DoorDash angers Halifax restaurants with unauthorized deliveries

Two Halifax restaurants say delivery service DoorDash is risking their reputations by using outdated menus without permission and delivering their food, despite having no affiliation with them. 

John House, co-owner of the Black Sheep restaurant on Dresden Row, said he found out DoorDash was delivering his food when a driver turned up to claim an order. 

"We were surprised, because we have no affiliation with them. We didn't know we were listed on there," he told CBC News Monday. 

He checked DoorDash's website and found an outdated menu for his restaurant. He said DoorDash would take orders from the old menu, then tell customers the restaurant "just sold out." 

House said that reflects badly on the business. He also questioned why DoorDash would offer to deliver desserts featuring ice cream. They made a DoorDash order themselves and found the pickup was 10-minutes late, meaning the food sat longer than they'd like to leave it. 

"We aren't really in control of how the food is handled. We have lots of things on the menu that don't necessarily travel well," House said. 

He worries people will think Black Sheep is behind the deliveries. 

House said they do offer take-out food, but his restaurant focuses on the in-house experience. "We want people to come in and experience it in our space. It's part of the whole package."

He asked DoorDash to take his menu down, but it's still on the app as of Monday evening. The listing does say the store is not affiliated with DoorDash and says the owners can contact them to "claim your business."

'We didn't consent to being part of that delivery service'

Eric McIntyre, co-owner of Kitsune Food Co. on Agricola Street, also wants DoorDash to stop delivering his food. But as the drivers can just place the orders as a regular customer, he has no way to stop them. 

"We didn't consent to being a part of that delivery service. We're an extremely small restaurant where it's just the two of us running it and that's not how we operate our business," he said. "We do local pick-up orders only, or eat-in at our counter."

He too said he'd tried to get his restaurant removed from the app, but it too was still listed Monday evening. 

"If DoorDash is doing a poor job at this, that's a representation of our business, and we're not asking to be represented by them. And they didn't ask us at all to use our menu," McIntyre said. "It's super shady."

McIntyre and House said hungry Haligonians should either dine in their establishments, or call the eateries directly to order pick-up. "And DoorDash if you're listening, take our menu off your site. Please."

DoorDash responds

DoorDash declined to do an interview, but sent a statement. 

"We work constantly to ensure that our services make merchants more successful, and thousands of restaurants across Canada have told us that this is the case. For those not interested in being on DoorDash for any reason, we immediately remove them from the platform upon their request," it reads in part. 

A spokesperson for DoorDash would not answer specific questions about why it hadn't removed the menus for Black Sheep or Kistune.