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Comment by tyingq | Hacker News Reader

Contractual terms.

For example, from Uber's terms for UberEats restaurants[1]:

"Notwithstanding anything to the contrary in this Section 5, Merchant may not make any Item available to Customers through the Eats App at a price that is higher than the price that Merchant charges in-store for similar Items. Merchant agrees that you will not make an Item available under this Agreement at a price higher than the amount Merchant is charging for similar Items through any comparable platform for food delivery services."

[1] https://www.uber.com/legal/en/document/?country=united-state...

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That's fascinating, because out of all of the restaurants I have browsed on Uber Eats, I noticed about half had higher prices than they do on location (and generally significantly so—it wasn't uncommon to see a 20-30% difference). So they must not currently enforce it.

Edit: Even more interestingly, I rarely see this behavior on GrubHub. Maybe they have a history of enforcing it? Or are just more explicit about the rule? Or just coincidence? I'm not sure.

Enforcement varies city to city. They only start to enforce it when they have most of the resturants in a city on the platform.

That makes sense, because GrubHub is by far the biggest player where I live. Uber Eats has a small slice of the pie in comparison.

Couldn't they increase the cost of all items, and then provide a 30% reduction on direct orders.

Isn't that why discount for cash exists at gas stations etc? To get around these sorts of policies from the credit card companies.

I don't think it's that easy. See https://www.pymnts.com/visa/2018/non-compliant-cash-discount... for example.

Every restaurant that I have seen on Uber Eats charges more for items on UberEats than they do in store. In some cases, the prices are 50% higher.

However, they don't charge more on UE than they do on competing delivery apps.

Also, the attorneys general of CA and NY have begun investigating these app pricing policies, so it's very likely they'll be deemed illegal by the end of the year.

This seems to depend on the country, for instance https://medium.com/@joelleparenteau/why-uber-eats-is-a-neces... in Canada have higher prices on uber.

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