Delivery Scam Targets Stay-At-Home Shoppers

A Madison County woman ordered groceries delivered from Costco through Instacart, but her order was never delivered.

Tonight in north alabama... latest numbers new at 10 -- a madison county woman has a warning if you use a grocery delivery service.

More people are using them to stay out of stores during the coronavirus pandemic.

She says she paid for more than two hundred dollars worth of items but never received any of them.

Waay31's steven dilsizian joins us live after hearing from the victim about what happened.

The company instacart lets you shop from local grocery stores, like costco, online and the company send a personal shopper to deliver your purchases to you.

But people on social media and throughout the country are claiming they never received their groceries... and now a local woman is among them take sot: denelle taylor - lives in madison county "obviously we are asked to stay at home and shelter in place and not go out unless we have to.

Well, with delivery systems and the ability to have your groceries delivered or anything else delivered, picked up curbside, it makes it seem quite easy to do that" denelle taylor wanted to reduce her family's potential exposure to coronavirus... she ordered her groceries online through costco, expecting them to be delivered directly to her house by a costco employee.

What she didn't know was the company utilizes a different business, called instacart, to fill and deliver online orders.

Take sot: denelle taylor - lives in madison county "i guess naively just thought that costco had their employees go get your groceries for you and package them up for you and deliver them" taylor's total grocery bill... more than 200 dollars..... but the food and supplies she ordered never showed up.

She says the instacart shopper claimed to be searching for her house but couldnt find it.....she then got a text message.... take sot: denelle taylor - lives in madison county "person is trying to get a hold of you, they cant find you, come outside.

And so i went outside and obviously nobody was there and and i looked at the pin at that point and she was now three hours away from where i was, so i knew at that point i was not going to get my groceries" i reached out to costco, and was told they have no comment.

I also contacted instacart, where i was told if an order is not filled, customers can contact the company online.

Instacart says they do quote "thorough background checks" on personal shoppers.

Instacart has its own set of terms of service you agree to when you make a purchase.

And one of those terms is that you won't hold instacart responsible for any problems that occur.

Taylor says the entire experience now forces her to put her health at risk and go to the store.

Take sot: denelle taylor - lives in madison county "it's limited my ability to get groceries delivered because i cant trust a third party to deliver them" ive contacted the better business bureau of north alabama, they say they have not received local complaints about instacart at this time.

Of course most delivery services have good reputations, taylor just wants you to be more aware when shopping online.

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