This is the same thing the food delivery apps (including Uber Eats) do. I have screenshots showing the estimated delivery time pretty consistently jumping up anywhere between 20% and 50% from what it shows on the initial screen to what you get once you've placed the order. And then often they don't even make that time estimate.
An accurate estimate isn't really possible with the food delivery business model. Couriers will have 2-3 orders, so if you are order 1 or two, there is a new variable that enters the equation after you purchase the food. They obviously add other items on a similar route, but wait times and such are fairly random). Of course they could do 1 order to 1 driver but that would double the labor costs (sequential orders would be 2-3 deliveries per hour max per courier, vs 4ish when optimized).
That doesn't explain why the delivery consistently jumps 30% to 50% as soon as you hit the confirm button and they process your payment. If they were giving an honest estimate, you'd expect a gradual increase in the estimate as the delivery person showed up 2 minutes late at point A, then 5 minutes late at point B, then 10 minutes late at point C, etc.
The Uber Eats delivery time estimates are a lie, plain and simple. Once they have your money in hand, they'll shamelessly admit to the lie, which is why the estimate jumps instantaneously.
also, you would expect to at times get over-estimated wait times. but my experience is always underestimated by about 20 minutes. so consistently, in fact, that I suspect they have a very good idea of the true time and then subtract 20 min from it.
Then they shouldn't charge for faster delivery. It just doesn't make any sense. Like i'm 95% sure in most cases you don't actually get a car faster and they just take your money and provide no marginal value (granted, I only use the apps about every other month). How else could they consistently offer multiple price tiers regardless of availability? I'm not claiming fraud necessarily, but I also can't imagine how you could offer it without committing fraud. At some point you're just lying ("estimation with negative effort" as a friend calls it) about car etas to drive the perception of value.
Uber could provide a range or a point in the middle, but it seems like they just estimate the best case scenario and then it's usually not the best case.
Dev turned doordash driver here. Let me tell you why those estimates are bullshit.
First, there are three different ways that orders can come in. 1) Tight integration into the POS system. 2) Through a separate parallel physical tablet. 3) Something spits out something on a printer.
There are opportunities with 1 and 2 to do some sort of feedback on how busy things are. I know for the tablet option that at least for some restaurants they are able to indicate how long the order will take.
But half the places I get to have no integration, they just put the ticket on the pile and it's done when it's done. A couple places that do this in particular also don't even start the order until the driver shows up, on purpose. The app will tell the customer I'll pick it up in 5 minutes no matter what. There's a chain that does prep work in front of the customer, but certain locations will not make pickup/delivery orders if there's anyone in line in the shop. I stopped doing deliveries there.
You'd also think that places with the potential for awesome metrics making pickup timing a breeze would be fast food chains, right? Nope. Not a single iota of smart integration whatsoever.
I've found that keeping customers in the loop as to what's happening with their deliveries ends up keeping them happy, even if it's gonna be slow. I suppose some things never change.
You're spot on, I've been doing Doordash on an e-bike on the weekends for exercise and the wait times are BS because everyone orders lunch/dinner at the same time and they're in essentially a random queue with everyone else who orders. Add to that multiple pick ups and drop offs and you've got a mess.
Talking to people really does help though, everyone wants to be more forgiving when you remind them theirs a human factor involved in getting the food to them.
