- Instacart’s network crashed late Sunday, leaving customers waiting hours for food deliveries that never arrived.
- “I waited close to 6 hours for my order before canceling it,” one customer tweeted. “The worst service ever.”
- Some customers said they were unable to cancel orders that were automatically rescheduled to the middle of the night or the following day.
- The network issue has since been resolved, and impacted customers can now cancel or reschedule their orders, according to someone with knowledge of the company’s outage.
Dozens of Instacart customers are furious after a network outage left them waiting all night for food deliveries that never arrived.
“Do NOT subscribe to Instacart,” Mick Weidner wrote on Twitter. “They screwed up my order yesterday. I tried to contact them in multiple ways. I tried to cancel my subscription and was told I can’t. So I resubmitted my order and it appears that the order didn’t process. Terrible company!”
Another customer tweeted: “I waited close to 6 hours for my order before canceling it. The worst service ever.”
Instacart confirmed the outage on Twitter, writing, “Our site is currently experiencing technical difficulties. We are actively working on the issue and apologize for the inconvenience.”
Dozens of people took to social media to complain that the company never directly notified customers of the outage. Several said they were unable to reach Instacart's customer service when their orders failed to arrive. Some said their orders were automatically rescheduled to the middle of the night or the next day.
"I ordered Instacart today to be delivered in two hours," one customer tweeted. "They never showed up, didn't notify me or anything. I log in to check status and they postponed it to tomorrow from 9-11 am when I'll be at work. I'm furious. No response back to my complaint."
On Monday morning, some customers said they still hadn't heard anything from Instacart about the outage or what would happen to their missing deliveries.
The outage also impacted Instacart employees who fill and deliver shoppers' orders.
"I am a shopper and was stuck at the grocery store from 6 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. last night," Stephanie Abene tweeted. "Due to the outage, I was never able to checkout and deliver a very difficult and substitution heavy order to my customer. I want to be compensated for my time and the inconvenience."
The network issue has since been resolved, and impacted customers can now cancel or reschedule their orders, according to someone with knowledge of the company's outage.
Here's what customers are saying on Twitter about the incident:
https://twitter.com/mickweidner/status/1051878093634330624?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfwhttps://twitter.com/kamiliatorres/status/1051715736102625281?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
I ordered @Instacart today to be delivered in two hours. They never showed up, didn’t notify me or anything. I login to check status and they postponed it to tomorrow from 9-11 am when I’ll be at work. I’m furious. No response back to my complaint.
— Liv (BugLover69) (@hello_livvy) October 15, 2018
@Instacart you should change your name to nevercart. I waited close to 6 hours for my order before canceling it. 😫 The worst service ever.
— DrDina420 (@DrDina) October 15, 2018
And now I wake up to my @Instacart order just being cancelled?!? And with no communication? What am I paying a subscription for? #nothappy pic.twitter.com/8D6aoqTM3F
— Rachel Brockway (@RachelBrockway) October 15, 2018
https://twitter.com/meyphotography/status/1051838535911624704?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
Any word on what will happen w/ orders from @Instacart last night? Will they be delivered? Should I reach out to someone else for fulfillment?
— Amy Gross (@AmyCGross) October 15, 2018
https://twitter.com/techmatchmaker/status/1051863577370320896?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
Just how I called it . After 3hr of waiting for Instacart system to be back up. The order was cancelled and we got nothing . Well done Instacart . We see how much your care about your shoppers .
— Itsmetricky (@MigdadTarik) October 15, 2018
@Instacart so, your whole system goes down and you do nothing for everyone who was inconvenienced. Great service. We are planning to switch to @Shipt
— Billy Schroeder (@Schrowa) October 15, 2018
https://twitter.com/StephanieAbene/status/1051815385660571648?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
@Wegmans @Instacart 1 of 2. NEVER AGAIN. I am so frustrated over my experience yesterday and the lack of support given to fix the issue. The initial delivery was 830-9 which was changed to 1130pm (what??????) after i finally went to bed at 11pm.
— kelly larkin (@Kc91me) October 15, 2018
@Wegmans @Instacart 2 of 2... so now it’s morning and no delivery is made and the app shows only 1 item shopped. WHAT IS GOING ON??? I demand full refunds and service cancellation. Mr Wegman pls choose a new partner for deliveries
— kelly larkin (@Kc91me) October 15, 2018
https://twitter.com/chloejanekg/status/1051712826207662081?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
As shopper, the app was down for us too. There was no way to view the order, cancel or even if the transaction competed there was no way to move to the next step to deliver the groceries as we are not given the address until after checkout a few steps later. We were SOL too.
— ysa_ballerina (@4lyfYzamar) October 15, 2018
https://twitter.com/natalieenoble/status/1051693501841268736?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfwhttps://twitter.com/JureeGee/status/1051688295153819648?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfwhttps://twitter.com/natalieenoble/status/1051697144787136512?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfwhttps://twitter.com/yarawilson92/status/1051662120302112768?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
@Instacart - placed and order for 10 pm est. Not here yet. Been on the call for the 30 minutes and now the order won't be here till 10-11 am tomorrow morning. Why do I subscribe to your service if I do not get delivery when needed? Spoke to 3 levels of support and no one can help
— Mav (@maverickpreet) July 26, 2018