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1 in 4 delivery drivers are tasting food before it's delivered

Woman holding paper bag with take out food, home delivery, food order, takeaway. source: Getty
1 in 4 delivery drivers in the US are trying your food before you eat it. Source: Getty

As of last year, Aussies were spending a whopping $1,590 a year on delivered food from UberEats, Menulog and Deliveroo, with that number reaching $2,000 in Sydney.

There are around 68 million online food orders each year, and around 7,000 orders per hour, research from Finder has revealed.

But those platforms have had their fair share of bad press.

Earlier this year, a number of delivery drivers were caught feasting on meals before repacking them and giving them back to customers.

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A Current Affair reported drivers were moving food around so it didn’t look it had been eaten, and placing tampered with boxes to the bottom of the bag to avoid detection.

But while those incidents seemed rare, a US study has revealed they might be more common than we think.

The study conducted by restaurant food supplier, US Foods, examined consumer and delivery worker ‘habits and pain points’ when it comes to ordering and delivering meals.

Of the 500 delivery workers surveyed, over 25 per cent (28 per cent) said they’d munched on food from an order.

I think my order has been tampered with, what can I do?

If you think your order has been tampered with, there are avenues to seek support from the delivery apps.

In UberEats for example, you can click on the order in question, click “Issue with a delivered or past order” and choose the option that best suits.

It could be “I had a food safety issue with my order” or “My order was damaged”.

You can then list the item, add pictures of the food and explain the issue.

Deliveroo Australia said it had a “zero tolerance” towards this behaviour.

“Should a rider ever be found to have acted in such a way we would stop working with that individual immediately.” Deliveroo told Yahoo Finance.

“Deliveroo cares deeply about the quality of the service we offer to customers, who we want to have an amazing experience each time they order with us.”

Yahoo Finance has contacted UberEats for comment.

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