Instacart Shopper: Earn money

I’ve been an Instacart shopper for a little over 3 years now with few issues. I absolutely adore doing the work and maintain a 4.5 customer rating. Recently (a few weeks ago) on an order I lost my drivers license and had to replace it. Due to not having my physical license I had to cancel order that contained alcohol as there is no way to see if the order contains alcohol until you accept (especially with larger orders). The store will not accept paper copy or just customers birthdate, I know because I tried. This had my cancellation rate high, when I reached out to customer service about it I was told they would look into and and had not heard anything back. On my last order I ran over something in the road and ended up with 2 flat tires, when I reached out to customer service he said it would count against me which I didn’t understand why as I cannot control getting a flat. My account was immediately deactivated and when I reached out to customer service via email they wouldn’t reactivate. My car is still sitting in front of the first customers address, by the grace of god she has been very understanding offer to help me replace my tires. I have been writing to there appeals department for over a week now and have not heard back at all. Not having an active customer service line is becoming a problem. Please reach back out to me, I am a great shopper and love what I do, I’ve never had an issue like this so there has to be a way to rectify.

At first I wasn’t sure if there was a glitch on my app or people just didn’t do the ratings after I delivered. I have completed over a thousand orders and can’t seem to get passed 99 five stars. The only time it changes is when a random four star shows up with no explanation and the five star amount reduces. Also I have received several compliments from customers but I’m unable to see them. I have talked to other shoppers about this and they have showed me their ratings and some have been in the thousands. I’m also having issues with orders appearing for a fraction of a second then disappearing before I can react. Sitting at stores and waiting when the app says 15-30 minutes or even 5-15 minutes and no orders come up. I move to a different store only to get an order at a store that’s not even on the map. Also why does the pay reduce when a customer requests a refund on an item that isn’t available and the customer didn’t like any replacement options? Sometimes I spent entirely to much time waiting on customers to respond to messages and searching for items that aren’t there just to have my pay reduced. Even with these issues I’m still giving Instacart a five star review because for me there are more pros than cons. At least most days. Also I have never had any issues with shopper support. They have always been nice and helpful.

Instacart is a great way to make money however it is not as great as it used to be, at least in my area. There are far too many shoppers and not enough batches. When there are batches, they pay little to none or they’re combing two stores so the pay/effort put in is not worth it. The promos are a joke at times as you can easily pass the bonus earning without even trying. For example, I’ve had a promo that was $48 for 6 batches. Well math will tell you that if most batches pay about $7, you’ve already basically hit the $48 or close to it without trying. If you don’t have a shopper card or are waiting for a new one, there are not many stores in my area that accept Apple Pay/mobile Pay. When shopping at stores like Kroger, there should be an option that informs you if the batch is an online pay or not BEFORE accepting. This would be helpful for those who don’t have their cards just yet. Also, I don’t think customers should be able to add items once the shopping starts. They’ve had plenty of time beforehand to do so. Shop only orders should just automatically use online pay and should at least have the option for tips. Stores that don’t have aisle numbers such as Sam’s or Costco should have more time added to shop. Also customer service needs a lot of training and revamping. With some reps I’ve had to ask the same question multiple times to MAYBE get the correct answer. Please read these reviews and work on improving your app for the people that spend time working.