State AGs Deliver Input On FTC’s Food Delivery Fee ANPRM

Last month, a bipartisan group of attorneys general from 16 states submitted a comment letter in response to the FTC’s ANPRM on food delivery fees that advocated for the FTC to adopt a new rule addressing pricing for food delivery services. In their letter, the AGs noted the growth and “essential” nature of food delivery platforms to consumers and suggested that some platforms use “drip pricing” by not presenting fees clearly until at the point of checkout and may fail to conspicuously disclose the purpose or methodology of those fees, such as “service fees” and “small order fees.” The AGs posited that consumers may not be able to understand how much to tip due to lack of clarity regarding these and other fees. They further claimed that consumers are confused by “markups” of items, where the price on the platform is higher than the price in a restaurant.