Instacart
reviews and complaints

I have been using this service several times a week for well over a year, as I have been struggling with health issues so the "convenience" of this services has its benefits, when it runs smoothly. Unfortunately some of the shoppers dont communicate when swapping items and purchase things that are beyond the same or similar price, buy the wrong item, buy expired or damages items or charge you for the item and it doesn't arrive. I've even had my groceries delivered to some other address. My delivery instructions also list to leave at the side door, which on numerous occasions it has been left on my front door, which I have no access to.

Because apparently I have received too many refunds for legitimate shopping mistakes I now get referred to having to deal with the appeals department, where I have to email my complaints, and I either hear nothing at all back or my appeal gets denied. The appeals department has no direct phone line, nd the customer service helpline is unable to do anything regarding appeals, so you are left in limbo while the company and its shoppers steal money from a single mother dealing with severe health issues on a limited income. Its disgusting.

For a company who brags about its convenience and customer service and support, prays on the innocent who believe that to be true and rely on the service. I cant imagine how many seniors or severely disabled people have been ripped off

I have requested on numerous occasions for them to go through all my appeals and grant the refunds back to me. These are legitimate complaints about legitimate issues, your shoppers mistakes are not something I should be paying for.

So I wake to find my instacart account has been hacked and someone is shopping and having items delivered to a hotel room across the other side of the country - mind you it is a hotel room with a room number the chat history has the person talking to the shoppers and telling them to leave the items outside the hotel room.

So, I contact instacart they ask a bunch of questions and say ok let's deactivate your account and give us 24hrs to look into this. Meanwhile the person in the hotel room has gotten away with fraud I had to call my bank to cancel my bank card so now I have no access to funds until my new card arrives but worse instacart could call the police and have them go to that hotel room or find out who booked the room before other people experience the same its not a small amount of orders or money but no instacart won't do this they say wait 24hrs this is crazy people are committing fraud and they do little about it and they don't have a number you can call only a chat person who send emails this is the worst service ever.

I was promised a redelivery for an order from Rosauers that was delivered on Jan 13 to a wrong street and number. the redelivery was received on Jan 14 but was not complete because several items were refunded. The original amount of 92.36 remains on my debit card which means that the original delivery amount was charged when items were missing in the redelivery.

On January 16th, I placed two orders. One order with Tony's Finer Foods for $105.00 and one order with Sam's Club for $165.00. I was charged 2 times back to back. I was charged over $550.00 for my two orders. My account was then overdrawn. I spoke to one customer service employee and 2 supervisors and a woman named Kelly who claimed she was a senior supervisor. Kelly, was very argumentative and kept blaming the double charges on BMO Harris. She then told me that it was my fault because, "charges just don't magically appear" She then told me it was my fault because I didn't have the funds available in my account so they tried 4 times. I said to her, if I didn't have funds, all of the charges totaling over $550 wouldn't have been debited. It has been two days now and I have received no reimbursement. I will never order again from Instacart.

On 2/14/23/ I placed an order for some salad and some badly needed bandages. To this day 2/17/23 I have not received my order. You keep giving delivery dates but you don't show up.
Cancel. And if I happen to be in the club, do not charge me. I will never use you again.
This was a Publix in Fayetteville, GA. If you can't advise me you will not be bringing my stuff, just say so and don't have me waiting while you keep changing the delivery date. You suck. I am handicapped and I needed those bandages.
A special [censored] you very much.

On Dec. 31st I placed a rather large order at my local grocery store. The total came to $257 and Instacart charged me $72 for a tip. I went in within the two-hour window that you have to change your tip to $20. Not only did Instacart charge me the $72, but also charged me the $20. I have been on the phone for the past two weeks trying to clear this up with them. I get on the phone today and the woman was so incredibly nasty and told me there was nothing that could be done. I told her to cancel my account on the spot! Never again!

I've cancelled my last 2 fairway orders and will not order again from them. In my last order I included 6 bottles of Hal's seltzer (1/2 liter size) & an 8-pack of Poland springs black cherry carbonated water (1/2 liter bottles).

Plus some bread, hot dog buns, Kellogg's breakfast bars.

THEY ADDED A $10 HEAVY CHARGE!

That is OUTRAGEOUS. No other store includes this charge.

Another issue is Walgreens. I ordered 3 6-packs of Diet Coke bottles listed for $4.99 each. My order was cancelled. Later that day, I went into Walgreens. There was a shelf of Diet Coke 6-pack bottles listed at $5.99.

They would not honor the listed price on the Instacart web site.

As a result, I doubt I'll renew my service.

Thank you.

Merle Bolonkin

On December 13,2022 I placed an order with Instacart the total amount was $159.14 plus a $21.51 delivery fee that was supposed to be free for that order. Instacart took the $149.14 out of my account on December 13th and,14. I have contacted Instacart multiple times about this matter to either be ignored or get no resolution. Because they took it upon themselves to double charge me it overdrafted my account. I had to pay overdraft fees plus come up with the extra money to put back back in my account to recover my bills. This has been one of the most horrible experiences of my life and don't recommend Instacart to anyone ever. One representative told me my refund was processed and would be back in my account in 10-14 days and it never was.

I've worked for these people for the last 4 months, they have no service available to their drivers so if you get into a jam you wait on hold for 40 minutes through the app only. My last order for them was the Thursday before Christmas at Costco, it was slammed and their app shut down. I paid for the groceries out of my own pocket and finally someone answered, they chewed me out for using my own funds. I received a 1 star review from the customer, which I found out later is related to the founder. In essence, this company is a product of satan's work, however, if you're completely desperate this is your wonderland.

I made an order on December 31, which is NY Eve. I had a party this evening. The delivery was scheduled for 7pm, than rescheduled to 7:45 and then to January 2 which I did not need at all. I was already late for holiday evening and the only open store was far. We spent 100 dollars on UBER. our party was almost screwed up.The company offered me 10$ certificate to my next puchase. I am not going to use this company any more for the awful service and customer support and insist on normal compensation.

An instacart shopper delivered to a neighbor at my friend's apartment on sunday, Jan. 1, 2023 around 4:30pm. I had left 2 christmas presents at her door as I walked back to my car to call them to see how much longer they were going to be before they arrived. During this time, a black large SUV arrived in the parking lot and a black male got out with bags. He preceded up the apartment stairs and by my friend's apartment on the 2nd floor. He continued to the 3rd floor to drop off the groceries. I walked back up the stairs and the packages I had set there were gone. He jumped into the SUV and drove off with whoever was driving. This all occured within less than 10 minutes. He stole the packages as he delivered to another apartment.

I called your customer cares within 15 minutes of this happening. The person was unable to assist telling me that she would send me a form to fill out. I gave her the address of the delivery. She never sent the form.

The police were called and a report was done. The lower level apartment has a ring video of the person.

What are you going to do about this? Y'all know who delivered to this address!

Occurred at: Trophy Club Apartments

Address of where packages were stolen: 2620 Stableside Ct apt 203-12

Address of where Instacart shopper delivered: Apt 205-12

My contact info: [protected]@gmail.com

Instacart, great concept, but a huge rip-off. They have zero customer service knowledge and deliveries are never complete as ordered. They charge for membership, service fees, service fee tax, traveling fees and container fees. None of these fees are disclosed prior to processing payment. They also expect a 10% gratuity with the option to increase!

Customer service has been contacted several times and they simply send out form letters to address issues. Their BBB rating is 1.1/5 closing over 4,652 complaints in the past 3 years. Wonder how many have NOT been closed! Clearly not a reputable company.

Instacart practices fraudulent billing by not specifying and disclosing charges prior to checkout. They charge an addition amount on your card when ordering and return unused funds 3-4 days later. Membership only buys a reduced Service fee which varies per delivery yet they state Free Member delivery. LIES!

Service fees applies mostly to their Instacart driver background. So what does Membership include? I have not yet received an order that was complete or correct and customer service is useless avoiding known issues.

I am canceling membership as it is worthless.

Recently 12/12/22, I was charged $99 for Instacart's annual membership. This was strange to me as I had used the service a maximum of 3 times, months... possibly years ago (2020) and never signed up for their auto renewal, much less their annual plan. This seems like a fraudulent practice to me as my card details were stored on their app and it appears they want these charges to go under the radar. I have reached out to customer support and have received a refund, makes me wonder why they did it no questions asked. This seems like a massive breach of confidential credit card information. I only hope people check their bank billing and report this fraud of a company.

On 12/20/2022, my wife ordered some groceries from Sam's Club Via Instacart... At 4:39 pm Hawaii time, the Instacart driver named Solomon S. texts my wife and tells her he cant find parking to deliver the groceries... My wife explained to the driver, Solomon, where he could park but he refused, claiming he doesn't want to pay for a parking ticket... The driver Solomon then put the groceries on the pathway to the entrance of the building... He then texts a picture of the groceries left.. (see attached picture).. and then asked my wife if she wants to return the groceries... My wife said no and then went downstairs with her WHEELCHAIR she uses due to a recent surgery... Solomon did put the groceries on the wheelchair but did not even offer to help bring up the groceries... The driver also stated he didn't have a wagon or a cart to bring up the groceries... My wife paid an additional $20.00 in service fees to Instacart to get groceries delivered... We have used Instacart in the past and never had this problem... I choose to post here because I read that dealing directly with Instacart is very difficult...

I had an Instacart Shopper use my credit card for unauthorize purchased today around 130pm December 19, 2022!

I made an online order with Harris Teeter who used Instacart. I could not see any of the process in the grocery shopping and thought it was Harris Teeter new app and online service. Strangely, the order was complete with no issue so I thought. Got my order which smells like cigarettes, notice I was missing items. I had my receipt, and notices 2 sandwiches that was additional purchases I did not make. Harris Teeter did not resolve my issues due to having disconnected calls by rude customer service reps. I call Instacart who I believe will sweep this under the rug with all of their out sourcing these days. I will continue to pursue this until justice is serve!

On December 14, 2022 I placed an order with instacart for my elderly mother who is handicapped and housebound. She was skeptical about using the service as it connected her debit card and she is on a limited income. I entered her EBT information and selected the option to use ebt/snap as the payment method.

Upon checkout, I was prompted to enter her pin to her debit card twice which was unsuccessful but the order was still placed. I shortly received an email confirming her delivery and the entire order was charged to her debit card. I began by responding by email in an attempt to resolve the issue, and reached no resolution. Today, I called and spoke with a representative who informed me that the PIN for the EBT card was never submitted. That is not my ever, that is a technical error with the app, and how was I to know that I was supposed to enter a pin for the EBT card to begin with?

I asked the representative to please speak with a manager and was informed that he was in a meeting and I would receive a call back within 30 minutes to an hour. I never received that call back. It appears as though this is a fraudulent scheme that instacart uses in an attempt to defraud customers and charge their debit cards instead of applying their snap benefits. The problem is that my mother now has no money left in her bank account for the rest of her month and needed it to take a ride to the doctors and back, and now she is unable to do so, and has chronic health issues that need to be addressed. I am outraged that this company could deliver such poor customer service and made no attempt to resolve this issue. Praying on the handicapped and the elderly is not cool at all and I intend on complaining until this issue is addressed. She depended on this service and it was her first time using it and I'm sure she will never want to use it again.

I truly hope that there is someone in this company who has some level of ethics and professionalism and can resolve the problem.

This complaint is about instacart and how they lie , hold back pay earned and overall treatment of there employees . I have been with instacart I believe two years , I work alot and especially during the holidays, every major storm for the last 2 years and there's been several , often times 1 of 3 I the niagara falls and surrounding areas during bad weather times but on day I believe 15 or in that Area, buffalo was hit with a major snow storm and that's when I was out rherr geti.g customers grocerys t hat they had been waiti.g for (in some cases 2 and 3 days . That is when instacart loved me especially until... I didn't have much time it wS day 2 of snowstorm and roads were getting shut down and instacart was they only company still taking customers orders all other delivery company's refused there workers to work because of conditions , well I waited till the light came on for gad as I was delivering I stopped quickly to fill my tank however I was out aprox 20 miles room home and had a tripple order still needing delivered, only l

Problem my debit card was being denied , what I should have atleast 190 bucks or so , that was for my gas and my phone bill both used for instacart and budgeted accordingly however a week before on a cash out instacart had said there was a problem with deposit because my card had expired and to put new info on and the 2 wkly amounts would be deposited right away , so I did and used to cash out a couple times for small daily amounts and no problem it was verified and all set but still no 200 owed from initial , I freak out and mssg because it was obviously a emergency and there would be no way to deliver and make it home , they apologize and say that it will be on withing a hr tops to go ahead and deliver , that wS 2nd week of November and I've still yet to get paid foe that bit have gotten other payments , I have 27 documented and recorded conversations with instacart help and who shoppers would speak with in reference to anything, that night and until the following night I was broken down. On the side of rhe highway with no has and a bunch of promises, I've to dated spoke with head of finance , the escalations team , 17 representives 2 managers and 1 head honcho that said they werr so sorry , I've been disconnected , hung up on 6 times , I have been promised my money withing a hour, a day and maximum 14 days a total of 22 times ,, I've been told to refresh screen and it would 100 % be on there , only to realize that was there way of getting off complaint , I've had sets of numbers given to me about the complaint only to realize from a manager that those numbers were obviously made up or were ticket numbers to things that I supposedly did wrong, I started getting upset and trying to force them to simply pay me my wages after 30 days past the legal parameters of holding back pay , I've spent almost 25 hours talking and texting about this , I froze that night and they could even comp me gas money or send someone to get me , I was unable yo pay my phone bill without borrowing money that cost more , I've lost out a average 3 or 4 k of work because one it's hard to trust them two that money owed is used to continue to work and make money as basically a sub contractor , this ordeal has coat me alot , it's effe ti.g my Christmas, and it all started over 200.000 once I begin to complain the one rep told me and I have it recorded to go to social media and they will fix it , I didn't but threatened too and another rep also recorded told me that they will make things up and start putting co.aints on me and will put ratings down and cancelation rate up so that they can fire me legally , however I never had complaints before not outside the norm , if any at all , cancelation rate wa always around 9 or 10percent , I've since wathched it go up to 16 percent without working a single day ( impossible ) I watched commits of me supposedly shopi.g with other people etc... never happend this is instacary retaliating all to save a couple hundred dollars , I was told I would be fired any day and especially if I'm do what I'm doing now , that is wrong I've never mad a complaint against any employer and certainly not I stalwart, but enough is enough I'm sick of being bullied , the other day I stopped a tripple order spent hours because instacart wouldn't allow me to pay for one of the orders which held me from going for delivery of any of them , wouldn't answer my pleas for help , didn't pay me anything and then canceled the orders and pur cancelation rate up to 16 % and again another threat , what the heck is going on , this is the beginning for me , I an to file a lawsuit tomorrow morning and I have a interview hopefully for Fri with the buffalo news , I oy wanted my money that was owed 200.oo now I going for much more , all they had to do was apologize and pay me , I. A good worker , please help me to get paid and to take this as far as I can and hopefully make the shopping and delivery giant feel it where it hurts , I have been and it's been almost 2 months ,and before I f

Go they lie and cover up so good , they sent me a email LA week sayi.g we tried to deposit that money but unable too , however they picked a day where I was transwferi.g money before and afterwards dromedary then to that very bank account , I also have every conversation whether in text form or audio for the record . It will take time but I will win and they will lose , I hope much heavier than they realize, I aim to make this wrong right for not only me but all the workers that work for them and for all the customers that trust them and believe in their word, a company is only as good as there word .

I have been a shopper for Instacart since Jan 2022. I had watched a YouTube video about the mileage pay and Instacart and was advised to do the math myself don't trust Instacart's calculations. So i went back and did the math on all of my batches ALL OF THEM. I found over 150.00 i was shorted and immediately contacted support through text because unless your on a batch you can not call instacart. So this process takes anywhere from 20-90 mins. I finally reached someone who promised me a team of experts would fine tooth comb my profile and correct every mistake. I would be notified by email if they needed any further info. This went on for over two weeks every time i am given a shopper bump and told of someway it will be corrected. After 3 weeks i accepted a batch and called support was on the phone for almost two hours and was informed that corrections can only be made in the current pay period. Anything after that can't be opened. I requested to make a formal complaint due to the fact that i was being shorted over 150.00 and once i found the mistake I'm told i can't get the correct pay. Since i discovered the incorrect calculations i have had to check each batch and daily i have to contact support to get paid correctly. I struggle nightly with each agent and their promises of it never happening again.

Order from evening of 12/3/22, Food Lion.

(Problem with order 5 days old—your 4 day policy is brand new to me and I’ve been sick since that night.)

If a store you contract with wants to sell flowers, the employees have got to be to be better educated.

It shouldn’t matter that it was evening (or if I’d ordered incredibly early). All retail employees, as a rule, should be cross trained in every department and lateral duties.

My shopper, who is one of my favorites because she’s unfailingly diligent and committed to finding exactly what you ordered, and if it’s not available, does all she can to find a replacement you feel happy about. She’s clearly invested in the satisfaction of her customers.

She tried to ask numerous employees at Food Lion about an item I’d ordered in quantity of 2. She asked every employee she could find if the paper white bulbs would bloom again —- not one person knew anything about these popular December&January flowers.

I definitely understand why she thought surely they must because Food Lion actually chose to keep the dead flowers as a display in the store. Again, none of this is my shopper’s fault.

But no, paper whites DO NOT bloom again. They can offer an extended blooming period if the bulbs are of good quality and if one cares for them properly.

So I got two dead paper whites I had planned to give to my mom. Again, these are not perennial bulbs so they will not come back next year. I’m requesting a refund for those two items, to be credited to my card ending in 3804.

HUGELY DISAPPOINTED!

I ordered my grocery order last night 12-02-2022 to be delivered today 12-03-2022 between 10:00 am -12:00pm. Part of my order was delivered by the driver Nicholas, he checked out at 10:28 am delivered my order at 11:55am, five miles away. I should have checked for all items in bag, as I was charged for Food Lion frozen orange juices, 1 Kraft single slice cheese that were not in my order. He put a bag with a loaf of bread on top of my cart, I ask him what's this for, he said it's your bread, I told him I didn't order any bread, he checked his phone and said ooh-ooh. I called Instacart, told the girl I spoke with that I had items missing, her response, I'll refund these items and take the delivery charge off your next order. If this was a one time thing would be one thing BUT, it happens with 9 out of 10 orders! This is SHAMEFUL way to run a business and a discourtesy to the customers. I have to use this service as I'm 75 years old legally blind and disabled, my only transportation is the City Bus, or a Taxi. I'm on a fixed income, and can't afford $20.00 round trip to and back from the grocery store, I can't hardly walk and have to use a cane just to get around. Instacart, hires people that have no respect for the customers or the company apparently. Something has got to be done!