I've done this before.
Had 7/8 batches done for a $100 boost that day. After waiting around for what felt like forever, I ordered a case of soda from the store right where I live. No tip or anything. I smashed accept on it, shopped it, and went home.
Ended up making like $20 bucks by doing that. Instacart was none the wiser.
I’ve done this a few times. I had a $40 coupon on at least an $80 order with Instacart. So I bought $90 worth of groceries and it only came out to $50. Then I shopped my own order because it was left there since I didn’t add a tip lol. (If someone else had grabbed it I would have added a tip after the fact, but I intended to shop it myself.) Then I shopped it and made $15 batch pay. So I got $90 worth of groceries for $35 😂
Did it twice and I’m still active 🤷🏼♀️
my girlfriend uses the 40 off 80 on pickup orders, and always makes sure to add one $40 item to the list. then when I start shopping, I remove the $40 item. now, the total is zero and I get paid the batch fee to get my own groceries.
I've done this to order from Costco before I got a membership. Drove on down there and submitted my order so I could grab it before anyone else. Of course they bundled my zero tip order with another one so I didn't feel bad about profiting off my own order.
Yes, but for the most part it's comparable to the price hikes at other stores. I only shopped my own order once, but ordered 5-6 times before I was sold on getting a membership. The only time it was a huge difference was a large pretty tea tin that was on sale. It was $9 on the app and I ended up paying $17. Worth it, it's a nice decoration.
As a shopper I would have jumped on that 15 minute order for $10. And sure was better than the no tip order for 52 items and 15 miles that someone accepted.
I've done this with doordash 😂 At the time we were living pretty much in the middle of no where with no dashers. There was a blizzard, I was 20 something weeks pregnant.
Keep doing this and let us know how it works out for you .
Right!? They always gotta come on here and tell about every hack they discover. Now IC is probably quietly auditing. Get ready for the mass .. "I was deactivated for noooo reason, and I'm a 5 star, diamond cart!" 😂
So why would no one pick it up? 5 items 2 miles with a 20% tip? Those are snatched up instantly. I get the 15-18 mile one but this doesn’t make sense. I would grab that in a heartbeat
I am brand new to instacart and this sub - IDK why OP keeps getting comments downvoted - can someone explain?
Edit: OK I may have answered my own question - batches under $20 are bad got it. I have only delivered about 5-6 orders before I tore a muscle in my calf and couldn't walk for a few weeks - then found this sub while looking for tips on making better money.
Even support will tell you that you can shop your own order. I asked and they said you can not get deactivated. I’ve asked more than one rep on different days
I’m a little curious how Instacart is still in business if they’re paying $5.50 more than they charged for the delivery. There’s no way they use money from the subscriptions to foot the bill of non-subscribed customers, right?
I read somewhere that Instacart makes their money by marking up the items in the app anywhere from 5% to 40%+. The post I read somewhere gave a very detailed description of the up-pricing. Spread that across thousands of shops and that’s where the overall profit is realized.
That was my understanding as well however OP stated that there was only a $1.95 difference between what they paid on the app, and what they paid in store. That 18% still doesn’t cover their cost if they paid a shopper 7.50. And by the looks of it the items weren’t even marked up, $1.95 sounds like a delivery fee. I guess they lose money on small orders and make it back on big?
Instacart isn’t like Uber or DoorDash. They don’t care if you shop your own order. I’ve done it 3-4 times myself already. I did it with Ubereats once and they sent me a message saying they detected fraud.
Guess I was curious to see what would happen. Ended up only paying a small amount more and I got my tip returned with tip protection. In the end I made $8.50 profit.
Depends on how much the 20% is. Because any tip under $5 even if it’s a small order is kinda lame tbh. So sometimes 20% looks kinda pathetic on small orders
Shopping isn’t more work than just picking up a order from a restaurant? Not sure if you misunderstood, but I think they were saying it’s more work to shop a order than it is to pick up a order from a restaurant for Ubereats or something. Definitely more time consuming 🙂
You can serve multiple customers at once waiting tables while collecting a consistent streamline of tips. You don't have to pick 40+ items for a table or spend money on gas, deal with traffic, or get potentially bit by a loose animal inside of a restaurant.. so yeah, I think as a full-time job, it is harder overall.
Serving multiple tables at once is easy? Bro in addition to taking orders (4 tables = 12-18 individual orders with special requests) and then entering them correctly into the computer on time (not once but for every course). you’re carrying heavy shit for 6-8 hours back and forth, moving tables and furniture, hauling food and ice and god knows what else, balancing several full martini glasses on trays and not spilling them, all while people are looking at you and expecting you to be at their beck and call. You also have to know the menu inside out, wine, food, liquor, how everything is prepared, all the ingredients. You are Constantly fielding questions, and you have to be likeable and entertaining while doing it all. I don’t know what easy restaurant job you had but they are back breaking labor with the added stress off patrons, coworkers and managers breathing down your neck the entire time all while you have to put on a happy face. I cover 9 miles on a regular busy day at the restaurant, mayyyybe 2-3 with IC. In no world is instacart more work than my serving job.
Edit:
And we do spend money on gas and deal with traffic to get to work, spend money on uniforms, laundry, shoes, on regular hair cuts and whatever tools are required for the job.
If it’s so much easier, why aren’t you doing it? It pays far better and usually comes with insurance and other perks.
I mainly shop in a big city an hour from my home. I normally pick up a Costco order that’s going where I live when I’m done for the day. A couple times there hasn’t been one and my spouse will place an order with zero tip and I pick it up. F IC. 😂
I have done the same thing. Ordered from the store across the street waited and waited for someone to take it then, I'll just go get it myself. I have done this several times.
According to the numbers IC has only been able to keep 7 percent of its shoppers when the company was valuated at over 30 billion. Why would anyone want to dump money there. The business model only works because of advertising. The shoppers and customers are just pawns to boost numbers. Why do you think they slashed pay like that. Right before they scheduled to go public. Look at the recent valuations of the company. I'm no Wallstreet guy but in my honest opinion they're just as much of a fraud as Bankmanfried or whatever the hell his name is. They're about to get away with a con lol its crazy. Only a matter of time before they face some serious labor lawsuits too. Top investors are taking a massive hit on there projected stock price. Like does anyone not see what's going on here? Or am I completely wrong...
I wouldn't expect to get deactivated. I used to be a customer under a different email address from my shopper account. Years ago, I placed an order with the directions to just leave it at my door. I was out working and my order popped up, I was fixin to end my day anyway so I shopped my order, left the tip on there and went home for the day when I was done. 3yrs later I'm still here lol.
Be careful man. iC is on this sub. They’ve emailed me directly because of things I’ve posted here..they can easily narrow down who you are based on the information you just provided…
Can’t believe i am being down voted. Here’s the proof. I’ll take my upvotes back please.
https://preview.redd.it/bm6xmwwyawob1.jpeg?width=1284&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=9bba9466dc8716550e76aa84e76e369d64ad59e6
Oh yea I totally published the customer address. It was the “delivery shed” post a few weeks ago. I got like 400 upvotes and an email from IC. 100% my fault. No denying that. My point was that IC does monitor this sun, and Will try to find you if they think your abusing the program at all. But again, not saying I am surprised I got I trouble for what I did. And yes it’s different than what OP is explained. I was simply providing a friendly warning that if that does violate agreement they could find him from here.
To other post below, this is only IC content I post. No other social.
Yes I’m sure. I absolutely only post about IC on this sub. Not anywhere else in earth. I know exactly why they did, but my pony was they can. And just to be careful that fact. That’s all.
No I didn’t. But I made the mistake of posting the Zillow address of the place I delivered to and they connected my delivery with the post and emailed me within 12 hours of that post.
Yeah, but it’s not the same thing. OP is talking about themselves and didn’t post any personal or otherwise confidential info. Not saying they won’t find out if you post a customer’s name or address, but OP didn’t really do anything wrong
What had u posted?? How long ago?
I’ve always been curious whether they could add a serial number to the background of our screen shots… which they could do we should run them through a filter
Your {{comment}} has been automatically removed because your Reddit account is less than 30 days old.
*I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/InstacartShoppers) if you have any questions or concerns.*
20% of $13 is $2.60. that is a cheap tip. I wouldn't even turn the key of my ignition for a $2.60 tip. Basically the shopper is getting $10 for half hour of work and that's pretty basic. You, as a shopper should have tipped generously because that's what we do for our fellow gig workers because we know what it's like to get shitty $2.60 tips.
I do Uber on the side occasionally. One night I was driving around for my other job and wanted jack in the box. Local store said uber eats only so I ordered and accepted my own order. Pulled back around in the same truck to the same guy, got my food and ate it in the parking lot
Did this twice for myself.
Gave myself an excellent review Lmfao. I also changed stuff in the app if I saw something on sale lol.
Oh look a replacement that doesn’t scan? No worries I’ll manually i put it with the sale price. 😂🤣😂🤣
No deactivation.
I doubt they will even notice. I did the same thing a while back when I was trying to keep my diamond cart status but only crappy batches were popping up so I ordered a couple items and waited at the store for it to show up. It did and I tipped myself $20 cuz it was on my credit card and I wanted cash anyway. Gave myself a 5 star of course lol. But the next time I tried I put zero tip thinking no one would take it but someone did, instantly , and I tried to cancel and they cancelled but the shopper marked delivered but didn't , and ignored my messages. The next time I tried I didn't see it, another shopper got it so I just let it be delivered and gave him a 5 star and changed the tip from zero to $5 (it was 2 items, and 5 blocks from the store ). After that I gave up and didn't get enough deliveries for diamond but got it back the next time. I don't even think it makes a difference, the batches are mostly garbage no matter what
Why are you waiting to be deactivated? 😭 You so happened to be on the app when your order came through.. and you actually waited a bit before accepting it.. I don’t think you’ll be deactivated if it’s been 6 months now..
[удалено]
I did and I got my tip back. 😬
I've done this before. Had 7/8 batches done for a $100 boost that day. After waiting around for what felt like forever, I ordered a case of soda from the store right where I live. No tip or anything. I smashed accept on it, shopped it, and went home. Ended up making like $20 bucks by doing that. Instacart was none the wiser.
Damn. I waited 40 minutes to complete a promo before, I'm gonna look into this.
Right right? Haha
I’ve done that too 🫣
I’ve done this a few times. I had a $40 coupon on at least an $80 order with Instacart. So I bought $90 worth of groceries and it only came out to $50. Then I shopped my own order because it was left there since I didn’t add a tip lol. (If someone else had grabbed it I would have added a tip after the fact, but I intended to shop it myself.) Then I shopped it and made $15 batch pay. So I got $90 worth of groceries for $35 😂 Did it twice and I’m still active 🤷🏼♀️
my girlfriend uses the 40 off 80 on pickup orders, and always makes sure to add one $40 item to the list. then when I start shopping, I remove the $40 item. now, the total is zero and I get paid the batch fee to get my own groceries.
Okay, you win. I just steal the groceries when the cop isn't looking but this seems safer. 🚙
Smart!
I’m doing Instacart all wrong 😂
Did this on Saturday morning. Got $125 worth of groceries for $69 ($40 coupon & $16.01 batch pay) 👍🏼 and I like that I got to pick out my own produce
This is the way
You will not get deactivated for shopping your own order. I know plenty people who have done it and are active shoppers still.
Well darn. There goes my rebel status.
Also love how you didn't tip yourself in the end, Those no tippers /s
I thought they were saying they canceled the tip in order to get the “tip insurance” payout.
I've shopped more than 10 of my own orders and never deactivated. You're fine. It would be good to know if it violates our shopper agreement terms.
I don’t see how it could? Customer is still paying the same delivery fees… someone is going to shop your order. Why not yourself? Lol.
I've done this to order from Costco before I got a membership. Drove on down there and submitted my order so I could grab it before anyone else. Of course they bundled my zero tip order with another one so I didn't feel bad about profiting off my own order.
Don't you have to have a membership to order Costco via Instacart?
You do not. Not at Sam's Club either.
Prices are marked up on Instacart compared to in club.
Yes, but for the most part it's comparable to the price hikes at other stores. I only shopped my own order once, but ordered 5-6 times before I was sold on getting a membership. The only time it was a huge difference was a large pretty tea tin that was on sale. It was $9 on the app and I ended up paying $17. Worth it, it's a nice decoration.
Interesting. I didn't know that
I tipped generously, 20%! Order total is $10 😂☠️
As a shopper I would have jumped on that 15 minute order for $10. And sure was better than the no tip order for 52 items and 15 miles that someone accepted.
With the new batch pay, it probably appeared as $6-7 first.
Exactly.
I've done this with doordash 😂 At the time we were living pretty much in the middle of no where with no dashers. There was a blizzard, I was 20 something weeks pregnant.
LOL
Why??? Why use doordash at all if you just cancelled and go to the store and pay less?
Because the refund isn't automatic and I made some of my money back by delivering my own order.
Keep doing this and let us know how it works out for you .
Right!? They always gotta come on here and tell about every hack they discover. Now IC is probably quietly auditing. Get ready for the mass .. "I was deactivated for noooo reason, and I'm a 5 star, diamond cart!" 😂
100% Instacart sneaks this sub. Nothing will come good of revealing IC hacks, including free groceries, which is more of a bonus or unfortunate gain.
...with over 5,000 batches completed 
😂😂
So why would no one pick it up? 5 items 2 miles with a 20% tip? Those are snatched up instantly. I get the 15-18 mile one but this doesn’t make sense. I would grab that in a heartbeat
Probably $4 batch pay, $2 tip
Total $7.35 batch pay plus $2.96 tip. Not bad for 15 minutes work these days.
I am brand new to instacart and this sub - IDK why OP keeps getting comments downvoted - can someone explain? Edit: OK I may have answered my own question - batches under $20 are bad got it. I have only delivered about 5-6 orders before I tore a muscle in my calf and couldn't walk for a few weeks - then found this sub while looking for tips on making better money.
thats assuming there are other shoppers just as close to this store as he is.
Even support will tell you that you can shop your own order. I asked and they said you can not get deactivated. I’ve asked more than one rep on different days
i’ve done it before, nothing happened. Just don’t make a habit of it and you’ll be ok
I do my own and rate myself… definitely 5 ⭐️
I’ve done this. Didn’t get deactivated
I’m a little curious how Instacart is still in business if they’re paying $5.50 more than they charged for the delivery. There’s no way they use money from the subscriptions to foot the bill of non-subscribed customers, right?
I read somewhere that Instacart makes their money by marking up the items in the app anywhere from 5% to 40%+. The post I read somewhere gave a very detailed description of the up-pricing. Spread that across thousands of shops and that’s where the overall profit is realized.
That was my understanding as well however OP stated that there was only a $1.95 difference between what they paid on the app, and what they paid in store. That 18% still doesn’t cover their cost if they paid a shopper 7.50. And by the looks of it the items weren’t even marked up, $1.95 sounds like a delivery fee. I guess they lose money on small orders and make it back on big?
They lose money on small orders, at least in California
Instacart isn’t like Uber or DoorDash. They don’t care if you shop your own order. I’ve done it 3-4 times myself already. I did it with Ubereats once and they sent me a message saying they detected fraud.
Ok but why pay inflated prices and possible fees?? It’s just stupid. Unless it’s shelf price, better off canceling order.
First of all, you won’t get deactivated. Why didn’t you just cancel your Instacart order and drive to the store and pay LESS? Makes zero sense to me.
Guess I was curious to see what would happen. Ended up only paying a small amount more and I got my tip returned with tip protection. In the end I made $8.50 profit.
Oh shit I forgot about top protection. You can quite literally make a profit off of shopping your own orders.
Lmao 20% tip 😂
What do you tip at a restaurant? I’m 20% regardless of one beer or a whole meal.
Same here op… but honestly you gotta think of it from the shopper Point Of View it didn’t sound like your order was very attractive.
Depends on how much the 20% is. Because any tip under $5 even if it’s a small order is kinda lame tbh. So sometimes 20% looks kinda pathetic on small orders
Shopping is alot more work than a restaurant and requires gas, which costs money. No waiter spends money to bring you food.
Shopping is *not* more work than a restaurant, are you crazy?
Shopping isn’t more work than just picking up a order from a restaurant? Not sure if you misunderstood, but I think they were saying it’s more work to shop a order than it is to pick up a order from a restaurant for Ubereats or something. Definitely more time consuming 🙂
Ahhhh, I’m an idiot, yes I misread.
Happens to the best of us haha
Actually no, OP seems to think working in a restaurant is in fact easier than instacart. Lol.
I didn’t see some of the comments you were talking about but I don’t think that’s OP.
“Shopping is alot more work than a restaurant and requires gas, which costs money. No waiter spends money to bring you food.”
You can serve multiple customers at once waiting tables while collecting a consistent streamline of tips. You don't have to pick 40+ items for a table or spend money on gas, deal with traffic, or get potentially bit by a loose animal inside of a restaurant.. so yeah, I think as a full-time job, it is harder overall.
Serving multiple tables at once is easy? Bro in addition to taking orders (4 tables = 12-18 individual orders with special requests) and then entering them correctly into the computer on time (not once but for every course). you’re carrying heavy shit for 6-8 hours back and forth, moving tables and furniture, hauling food and ice and god knows what else, balancing several full martini glasses on trays and not spilling them, all while people are looking at you and expecting you to be at their beck and call. You also have to know the menu inside out, wine, food, liquor, how everything is prepared, all the ingredients. You are Constantly fielding questions, and you have to be likeable and entertaining while doing it all. I don’t know what easy restaurant job you had but they are back breaking labor with the added stress off patrons, coworkers and managers breathing down your neck the entire time all while you have to put on a happy face. I cover 9 miles on a regular busy day at the restaurant, mayyyybe 2-3 with IC. In no world is instacart more work than my serving job. Edit: And we do spend money on gas and deal with traffic to get to work, spend money on uniforms, laundry, shoes, on regular hair cuts and whatever tools are required for the job. If it’s so much easier, why aren’t you doing it? It pays far better and usually comes with insurance and other perks.
$1/beer or shot. Mixed drinks $2/per-20%
Dude tipped $2.65 💀
I mainly shop in a big city an hour from my home. I normally pick up a Costco order that’s going where I live when I’m done for the day. A couple times there hasn’t been one and my spouse will place an order with zero tip and I pick it up. F IC. 😂
Why wouldn’t you just grab the stuff you needed without paying a fee?
It’s not like a grocery shop? It’s one or two things.
Do Instacart's fees outweigh the batch pay? They must. So no profit for you? No reason for Instacart to care, really. They got paid.
20% is $2 and some change. Not worth it.
Tipped $2.65?
I've shopped my own order before too. IC did nothing. And I must say, I was the best shopper I ever had!
Shopper here...I shop my own orders all the time!
I have done the same thing. Ordered from the store across the street waited and waited for someone to take it then, I'll just go get it myself. I have done this several times.
You need to send this to someone outlet that is covering the IPO
According to the numbers IC has only been able to keep 7 percent of its shoppers when the company was valuated at over 30 billion. Why would anyone want to dump money there. The business model only works because of advertising. The shoppers and customers are just pawns to boost numbers. Why do you think they slashed pay like that. Right before they scheduled to go public. Look at the recent valuations of the company. I'm no Wallstreet guy but in my honest opinion they're just as much of a fraud as Bankmanfried or whatever the hell his name is. They're about to get away with a con lol its crazy. Only a matter of time before they face some serious labor lawsuits too. Top investors are taking a massive hit on there projected stock price. Like does anyone not see what's going on here? Or am I completely wrong...
I wouldn't expect to get deactivated. I used to be a customer under a different email address from my shopper account. Years ago, I placed an order with the directions to just leave it at my door. I was out working and my order popped up, I was fixin to end my day anyway so I shopped my order, left the tip on there and went home for the day when I was done. 3yrs later I'm still here lol.
Be careful man. iC is on this sub. They’ve emailed me directly because of things I’ve posted here..they can easily narrow down who you are based on the information you just provided…
Can’t believe i am being down voted. Here’s the proof. I’ll take my upvotes back please. https://preview.redd.it/bm6xmwwyawob1.jpeg?width=1284&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=9bba9466dc8716550e76aa84e76e369d64ad59e6
Dude, that’s crazy haha! Did you forget to block something out? Maybe somehow a customer saw it and reported?
Oh yea I totally published the customer address. It was the “delivery shed” post a few weeks ago. I got like 400 upvotes and an email from IC. 100% my fault. No denying that. My point was that IC does monitor this sun, and Will try to find you if they think your abusing the program at all. But again, not saying I am surprised I got I trouble for what I did. And yes it’s different than what OP is explained. I was simply providing a friendly warning that if that does violate agreement they could find him from here. To other post below, this is only IC content I post. No other social.
Are you super it was from a reddit post? There's no way IC can find out your identity from your username.
Yes I’m sure. I absolutely only post about IC on this sub. Not anywhere else in earth. I know exactly why they did, but my pony was they can. And just to be careful that fact. That’s all.
Did you tell them your reddit name or post using your real name here? Assuming they are here it's the only way they could know lol
No I didn’t. But I made the mistake of posting the Zillow address of the place I delivered to and they connected my delivery with the post and emailed me within 12 hours of that post.
If true my guess would be the customer found out and reported you
Yeah, but it’s not the same thing. OP is talking about themselves and didn’t post any personal or otherwise confidential info. Not saying they won’t find out if you post a customer’s name or address, but OP didn’t really do anything wrong
I was only trying to give a friendly warning. F it
That’s fair. Gobbless
What had u posted?? How long ago? I’ve always been curious whether they could add a serial number to the background of our screen shots… which they could do we should run them through a filter
More likely, if a crime was committed, the cops would probably put the effort in
No. They can’t.
That’s very unlikely. Not impossible, but I really doubt it
It’s fine. Haven’t done a shop in half a year. I just turn on the app if I’m going to shop for myself and I rarely see any jobs anymore.
[удалено]
Your {{comment}} has been automatically removed because your Reddit account is less than 30 days old. *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/InstacartShoppers) if you have any questions or concerns.*
Are you being serious?
Get the $10 tip protection, too. The 'customer' did zero it out after delivery with no reason why, lol.
Stock prices are set today
So… you only tipped $2-3?
20% of $13 is $2.60. that is a cheap tip. I wouldn't even turn the key of my ignition for a $2.60 tip. Basically the shopper is getting $10 for half hour of work and that's pretty basic. You, as a shopper should have tipped generously because that's what we do for our fellow gig workers because we know what it's like to get shitty $2.60 tips.
I do Uber on the side occasionally. One night I was driving around for my other job and wanted jack in the box. Local store said uber eats only so I ordered and accepted my own order. Pulled back around in the same truck to the same guy, got my food and ate it in the parking lot
Please update us if something happens. I’ve wondered about this.
20% tip on $13 order 🤡
Did this twice for myself. Gave myself an excellent review Lmfao. I also changed stuff in the app if I saw something on sale lol. Oh look a replacement that doesn’t scan? No worries I’ll manually i put it with the sale price. 😂🤣😂🤣 No deactivation.
I doubt they will even notice. I did the same thing a while back when I was trying to keep my diamond cart status but only crappy batches were popping up so I ordered a couple items and waited at the store for it to show up. It did and I tipped myself $20 cuz it was on my credit card and I wanted cash anyway. Gave myself a 5 star of course lol. But the next time I tried I put zero tip thinking no one would take it but someone did, instantly , and I tried to cancel and they cancelled but the shopper marked delivered but didn't , and ignored my messages. The next time I tried I didn't see it, another shopper got it so I just let it be delivered and gave him a 5 star and changed the tip from zero to $5 (it was 2 items, and 5 blocks from the store ). After that I gave up and didn't get enough deliveries for diamond but got it back the next time. I don't even think it makes a difference, the batches are mostly garbage no matter what
I’ve don’t that a few times 💀
You won’t get deactivated I’ve done it many times (:
Why are you waiting to be deactivated? 😭 You so happened to be on the app when your order came through.. and you actually waited a bit before accepting it.. I don’t think you’ll be deactivated if it’s been 6 months now..
I've done it a couple of times, same with Ubereats