How Safe is Instacart Food Delivery During Coronavirus

As we stay home and continue to survive under quarantine orders, a thought about another lunch of canned tuna can be more deadly than coronavirus itself. Can we order takeout food or fresh produce? Is it safe?

Yes, we think it is and so does Instacart. First of all, the chances of getting COVID-19 from your chicken and potatoes are extremely low. But what if your personal shopper is coughing and sneezing all over those packages after 10 other shoppers did it already? Yes, you do have to put some trust in people who do the delivery for you, but it is safe to say that every store, restaurant, and delivery company, like Instacart, makes their employees wash hands and take other precautions now more than ever. It’s up to you to wipe your products after the delivery if that makes you feel better, and for many people – it does.

Instacart, in case you don’t know, is a service that will send dedicated shoppers to local grocery stores and pharmacies to do shopping for you and will deliver your order to your door in 1-2 hours. During recent corona outbreak, Instacart has been a life line for many people and saw demand hit the roof.

Instacart, just like Doordash and UberEats, now practices contact-free delivery, where tips are left online and no meeting at the door takes place, for the safety of all sides involved. The risk of getting the virus from food delivery bag is small, but problems from starvation might be of more immediate concern, so order and wipe upon receiving, but do order.

When it comes to disinfecting and wiping, Instacart is doing things its own way. Because of ongoing national shortages of health and safety supplies, Instacart will make their own and will distribute them among their full-service shoppers to protect them and their customers.

The company is also making leaving no tip more difficult with tip default setting from previous orders. Instacart has been in the forefront ever since the beginning of COVID-19 pandemic and provided essential service to all of us in need.

The personal shoppers have been so overloaded that additional hiring is taking place.

This is what Instacart is doing for their employees and customers:

• They were the first to implement no contact delivery
• Sick pay for shoppers and extended pay for those affected by COVID-19 is advocated
• Employees will get COVID-19 bonus to increase pay
• Making and distributing their own hand sanitizer for employees
• Tip default setting is launching to ensure bigger tips for shoppers
• There will be no “none” tip option, so $0 will have to be typed manually by customers with guilty feeling, no doubt
• As order volume grows by 150%, employee earnings increased by 40%
• About 300,000 new employees will be hired in the next few months
• Alcohol delivery doesn’t require a signature during the pandemic, but will return to previous rules in the future
• All incidents are reported in-app only for simplicity and easy access
• Customer order issues are visible to shoppers and they are able to handle them
• All ratings under 5 starts are forgiven at the moments and won’t affect the performance evaluation
• Customer items that are out of stock or entire orders can be cancelled with notification
• All Instacart customers are able to pay with Google or Apple Pay

When it comes to food variety, Instacart is hard to beat. Personal shoppers provide access to all your favorite grocery stores, except maybe Trader Joe’s. Out of current partnership with 150 or so grocery retailers, you are bound to find what you like. You can shop by categories and by dietary preferences; you can even chat on the phone with your personal shopper when there are questions or substitutions needed. Neat, right?

Instacart prices are almost always the same as what you would get in stores yourself. Very rarely will a store impose an extra fee for Instacart delivery. Merchant coupons can be applied, but not those from local stores. Instacart often issues its own coupons, something like BOGO free. First delivery is always free, later ones range from $5.99 to $7.99 depending on the time of the day. Delivery is unlimited and free with $149 yearly membership. There is also a small fee of 10% on every order.

In conclusion, while we are jailed at home, there is no better option than Instacart for receiving everything that we need without leaving our home and with safety in mind, so shop on, people, shop on!