Talabat does not condone late delivery cashback to customers as a policy due to the pressure that it places on the riders, the firm’s CEO told Arabian Business in an exclusive interview.
“We don’t want to do campaigns like this because at the end of the day, I think they just hurt the riders because they get more pressured to deliver faster,” Talabat’s CEO Tomaso Rodriguez said.
Rodriguez’s comments come after food delivery competitor Careem Food launched a late delivery refund promotion for customers last month, offering AED1 for every minute that the order is delayed.
“There are incentives put in so that they deliver faster and this is dangerous, it is not safe and it is not something we believe in,” the CEO said when asked about his thoughts on the campaign.
“We just believe in providing the best experience but we will never incentivise faster delivery and put that on the riders,” he added.
In early May, the super-app Careem announced the limited-time cashback offer for customers, “Get dirhams for delays. Get AED1 for every minute of delay.”
The money would be transferred to the customer’s account in credit through the Careem Pay wallet.
The initiative has since received backlash from concerned individuals who voiced concern about how this would negatively impact the drivers, both financially and in terms of safety.
Careem issued a statement last month clarifying that the late order cashback would be paid by the company and not the Captains.
“I think we provide a consistent experience and I order from Talabat almost everyday and I never got a late delivery, I always have a good experience,” Rodriguez said.
He concluded by saying that ultimately the company’s focus is to provide a consistently good experience for customers, and to avoid incentivising faster delivery that puts pressure on the riders which could potentially be unsafe.
Earlier this week, another delivery provider, Deliveroo also expressed concerns over the policy.
“We don’t believe it’s the right message to send out and I don’t think it’s something that we want the Deliveroo brand really too closely connected to as well. The whole idea of just delays and implications … I think it’s something that we have veered away from in the past,” Anis Harb, General Manager Middle East at Deliveroo told Arabian Business.
Arabian Business reached out to Careem to respond to its competitors’ criticism on their late delivery cashback policy.
Alex Golden, the super-app’s GM of Food, responded to the backlash in an exclusive statement to Arabian Business on Friday:
“Careem is proud to have the strongest safety record of any food delivery app in Dubai. Our commitment to our Captains and being a positive force in the community is ironclad. Our Dirhams for Delays campaign is about promises made and promises kept, not speed. Careem Captains cannot see the ETAs we promise customers, and are not incentivised nor penalised in any way by delivery time. We’re not promising faster ETAs, we’re promising accuracy.
We’re confident in our ability to deliver on time because we never batch orders; each customer gets a dedicated Captain to deliver their food. In contrast, Talabat packs multiple customers’ orders together which delays orders and hurts reliability.
But don’t take my word for it, actions always speak louder than words. The most important way that Careem guarantees on-time delivery is by treating our Captains better than anybody in the market. Careem Captains earn significantly more than Talabat riders and enjoy a lot more flexibility in their schedules. We won’t settle for anything less. Just a year ago most of Talabat’s riders walked off the job in a dispute over bad working conditions and poor pay, not a single Careem Captain stopped riding.”
Talabat AI powered by Chat GPT
Last month, the food-delivery giant launched a beta version of ‘talabat AI’ powered by Chat GPT, this allows customers to search for recipes, identify ingredients, nutritional information, cooking tips and more.
Talabat is seeking exponential growth in the region with new launches and upcoming announcements, “We want to build more stores, bigger stores, more convenience and better prices,” Rodriguez excitedly said.
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