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Uber Eats driver steals more than $2000 of Apple gear from purchaser

A customer who ordered an iPhone 14 Pro Max and Apple Watch Ultra through Apple has wound up empty-handed and left footing a $2098 bill.

On Wednesday, Reddit user isolatedparanoia posted their experience with Apple's same-day delivery service on the r/Apple subreddit.

According to isolatedparanoia, they had placed an order for an iPhone 14 Pro Max and an Apple Watch Ultra through Apple's website. They paid extra to have the items delivered by a courier, who turned out to work via Uber Eats.

However, they never received their iPhone or Apple Watch and, instead, got a notification that the Uber Eats driver had marked the order as delivered.

The customer reached out to Apple, who, according to them, "initially agreed to replace one of the items, the watch they later decided to cancel the replacement order, and denied me the replacement for the phone."

They also found that their local police department would not allow them to file a report for civil matters.

Apple offers same-day, two-hour courier delivery for eligible in-stock items from a local Apple Store. Customers must pay an extra $9 for same-day delivery.

Apple outsources same-day delivery to local courier services and, in this case, used Uber Eats.

A similar case happened in October 2021, when Apple Support forums user Llinares168 reported that an Uber Eats driver had stolen their package. They later said that after multiple phone calls, they later received a refund.



15 Comments

mike1 10 Years · 3437 comments

Huh? None of this makes sense. Regardless, a simple dispute of the credit card charge would resolve this pretty quickly.

topdrag 12 Years · 30 comments

It also doesn't make sense that the police called it a civil matter since stealing is criminal. Sooo I think there are a lot of details being omitted here. 

mrstep 15 Years · 524 comments

Lol - not at the theft, but this is the predictable outcome of the whole "stealing is fine, they have insurance" + "let's not prosecute theft" mentalities.  Surprise, in this case the 2 big companies won't take responsibility, the cops won't do anything, so it's the little guy that gets screwed.

Topdrag, I suspect the $ amount falls under some threshold of them caring - or maybe they're just lazy.  I've heard the same at a store here regarding people just walking out the door with merch - they can call the cops, and when they show up an hour later, they tell the employees "you know we can't do anything about it, right?"  Not in California, btw.  The stores either raise prices (and maybe close as a result) or just close the doors at some point if it gets to be too much.

mark fearing 16 Years · 441 comments

mrstep said:
Lol - not at the theft, but this is the predictable outcome of the whole "stealing is fine, they have insurance" + "let's not prosecute theft" mentalities.  Surprise, in this case the 2 big companies won't take responsibility, the cops won't do anything, so it's the little guy that gets screwed.

Topdrag, I suspect the $ amount falls under some threshold of them caring - or maybe they're just lazy.  I've heard the same at a store here regarding people just walking out the door with merch - they can call the cops, and when they show up an hour later, they tell the employees "you know we can't do anything about it, right?"  Not in California, btw.  The stores either raise prices (and maybe close as a result) or just close the doors at some point if it gets to be too much.

We don't know that a theft occurred, or did I miss the proof? Maybe a good reason for the companies to dispute this?

ronn 20 Years · 688 comments

Looks like some info is missing. The customer claims it wasn't delivered, but Apple and Uber Eats have to double-check and confirm what the driver claimed. Happened to me recently with an Amazon order. I got notified that two packages were delivered, and was provided with a photo of the delivery. The porch in the provided photo isn't mine though. When I contacted CS to report the wrong delivery, they wanted me to either wait till Monday to see if the package was marked delivered too early or go to the house and ask my neighbor. I wasn't doing either as the package was clearly not delivered properly and I am not risking a confrontation due to Amazon's mistake. They've done this before and instructions say to double-check the address.

Unlike the customer in this story, I got refunded immediately since two out of the three items are no longer available.