South African talk radio spent late June and early July circling a single, sharpening consumer complaint: food delivery apps — Uber Eats foremost among them — are taking orders and payment, failing to deliver, and then refusing refunds. Cape Talk's Consumer Talk strand, led by Wendy Knowler, drove the story with a case study of a Cape Town ophthalmologist billed more than R600 for pizzas that never arrived, and whose refund request was declined until the show intervened. The segment was replayed across the day and picked up by SAfm and 702.
Running alongside the refund story was a parallel thread on the delivery workforce — the June 30 disruption affecting foreign-national drivers on Uber Eats and Mr Delivery — and a broader consumer-goods conversation about opaque menu mark-ups, missing delivery-driver identities and weak in-app complaint channels. Presenters and consumer advocates converged on the same practical advice: screenshot everything, escalate publicly, and push regulators to treat platform complaints as a compliance signal rather than isolated grievances.
Talk radio's framing this fortnight was unusually consistent: the food delivery apps are no longer just a convenience story, they are a consumer-protection story. Cape Talk's Consumer Talk promo — running from 6 July into the 8 July broadcast — led with a single anchoring case: Cape Town ophthalmologist Dr Tibbs paid Uber Eats more than R600 to treat her nursing team to pizzas, the pizzas never arrived, and her refund request was declined.12 The clip was rebroadcast repeatedly across the Cape Talk schedule, giving the complaint unusual reach.34
When Wendy Knowler unpacked the case on-air with host Sara-Jayne Makwala King, she made clear it was not a one-off. "This is a story about 680 rand worth of pizzas which never arrived and about something bigger than that than just the one case — that is, you tell the food delivery giant Uber Eats that you didn't get what you paid for and they don't believe you," she said.5 Dr Tibbs described opening the Uber app to find no delivery driver's name listed at all, leaving her with no one to contact before being funnelled into an in-app chat.6
The turn in the story came when Uber, after Consumer Talk's intervention, processed a full refund while simultaneously telling Knowler that the driver "had been found to have done no wrong" — a contradiction she flagged live on air. "Which is odd, to put it mildly, because then why refund?" she asked.7 That inconsistency became the show's central charge against the platform: the internal investigation process is opaque, and the default posture is to disbelieve the customer.
Callers and the presenter then pushed into the pricing question. Knowler urged listeners to "do your sum to see how much extra you're paying for your food, as opposed to you going and collecting yourself the menu prices," arguing that basic menu items are marked up on the app before delivery fees are added on top.89 A listener proposed a system fix: auto-generated delivery verification codes that the driver must obtain from the customer at handover, rather than the current arrangement which, in her view, allows deliveries to be marked complete without confirmation.10
702's consumer segments picked up an overlapping pattern from the National Consumer Commission's complaint intake, with an official listing repossession disputes, prescription complaints, "value added products being added on accounts without consumer consent" and credit-bureau issues as the dominant categories — with clustering around specific companies.1112 Power FM's regulatory conversation reinforced the point that consumer complaints themselves are the enforcement signal: "When we get consumers telling us how they are experiencing the application of these regulations in the market, it helps us immensely… to then pick up anti-compliance behaviour," a regulator told the station.13
Running parallel to the refund story was a workforce thread. Cape Talk and 702 both flagged the 30 June disruption affecting delivery drivers on Uber Eats and Mr Delivery — "in the main made up of African nationals" — with the Consumer Goods Council warning stores were choosing to close rather than risk looting.1415 SAfm's morning show connected the two threads directly: "I realised… from Tuesday, Wednesday, that there was such a spike in complaints about deliveries," one presenter noted, linking the driver disruption to the sudden failure rate consumers were experiencing.16 A separate SAfm contributor pointed to a structural gap — platform drivers "are not actually employed, which is another issue altogether because there's no employer to go and check this out."17
Power FM added a supply-side observation from a retailer's perspective: "Pick n Pay delivery, some shops complaining that they are receiving orders but there are no bikes to come and pick up the parcels."18 702's Clement Manyathela read out a listener's cancelled order in real time — "Check 6060, order this morning, and it's just being cancelled… due to an in-store issue" — inviting more of the same.19 Meanwhile Mr D's own free-delivery ad ran repeatedly on 702 through the same window, an unavoidable irony given the editorial content around it.20
What's unresolved, and worth watching: none of the presenters walked away satisfied with the platforms' complaint architecture. Uber's new safety features for e-hailing — including a Record My Ride function and in-app emergency button — got airtime on Cape Talk,2122 but the equivalent overhaul on the Eats side, particularly around delivery verification and refund adjudication, has not been announced. Consumer advocates on air are pushing for auto-generated handover codes, clearer investigation criteria, and — failing that — for listeners to keep screenshots and escalate through consumer journalists and the NCC. Expect Cape Talk's Consumer Talk to keep the pressure on.
- 702
- Cape Talk
- Power FM
- SAfm
Citations
- 1.
“You want more bag for your buck? And need to avoid the badbyes. Tune in to Consumer Talk tomorrow, with award winning consumer journalist, Wendy Nola. Capetown Ophthalmologist, Dr. Tibbs, was operating with her nursing team when she thought she'd treat them to pizzas. She paid Uber Eats more than 600 rand for those pizzas, but they never arrived. She asked for a refund, of course, but was declared. And she's by no means alone. Consumer Talk asked Uber what investigations the company had to do with Uber.”
- 2.
“to Tibbs was operating with her nursing team when she thought she'd treat them to pizzas. She paid Uber Eats more than 600 grand for those pizzas, but they never arrived. She asked for a refund, of course, but was declined. And she's by no means alone. Consumer Talk asked Uber what investigations the company did before essentially telling a customer that they don't believe their version of events.”
- 3.
“and on the E.W.N. app. You want to move back for your buck? And need to avoid the badbyes. Tune in to Consumer Talk tomorrow with award winning consumer journalist, Wendy Nola. Capetown Ophthalmologist, Dr. Tebs, was operating with her nursing team when she thought she'd treat them to pizzas. She paid Uber Eats more than 600 rand for those pizzas, but they never arrived. She asked for a refund, of course, but was declared. And she's by no means alone. Consumer Talk asked Uber what investors”
- 4.
“You want more bang for your buck? And you need to avoid the bad buys. Tune in to Consumer Talk today at 2pm, with award-winning consumer journalist Wendy Nola. Capetown Ophthalmologist Dr. Tebs was operating with her nursing team when she thought she'd treat them to pizzas. She paid Uber Eats more than 600 rand for those pizzas, but they never arrived. She asked for a refund, of course, but was declined. And she's by no means alone. Consumer Talk asked Uber what investigations the company did before seeing Uber's”
- 5.
“Hungry and Waiting for the Food to arrive and then it doesn't and you can't get the service to help you. What happened to your Wendy? Hi, Saskar, good to be with you again. So this is a story about 680 rounds worth of pizzas which never arrived and about something bigger than that than just the one case and that is you know you tell the food delivery giant of this case Uber Eats that you didn't get what you paid for and they don't believe you.”
- 6.
“and the Pizzas, and the Pizzas were not there. Then I proceeded to go on the Uber app to try see where it's at to go try see if you contacted me. There was nothing. There was not even a name of a delivery person. That was the problem. So I can't even reach this person. And then I then proceeded to find how do I contact Uber to ask them about this. So then I went on to that chat for help. And then I submitted everything to the Uber app. And then I got to the app.”
- 7.
“and Venus and processed a full refund. And you confirm you received the money, but this is so much bigger than that. So off the record, I'm not going to read it, but essentially, Uber told me that the driver had been found to have done no wrong, which is odd to put it mildly because then why refund? I don't expect people to be refunded if there's solid proof that they got what they ordered, or that they made it.”
- 8.
“Acosta's Crazy, you've got it. The basic menu prices are higher for the delivery services and then you pay delivery on top of that and then there can be this problem. So I don't have first-hand experience of how these codes do it. But anyway, and I say to Uber, you know, what investigation is actually done before Uber reaches the conclusion that there's no refram due. In other words, the food actually was delivered and the customer is now lying about the fact that they didn't get their food. So it was first trip.”
- 9.
“, O214460567. We are inside of wrapping that Uber-Eats order going completely AWOL. Wendy, what can we learn from this experience? What advice would you give to food delivery app users? Okay, the first thing I would say is do your sum to see how much extra you're paying for your food, as opposed to you going and collecting yourself the menu prices? I don't know, people know that they're paying a delivery fee. But in the menu prices...”
- 10.
“They need to make their system more robust. It cannot have a code system which for large digits of your software number. It needs to be auto-generated and they need to say that the person needs to have contacted the other person who's they're delivering to and get the code to verify that definitely the food has been delivered and to say that they're not getting it correctly and exactly and not just leave it at the same time.”
- 11.
“came to a reposition of vehicle or furniture to prescription complaints, to value added products being added on accounts without consumer consent to credit bureau related issues. Anything credit related with as an office. Okay. I mean, was there a particular trend? Where did you find that suddenly there were a lot more complaints about one particular company?”
- 12.
“What kind of complaints were you getting? What kind of practices were people complaining against? The complaints ranged from non-compliance with the law when it came to reposition of vehicle or furniture to prescription complaints to value error products being added on accounts without consumer consent to credit bureau related issues. Anything credit related. We dealt with”
- 13.
“is consumer complaints. When we get consumers telling us how they are experiencing the application of these regulations in the market, it helps us immensely for us to then go into the issues, the cases that have been reported to then pick up anti-compliance behavior. What about the numbers that are not recut?”
- 14.
“Waihe, Neshuwina Warning, for the Korean drivers for the Uber Eats, Mr. Delivery, and those kinds of drivers who are in the main made up of African nationals, they will be affected, that platform on June 30th, and depending on what happens on Tuesday, we might see that disruption extending beyond Tuesday. We'll be speaking to Abraham now.”
- 15.
“Brother Risk, the looting of the store, and damage to the property that interests the lives of consumers as well as the staff. As the consumer puts down, so we work very closely with law enforcement, so we have in all the different provinces engaged with law enforcement. He says the risk for delivery services is Machia. First, because they're easy, target if you look at what has been happening recently, especially in Cozzolun, guys have been stopped on the road the property that they were transporting”
- 16.
“and M.E.W.A.T.T.S.C.D. for us, right? Yes. So now there's a huge opening for South Africans to take their jobs and to deliver groceries because it is apparent that the people that were delivering our groceries were people that were not from South Africa. You know, I realized by the way, I think from Tuesday, Wednesday that there was such a spike in complaints about deliveries.”
- 17.
“who go, "Well, we can't work the system because it's near impossible." Well, it goes one step further because you're talking about the Uber drivers, the motorbike delivery people. They're not actually employed, which is another issue altogether because there's no employer to go and check this out. It's a platform and the platform is not interested whether you, so African or whether you come from your home,”
- 18.
“Is it really true that people are grilling jobs or is it just the euphoria? I've seen with this thing, pick and pay delivery, some shops complaining that they are receiving orders but there are no bikes to come and pick up the parcels and take them to the people who ordered. So, I don't know how much I'm gonna do. I'm gonna go to the gym.”
- 19.
“and the delivery guys. Check 6060 order this morning and it's just being cancelled. We're grateful to inform you it's being cancelled due to an in-store issue. Hashtag real-life problems. Much, but obviously there's a knock-on effect with what's happening. If you've had that experience, I'd love to hear from you too. Last night the storm did quite a bit of damage.”
- 20.
“and Revider, Season C Supply. It's lunchtime and Mr. D has you covered. Open the app, pick your favorite meal and enjoy free delivery between 11am and 2pm. No restrictions, no hassle, skip the line, stay at your desk and let us bring lunch to you. Plus, every food order on the Mr. D app gives you a chance to win exciting prizes. Download the app now and make lunchtime effortless. Let's walk with a torch. This is Clement Manyathela. On 702. Five minutes before 11 o'clock, we continue now.”
- 21.
“, Standard Bank and Start It Over again from your favourite dock. I love that thanks dock for the message. Keep yours coming to 0725671567. If you're a user of e-hailing service, Uber, you probably noticed a mail in your inbox advising you of new safety features on the app and they've introduced four new safety features aimed at improving protection for both riders and drivers on the platform. One of the key additions is Record My Ride, which is a new service for your”
- 22.
“and his, attacking, e-hailing or uber-travers, so we've come a long way. Where there are some certain gaps, which are actually currently being addressed, is centered a lot around when someone is feeling unsafe, but not necessarily unsafe enough to request a vehicle. So there's a lot of updates coming in the near future around, flagging that gap specifically and then centered also around how you and your loved ones or dependents are tracking and able to send help. And so, in fact, you know, when you're able to”