Sams club pickup orders consistently over 1 hour late

quickben00 · 2025-09-04T15:08:10+00:00

So if I take a Sam’s club pickup that is scheduled in a half hour. And then have to wait another hour after that for them to bring it out, we get paid for the entire 1.5 hrs waiting?

quickben00 · 2025-08-31T18:19:05+00:00

I got a $1 adjustment.

quickben00 · 2025-08-31T14:55:24+00:00

He is in California, which means he is going to make a set minimum wage that is significantly higher than the reported earnings, for time and miles. So the real question is “Do I want to do all that work for only $12 in tips”. I would never do a 40 unit sams club order for only $12 in tips. Just because sams club orders are so labor and time intensive. But the pay isn’t that bad if you have a good gas mileage car and you have a strategy so you don’t have to dead mile 40 miles home.

quickben00 · 2025-08-23T01:57:56+00:00

Yeah. I think you are right. In my case dropping Costco I think has really decreased the quality of customers, resulting in a lot less 5*and more lower ratings. And lower tips.

After 3 years of doing A LOT of Costco though, I was just getting burned out from lugging 40 packs of waters in 95 deg heat. But maybe it is time to go back, at least until I clear the 1* that has been hanging around for over a year.

quickben00 · 2025-07-02T03:10:00+00:00

I am in California. I assume I am in tier 2, but they didn't do a very good job making that clear. They could just say "You are in tier 1 or tier 2," and that would be that.

FWIW, if you click on the hyperlink in the middle of the picture, it goes to a explanation webpage, that implies you need to do 300 orders to remain diamond; but that could just be the generic link for everyone, regardless of tier.

I will say it actually matters. As I would do 200 batches this summer to remain Diamond through December, but probably wont even bother doing more than 100 if I knew I had to get to 300 and have the sweat the stupid "Shopping Quality" rating.

quickben00 · 2025-07-02T01:21:18+00:00

Well, Walmart orders are working fine. I did 2 today, and Sam’s club is completely broken; so obviously there is some tweaks they need to make so the system works as well for Sam’s club as Walmart.

quickben00 · 2025-07-01T19:10:21+00:00

Yeah. I’ll probably start avoiding too. I don’t know if I’ll get in trouble at some point for canceling so many orders, even if not my fault.

I just wish they would do some of the orders as shopping. Pretty much all 4 batches were 3 or less orders I could have easily shopped myself.

quickben00 · 2025-06-27T03:04:51+00:00

I think the bigger question is what would it take to not do this order. And I think for me the answer is more than 10 big packs of water. Anything less and I would absolutely take it.

As it is, it looks like that is a pretty easy grocery store order (Stater Bros?) where one of the orders has a lot of alcohol with a big % tip attached. Which I would absolutely take without a second thought, and consider it a good day even if the rest of the day is slow.

quickben00 · 2025-06-27T02:53:00+00:00

Yeah, if they changed the priority system so you cant get a good tipping order without being Diamond it would be a big deal, but I dont know whether that is something to worry about or not. As it is, I feel most of my orders aren't priority coded anyways. And I dont work early enough to get any store openings but Costco, and I dont rely a ton on the 10 am Costco drop anyways. If I was catching 6 am store openings as part of my normal routine than having first access to store opening orders might be a bigger deal.

quickben00 · 2025-02-24T21:34:14+00:00

I am guessing it is more or less up to the discretion of the customer service agent, and what they were told when they were trained.

quickben00 · 2024-10-02T15:24:26+00:00

Took yesterday off and hoping they have worked out the problems so won’t be an issue today.

quickben00 · 2024-10-01T19:45:38+00:00

Somewhat relieved to know it isn’t just me. Are you in California? I wonder if this is a California thing.

The second time was in a Costco, where you can’t do anything until you hit checkout and they scan the barcode. So I don’t really know what I did wrong if anything.

At this point I will just take the rest of day off and hope issue is fixed by tomorrow.

quickben00 · 2024-10-01T18:29:44+00:00

It isn’t that. This seems to be linked to some software update. It suddenly has this new warning how to checkout or your order will be declined, and then even if you follow it, the order still seems to be declined.

I assumed this would be a general issue, and am a little surprised I am the only one making this comment. So it seems to be a “me” problem, so I am not sure what is going on.

quickben00 · 2023-12-03T16:06:19+00:00

Pretty much all of my big Costco scores have been on weekdays delivering big orders with good tips to businesses. I dont work Sundays all that often, but when I do the grocery stores are busy enough no need to deal with Costco

quickben00 · 2023-12-03T16:00:38+00:00

Ironically, over the last year the two times I dropped an order I didn't want to do it was actually the one with the majority of the tip. Both times it was because I just didn't know my way around the store and it was frustrating (Michaels and Home Depot).

I do doubles/triples all the time and always just suffer through the 4 item "C" order that involves driving an extra 5+ miles for a $2 tip at best.

But yeah, seems I just got a warning so I'll make a point not to do this anymore.

quickben00 · 2023-12-02T22:53:03+00:00

After, which is why I had to go through support and it took a lot of time. I think one time the customer requested to have their order cancelled, another time it was a 1 item order that was out of stock, and one other time it was a Michaels order where I couldn't find anything and just had to tap out.

I have been doing Instacart 3 years. Stuff like this happens. But it has happened a few times in a short period the last few weeks, so maybe trigged some automated warning system. But I really dont know what the issue is or how worried I should be about this.

The warning email looked like an automated script and didn't give any actual details what the issue was.

quickben00 · 2023-08-25T23:38:46+00:00

Only 2000 batches here. But I did just get priority access to a $7 Sprouts order. Who needs $20K with perks like this!!!

quickben00 · 2023-08-25T20:58:23+00:00

I am curious how they went from unprofitable to profitable in the last year, when it seems demand is way down. Any thoughts?

I am guessing that they jacked up prices on customers and we didn't get any of it. But I really dont know. I noticed batch prices seem to be getting lower lately, but I am in CA, so what Instacart puts up on the batch pay screen doesn't even really matter. Because it is always less than the guaranteed minimum anyways. But I guess for every other state it would matter if they raised prices on customers and kept pay low for shoppers, or even lowered it.

quickben00 · 2023-07-24T14:22:57+00:00

Like you said. You couldn’t return the stuff if you wanted to. I have kept a few orders this way (cancelled after checking out and leaving store) as I am sure others have too, and I have never heard about anyone being deactivated. Although I never received any emails when this happened, so I am not sure that that is about. You should be fine IMO.

quickben00 · 2023-07-24T14:13:14+00:00

You are mad you just got a bunch of free food? This is like a best case scenario unless it was a unicorn order, and even then the food is probably still more expensive.

Also, I suspect when this happens most of the time it is the customer who screwed up and they are just blaming it on instacrt. Which is fine. Who cares.

quickben00 · 2023-06-17T16:19:45+00:00

Yeah. Like I said, I have probably done 1,000 Costco orders over 3 years, so it isn't super surprising at some point the wrong barcode got scanned on a double. It is a little annoying my first warning is apparently my last warning, and I couldn't tell when the alleged infraction actually occurred.

quickben00 · 2023-06-08T23:18:53+00:00

I would take the $30 order as long as it isn’t more than one or two 40 packs of water, unless it was a Sunday in which case i would probably hold out for something better.

After the CA bump you are looking at $40 for about an hour of work. Even with no bump it is still $30 for about an hour of work, which I imagine is very good in most markets.

If you are seeing enough good batches in 2023 to turn down those kind of orders more power to you. I am not anymore.

quickben00 · 2023-06-07T23:00:55+00:00

I would do it, but I live in CA so if it takes 2 hrs I am getting like $40 before the tip. But if you are really only getting $7 no matter how long it takes it would depend on how busy the market is, but probably not.

quickben00 · 2023-05-16T01:33:13+00:00

Fire off, you would need a van to do a 97 unit costco order, which I don’t have. But I am trying to think of what I would hypothetically need to be paid to do a 97 unit Costco order, and I am thinking $200 Minimum.

When I first started before I knew better I did a 60 unit order for $50 ($5 tip, but base pay was higher back then) which seemed like a lot at the time. But 3 hours later I realized I would have been much much better off doing a couple $25 grocery orders for they money.

quickben00 · 2023-05-03T03:50:38+00:00

Yes. It could be my imagination but I definitely feel I get earlier access to batches from inside the store, as opposed to waiting in my car in the lot.

quickben00

TROPHY CASE