Food delivery in Bkk

[Bang Bang]

Jeez, do I miss Uber Eats. Are there any decent alternatives? FoodPanda sucks. They have zillions of restaurants but I've typically been waiting nearly 2hrs. for a delivery, when the restaurant's page says 60mins+/-. And their order tracking page is a joke. The time left bounces up and down and then sometimes the page just disappears altogether. Which means the stress of interacting with their live support till matters finally get sorted.

 

This looks interesting but the menus are all in Thai. And has ChefXpress died and gone to heaven because I don't see it listed in a recent review of Bkk delivery services? Their customer service was pretty awful too as I remember from using them fairly often before Uber came along so I wouldn't be surprised if they didn't survive.

 

So, what do lazy bums like me who don't like to cook or go out do? What are the options?

 

Edited June 27, 2018 by Bang Bang

[smutcakes]

Not a lot of viable alternative to Foodpanda if you are after anything but the McDonalds, Pizza co/hut, BK, KFC, MK etc who still do their own delivery as well as Foodpanda.

 

Not sure where you live but i have never had food take more than 1 hour. An easy suggestion to solve your dilemma would be to order 2 hours before you want to eat and if it arrives early its a bonus. It is rainy season and the Thai schools are back so if you are slightly off the beaten track or the restaurant you are ordering from is a long way away it is likely that at certain times they are going to run into a delay or two due to traffic, flooded roads etc.

 

Does not really sound like an large issue to resolve in all honesty.

[Mattd]

14 hours ago, Bang Bang said:

ChefXpress died and gone to heaven because I don't see it listed in a recent review of Bkk delivery services?

ChefsXP is still up and running. http://www.chefsxp.com/index.php?option=com_virtuemart&view=virtuemart&zone=1&lang=en

[Nanaplaza666]

Lineman

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

On 6/28/2018 at 1:21 PM, Mattd said:

ChefsXP is still up and running. http://www.chefsxp.com/index.php?option=com_virtuemart&view=virtuemart&zone=1&lang=en

 

When I tried to access the ChefsXP site today for the first time in a couple months, I'm unable to access it via either IE or Firefox browsers.

 

In both cases, I get error messages saying the site is insecure and that their website security certificate has been revoked.  And in neither of those browsers, was there any apparent means to get past the security block.

 

That's a pretty bad status for a site that relies on website ordering. But then again, they've never been particularly good at tech, including in the past having a website that, like Thai Immigration, only seemed to reliably function when it did via IE.

 

 

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

On 6/27/2018 at 11:16 PM, Bang Bang said:

Jeez, do I miss Uber Eats.

 

Ditto on that. UberEats weren't perfect.

 

But, compared to the other local providers in BKK, they operated like all-stars....

 

Never yet have used Grab Food, in part because goodly parts of their site/app were only in TH last time I checked, even when you selected EN as your preference.  And LINEMan only takes cash and doesn't accept credit or debit cards, AFAIK.

 

FoodPanda is the next best, poor alternative option. Lots of restaurants, do take credit and debit cards. But if you rely on them, be prepared for lots of problems to arise, and for their customer service in typical Thai style to be poor.

 

My last experience with FP was where I ordered from a particular restaurant that was shown available on their website, then was charged for the order, then the order was canceled because I was told the restaurant's chef hadn't showed up that day, and I'd have to wait some days for a refund to my card.  Tried again the next day with the same restaurant that I really had wanted to try, and had exactly the same thing happen for a second day in the row.  That was the end for them with me.

 

[Mattd]

9 minutes ago, TallGuyJohninBKK said:

When I tried to access the ChefsXP site today for the first time in a couple months, I'm unable to access it via either IE or Firefox browsers.

Strange, I had no problem in Chrome or Edge just now.

[Mattd]

Correction, just tried it again in Edge and I am getting the security error, fine in Chrome.

Edited August 2, 2018 by Mattd

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

I just tried in Chrome and got the same error message. I haven't tried Edge.

 

If it's not working in Firefox, IE or Chrome, I'm going to leave it alone until they fix whatever security issue they're having.

 

 

 

Edited August 2, 2018 by TallGuyJohninBKK

[Bang Bang]

39 minutes ago, TallGuyJohninBKK said:

My last experience with FP was where I ordered from a particular restaurant that was shown available on their website, then was charged for the order, then the order was canceled because I was told the restaurant's chef hadn't showed up that day, and I'd have to wait some days for a refund to my card.  Tried again the next day with the same restaurant that I really had wanted to try, and had exactly the same thing happen for a second day in the row.  That was the end for them with me

 

Happened to me exactly the same thing a couple of nights ago and not for the first time. I had budgeted 90mins. for dinner to arrive from a 60mins.-delivery-advertised restaurant with a plan to head out soon after. 50 mins. later a whoops graphics shows up on the tracking page which had indicated the order accepted earlier, now the order's cancelled, please order again. Which screws up my plans for the evening altogether.

 

It can't be rocket science getting their act together. Uber's tech was near perfect. Order and then sit back and watch the action on your mobile, finally following the driver all the way to your doorstep, then opening the door just ahead of him knocking.

Edited August 2, 2018 by Bang Bang

[Mattd]

2 minutes ago, Bang Bang said:

 

Happened to me exactly the same thing a couple of nights ago and not for the first time. I had budgeted 90mins. for dinner to arrive from a 60mins.-delivery-advertised restaurant with a plan to head out soon after. 50 mins. later a whoops graphics shows up on the tracking page which had indicated the order accepted earlier, now the order's cancelled, please order again. Which screws up my plans for the evening altogether.

 

It can't be rocket science getting their act together. Uber's tech was near perfect. Order and then sit back and watch the action on your mobile, finally following the driver all the way to your doorstep, then opening the door just ahead of him knocking.

Yes FP are really bad for this, I've had it several times, both here in BKK and my home in Chonburi, funnily enough they sent me an email just the other day to fill out an online survey, I did and gave them crap scores on everything, especially customer service and explained why, I don't expect it will do any good, but it made me feel better!!

[ukrules]

14 hours ago, TallGuyJohninBKK said:

If it's not working in Firefox, IE or Chrome, I'm going to leave it alone until they fix whatever security issue they're having.

Do you really need high security food is the question ?

 

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

5 hours ago, ukrules said:

Do you really need high security food is the question ?

 

 

ChefsXP has fixed the problem now and their website is back to working now.

 

But yesterday, because of that website security problem, you couldn't access their website period -- it simply would not load -- on PC browsers. So it didn't matter what you needed or not.

 

[fusion58]

Honestbee does food delivery as well as shopping and concierge service...

 

https://www.honestbee.co.th/en/

 

 

 

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

9 hours ago, fusion58 said:

Honestbee does food delivery as well as shopping and concierge service...

 

https://www.honestbee.co.th/en/

 

I totally gave up on HB a while back for grocery deliveries because more often than not, I'd order something online with them, and then much of my order would not be delivered because the stores were out of stock, but no sign of that when ordering via their website. And then some pretty poor customer service related to all that. They just got to be a totally unreliable provider for groceries.

 

After your post, I went back today and looked at their seemingly expanded restaurant delivery inventory, which is a lot broader now than the last time I checked many months back (HB was never competitive with UberEats when UE was still around, but alas, they're dead now). So, perhaps I'll give HB another try with restaurants as opposed to groceries, and see how they do.

 

Although, gotta say, their website for restaurant ordering has got to be one of the most user unfriendly I've ever seen. You only see one page of restaurant listings at a time, have to click a green bar at the bottom of each section to display more, and then when you finally click one restaurant to look at, when you leave there, it automatically takes you back to the very top of the restaurants list, instead of going back to just where you were in their list before. Meaning, you have have to click down thru 3 or 4 screen of restaurant sections just to get back to where you were in their list. It's a hassle.

 

And, AFAICT, the ordering of the display of the restaurants in their list doesn't seem to change, so the same restaurants are always shown at the top of the list, and the others may be buried so far down in the list of different restaurant page groupings that you'd never find them -- unless you used their search box to search for a particular restaurant name you knew going in. But their restaurant discovery method on their web listings is horrible.

 

 

[Bang Bang]

5 hours ago, TallGuyJohninBKK said:

I'll give HB another try with restaurants as opposed to groceries, and see how they do.

Do let us know how it went. I'll give them a whirl if they are any good.

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

15 hours ago, Bang Bang said:

Do let us know how it went. I'll give them a whirl if they are any good.

 

Well, not very good.

 

Tried an online order last night around 7 pm with a bakery place. Order accepted online, and website then updated to say preparing. Then after about 20 minutes we get a phone call -- not from HB or from the bakery, but from a delivery driver for some reason -- saying about 80% of what we ordered wasn't available. So at that point, I canceled the order entirely.

 

The extenuating circumstances are -- I understand that bakery places can and do run out of things toward the end of the day. But the part that's bothering me is why didn't we get a phone call from either the bakery or HB soon after the online order was placed. And instead, we get a call from a motocy delivery driver 20 minutes later???

 

That makes no sense to me. But, it is indicative of the kinds of poor experiences I've had with HB in the past.

 

[Bang Bang]

7 hours ago, TallGuyJohninBKK said:

 

Well, not very good.

 

Tried an online order last night around 7 pm with a bakery place. Order accepted online, and website then updated to say preparing. Then after about 20 minutes we get a phone call -- not from HB or from the bakery, but from a delivery driver for some reason -- saying about 80% of what we ordered wasn't available. So at that point, I canceled the order entirely.

 

The extenuating circumstances are -- I understand that bakery places can and do run out of things toward the end of the day. But the part that's bothering me is why didn't we get a phone call from either the bakery or HB soon after the online order was placed. And instead, we get a call from a motocy delivery driver 20 minutes later???

 

That makes no sense to me. But, it is indicative of the kinds of poor experiences I've had with HB in the past.

 

Thanks, I just deleted HB from my bookmarks.

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

4 hours ago, Bang Bang said:

Thanks, I just deleted HB from my bookmarks.

Funny, when I went to try to log in and order from the restaurant last night, I found my old ID and PW didn't exist anymore. Because, I had forgotten, I got so pissed at them and their lousy customer service for groceries many months back that I did something I rarely do, and that entirely erased/deleted my account with them, just to reinforce that I wasn't ever going to use them again for grocery deliveries (and I haven't since that time).

 

So then, after your post, I had to go back to create a new account with HB just to try the restaurant order, and well, you already know what resulted from that. Hopefully, they're better at restaurant food delivery than they are a grocery delivery. But, then again, maybe not.

 

One big and prevailing problem with a lot of the online ordering experience in Thailand is, more often than not, there's absolutely no connection/correlation between what's shown as available online and what's really available in the store/restaurant etc. Amazon can manage to connect their inventory with their web presence. But sadly, most of Thailand cannot.

 

Big C and Tesco are terrible in that regard. Tops in a bit better but still doesn't have a web presence that actually reflects their store availability. Villa Market and their new online ordering and delivery platform from their Suk Soi 33 store seems to be better and actually removes items from their website or shows them as out of stock, when they are.

[SooKee]

I've used the Wongnai app several times. It's listed as a restaurant app but you can order home delivery from it too.

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[Bang Bang]

This is so bad it's hilarious:

About 1 1/2 hr. ago I ordered a couple of pork dishes from a street place on Foodpanda.

 

Here's roughly the sequence of mins to delivery on their order tracking page:

49 (start) - 43 - 56 - 81 - 57 - 47 - 18 (the screen shows xyz1 is on the way, I'm happy) - 46 (the screen's gone blank, no one's on the way) - 68 - 65 - 44 (xyz2 is on the way though the text shows restaurant is preparing your food) - ... - 99 (there's no one on the way anymore).

 

I kid you not. I am staring now at this moment at 99mins. after waiting for 11/2 hrs. for what started as 49 min. delivery.

 

I am scratching my head thinking it must take effort to be this bad. Or the management is a bunch of gifted men and women. And the weird thing is that it can't be that hard going by how smoothly Ubereats worked.