Is DoorDash charging iPhone users more for delivery?

Is it possible to be charged more due to the cellphone you use? There is a lawsuit based on that accusation, and the offender appears to be DoorDash.

In a scathing class-action lawsuit, filed at a U.S. District Court in Maryland, the food delivery company is being blamed for charging iPhone users more than Android handlers. WFTS Tampa Bay is reporting that the suit says the delivery app uses misleading and fraudulent tactics to charge customers, and even goes as far as alleging that DoorDash uses the tactic because studies show iPhone users earn more than Android users.

At the center of the allegations is the app’s expanded range delivery fee. DoorDash claims to use the charge to allow accessibility to available merchants farthest from the user. However, the accuser says DoorDash never creates a normal delivery area. Instead, the fee is based on how much money restaurants pay the online delivery company. According to the lawsuit, those with iPhones are charged the expanded range delivery fee more than Android users, and the suit even provides tests that were performed to prove it. Those tests revealed the iPhone was connected to the charge and the Android was not when the order was placed at the same time and at the same location.

DoorDash also is being blamed for using a number of smaller fees for a single service.

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"If DoorDash instead bundled all of its delivery fees into one large service fee, that practice would raise questions in a consumer's mind whether using DoorDash's platform is truly worth the cost. In other words, DoorDash utilizes a psychologically manipulative pricing structure that strategically misleads, deceives, and defrauds consumers into using the technology platform at a much higher, premium cost," the lawsuit said.

"To set the record straight: DoorDash does not charge more based on the type of phone you use — period," DoorDash said in a statement. "Any allegation that we deliberately charge iPhone and Android users differently or only charge DashPass members an Expanded Range Fee is blatantly false. We categorically reject the untrue claims in the lawsuit and look forward to vigorously fighting them."