food tastes bad, or if their suppliers refuse to do business with them because they're always late paying invoices, etc.

> That's a potential breach of contract between Uber and the delivery drivers.

You can't have a breach of contract for contracts you don't pick up... Or are you implying that you believe the relationship between Uber and their contractors is/should be one where the driver has to take every offer that Uber sends them? If so, are you a freelancer? How would you feel about an arrangement where, because you agreed to work with Marcy in Q2, then when Albert comes to you in Q3 and wants some work done, you have to take it no matter how bad Albert's offer is—e.g. one which very well might turn out to have you working for less than minimum wage—or without regard for whether you find Albert to be a loathsome, demanding prick?

> FedEx/USPS doesn't manage the customer relationship, doesn't broker the transaction

Neither do UberEATS drivers. That's the entire point of the metaphor. (Having said that, I misread your original comment, which other comments have pointed out.)

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