Jack in the Box & Del Taco moving to 100% kiosks

[mjhale]

I went to Taco Bell and said I had a mobile order. The cashier said, "Oh, God!"

She told me that when people do mobile orders, there are so many crazy customizations that can be missed. They end up having to remake the food and end up throwing away tons of food.

It really cuts into their profits and employees get into big trouble.

I always ended up with incorrect orders with missed customizations when I try to order on the Taco Bell app. It is a terrible system.

Trying to force kiosk ordering or app ordering ends up costing the company when incorrect orders need to be remade.

Starbucks has this issue, because customers are very picky about how they want their coffee customized. If it isn't perfect, it has to be thrown out and remade. It is a waste of labor and food.

Not to put Wawa or Sheetz on a pedestal, but they have been all kiosk for years. Both allow for multiple customizations of most if not all of the items that they offer through the kiosk. Somehow, Wawa and Sheetz manage to get orders out correct the majority of the time. The few times I have had a botched order at Sheetz (Historically, I have ordered food from them much more often), they have been happy to give me what I was missing if it was a condiment or remake the order. It sounds like the fast food restaurants are having trouble adapting to order customization. Perhaps the fast food system just isn't built for the level of customization that Wawa or Sheetz has in their systems. It has been only in the past 10 years or so that this level of customization at fast food restaurants has been available. In the past, a hamburger was a hamburger at places like McDonald's. Maybe it is poor training and/or inconsistent workers too.

Starbucks is a whole other level. People are obsessive over their drinks and the income (and the "Karen") level is higher so people demand more from Starbucks. At a place like Starbucks, consistency and quality of the drinks is paramount. Maybe that would limit customization if that means the product is always produced as requested.

[storewanderer]

I went to Taco Bell and said I had a mobile order. The cashier said, "Oh, God!"

She told me that when people do mobile orders, there are so many crazy customizations that can be missed. They end up having to remake the food and end up throwing away tons of food.

It really cuts into their profits and employees get into big trouble.

I always ended up with incorrect orders with missed customizations when I try to order on the Taco Bell app. It is a terrible system.

Trying to force kiosk ordering or app ordering ends up costing the company when incorrect orders need to be remade.

Starbucks has this issue, because customers are very picky about how they want their coffee customized. If it isn't perfect, it has to be thrown out and remade. It is a waste of labor and food.

Yeah, that is the attitude of some of these employees. I have heard this.

And I have fired it right back at the employee who reacts this way- I just punched in my whole order, saving you the task of having to help me on the register, right? (silence ... yes). Oh and look at that my order is already done there, all you have to do is bag it and hand it out to me (silence...).

If they are missing customizations that is not the customer's problem, that is their problem. And that kind of performance is not acceptable anymore at the $20/hour wage. The system shows them the item and shows them what items to subtract and add...

Maybe Taco Bell has too many items on their menu. Maybe that is the problem. I can order the same basic thing about 4 different ways there. And at radically different prices.

As of this week Arbys app still doesn't send customizations to the kitchen. Getting old. Real old.