In order to partially make up for increasing the Sapphire Reserve card’s annual fee from $450 to $550, Chase has added $60 per year in automatic statement credits for DoorDash food delivery purchases. I tried it out the other day and found that it worked exactly as expected. I charged the order to my Sapphire Reserve and the full cost was quickly reimbursed:
Chase has also thrown in DoorDash DashPass memberships for Sapphire Reserve and Sapphire Preferred cardholders through the end of 2021. Even Freedom and Slate cardholders can get in on the fun with 3 months of membership for free and then 9 months at half price. DashPass gives you free delivery and reduced service fees. You can read more about this new benefit here.
Chase vs. Amex
Chase isn’t the only credit card issuer that’s offering credits towards food purchases. The Amex Gold card offers up to $10 in statement credits each month when the card is used for purchases at GrubHub and Seamless (also at Boxed.com, Shake Shack, Cheesecake Factory and Ruth’s Chris Steakhouse). Further, the Amex Platinum card offers $15 per month in Uber credits ($35 each December) which can be used at Uber Eats.
DoorDash vs Grubhub vs Uber Eats
Food delivery benefits can be great if you use these services often. However, if these benefits encourage you to use more expensive services, you’ll get far less value than advertised.
To find out if there were big differences in price between the delivery services, I tested them out in three cities: Ann Arbor (where I live), New York City, and Los Angeles. In each case, I tested out two separate delivery orders from different restaurants. In order to compare apples to apples, I made sure that I picked restaurants that were available to all three delivery services. I clicked all the way through to the final check out screens in order to record the full price of each order. For DoorDash, I recorded prices with and without DashPass in order to help determine the value of that subscription service.
Equal Food Prices: In almost all cases, food prices were identical with all three services. The differences kicked in on the checkout screen when they added service and delivery fees.
Tips: I recorded subtotals before tip and totals after tip. In every case, I simply recorded the tip that was automatically suggested by the app.
Overall Results
If you look only at the bottom line, above, it looks like all three services are roughly equal and that the DashPass subscription will save you, on average, 5.7% per order. That’s not the whole story though…
Take a look at the subtotal line. There you’ll see that, before tip, GrubHub averaged slightly cheaper than DoorDash with DashPass (but the numbers are so close as to be basically identical). Meanwhile, Uber Eats appears to be the most expensive.
The reason that the findings with the bottom line totals and the pre-tip totals are so different is that each service varies wildly in how much of a tip they recommend. Uber Eats always suggests $4 even. GrubHub always suggests 20%. DoorDash uses a formula that I haven’t yet figured out. The result is that, on most orders, GrubHub suggests the biggest tip and Uber Eats suggests the smallest.
If you are someone (like me) who usually just accepts the suggested tip, then overall we can say that all three services are roughly equal and that the DashPass subscription will save you, on average, 5.7% per order.
However, if you tend to tip in cash or pick your own tip, the results show that GrubHub and DoorDash with DashPass are the best (and are roughly equal).
Location Matters
The high level results mask the fact that the trends vary by location (and probably by the restaurants I happened to pick as well). Let’s look at each…
In Ann Arbor, DoorDash with DashPass offers significant savings regardless of whether the tip is included in the results.
In Manhattan, GrubHub was the cheapest pre-tip option. With one of the two restaurants, GrubHub was offering an automatic $5 off plus free delivery. So that helped GrubHub come out ahead. Also note that DashPass didn’t do as well here because one of the two restaurants wasn’t eligible for DashPass savings. Despite these exceptions, DoorDash with DashPass was still the best option after including the suggested tip.
In Los Angeles, like in New York, GrubHub was the cheapest pre-tip option. After tip, DoorDash with DashPass was the cheapest.
Bottom Line
In most cases I found that the total cost when including the suggested tip was roughly equal across all three services. As a result, the DoorDash DashPass membership consistently offered better prices since it reduces fees.
I found two surprising details about the pre-tip prices:
- GrubHub was often cheaper in New York and Los Angeles when considering only the pre-tip price.
- Uber Eats was almost always more expensive when considering only the pre-tip price.
If you tend to tip your own way rather than going with suggested tips, you might be better off ordering through GrubHub rather than DoorDash with DashPass. And you’ll likely be better off with either of those services rather than Uber Eats.
Do your own comparison
In my little experiment, fees varied so much from location to location and restaurant to restaurant that it’s hard to say definitely which service is cheapest. If you order out a lot I recommend doing your own comparison with restaurants that you frequently order from.
In my case, I was very happy to see that DashPass resulted in real savings in Ann Arbor (at least with the two restaurants I looked at). This means to me that I’ll easily be able to get full value from the $60 per year Sapphire Reserve reimbursement and I’ll continue to save money after that thanks to the DashPass membership.
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I am as much interested in the service as the price. I had a driver who got lost twice on a 3 mile one turn trip. I had to stand on the street, wasn’t thanked for my order and customer service was rude and unprofessional. Grub hub is always the opposite. If there is a problem they are always helpful and courteous. No driver has ever gotten lost even on more circuitous routes and they are always friendly. I won’t touch ubereats any more.
The door dash formula is their drivers get 7 dollars. So the more of that 7 dollars you give the driver as a tip, the less of the “guaranteed pay” they have to pay their drivers. It’s not illegal, but it’s wrong.
Basically its saying we will pay the driver 7 dollars for delivery. You decide I want to tip them 5 dollars, and DoorDash says oh, then we will only pay him 2 dollars and use the 5 you tip to give them the 7 guaranteed.
Not anymore. Drivers get full doordash tips now. Variable delivery pay ($2-10) plus full amount of tip.
Is the full spreadsheet available?
Out of curiosity, what are these delivery guys paid before tips? I’m a suburbanite, and not really into food delivery. At 20% tip, I think I’d always pick up my own food. Or better yet, cook something myself.
I read that at least one of the food delivery services (DoorDash I believe) has a formula that guarantees a driver a certain payout based on the estimated time required to fulfill the order, complexity and price of the order, amongst other variables. So let’s say that figure is $5. So if you tip anything below $5 it makes no difference to the driver. Tbh with service fees, delivery fees and restaurants themselves inflating the cost of a dish by up to 20%, I really don’t see the point in tipping anymore when I’m paying easily 50% more for a dish using these services as compared to driving out and getting it myself.
Interesting. So the tip isn’t really even a tip? If that’s the case, there’s no reason whatsoever to tip (unless you want to be crazy generous).
The good waitresses @ my local places make $30 an hr CASH . It’s all where u are the EU pays good wages US doesn’t .
Get along very well with all staffs .
CHEERs
That Doordash tip formula is no longer from what I understand.
With Doordash you can also get the Wyndham points
In the Bay Area, California, DoorDash consistently inflates the food prices vs the other services by $1 or so per item, it’s interesting to see that doesn’t seem to be the case in other locations. Also, I always tip what I want to tip, 15% or 20% is ridiculous.
Matt
Good for u mine was 15% or 20% over normal then a 10% Tip figured in the first year. Then u were Limited what u could buy and Deadbeats on delivery too . Now a year later $99 a year not $150 and 5% tip + u pick the store (9) so big sales too !! The bad pickers left because no one tipped them and any Hot food is Hot now . Whole foods and Costco have unreal food and no LONG lines to wait in.
CHEERs
With enough restaurants around me within a 10min drive and use Grubhub, found it’s the best way to spend my Amex credits on a once a month order which I go pick up. No minimums and no tip needed.
I’ll probably end up doing the same thing with Door Dash if the credits work on pickups too. Not sure if I can really get any value out of DashPass…
so order on grubhub.com then pick up yourself?
Yes. UberEats also offers free pickup. That’s what I do at home in NYC and sometimes when traveling.
Biggest caveat is the selection of restaurants that offer pickup may be limited, depending on your area.
How quickly did you receive your credit? I used DoorDash for the first time after signing up with Chase Reserve on Jan 10 and I haven’t seen a credit yet. It’s been a week.
The credit started Jan 12, according to email from Chase.
Is there a signup bonus for DoorDash? I’m only seeing driver bonuses.
i hate all three of these companies and use my credits with them reluctantly. for that reason alone i only do restaurant pick-up.
david
From 9am to 3pm I have ONE hour service from like 9 high end grocery stores and they stand inline to get cut Deli Meat etc usually cheaper then my cost . Unreal.
CHEERs
Unfortunately, this comparison largely shows that all these competing services are roughly equal and will matter for each users unique situation. It’s only a piece of the pie when looking holistically at all the benefits of the competing cards.
There is also a discount for Postmates using s World MasterCard. $5 off every $25. Lucky had a post on this one: https://onemileatatime.com/mastercard-postmates-lyft/
Brings Citi into the mix if using Prestige at 5x
Newish Uber eats account have the $2/4/6 tip as defaults. Seasoned accounts have tips in %. My suggested tip in eats is 15%
That’s interesting. In that case I’d expect Uber to be much more expensive for those who go with the default tip.
I agree it’s now part of the pay pkg Built IN . Remember on FBN they said like 30% take or play with the food Hmmmm !! Before the driver clicks Yes they know what they will make $$$ I ask them. I do Instacart and I have a 4.9 star out of 5* with them and Uber . I did Uber last week it was almost the same as a Taxi like 2 years ago .
Tip What u Want !!!
CHEERs
Say what?
Drivers know what they make on tip up front on some apps and not on others. I believe Grubhub they see up front, Uber they don’t, and Doordash is some sort of weird hybrid.
veeRob
Would u take a job and not know what the pay is ? Their Begging for people who want to work hard by me . The labor market doesn’t get any better then this ..
CHEERs
@CaveDweller I do delivery for some of the apps sometimes, so yes.
Hope u make an Ungodly amount of $$$ ..
LOL
CHEERs
@CaveDweller I believe I’m in the top 1% of delivery drivers earnings. If you have a brain you can do well.
I agree and that go’s for any occupation. Maybe teach the others that policy like I try to do ..
LOL
CHEERs
I’ve had Uber and Ubereats for several years, my app is in dollars.