Columns28.10.2024

KFC secret price hikes for deliveries in South Africa

KFC is quietly charging South Africans 16.7% of their purchase value plus an additional R5 as a delivery fee for orders placed through its website.

Curiously, the KFC website does not list prices until a user has set their location, and selected whether they would like delivery or prefer to collect.

When logged in and the order is set to collect, the prices shown are much lower than if you specified that you wanted delivery.

When placing a delivery order, there is also no indication of how much the customer is paying for the convenience.

At checkout, the bill only shows the subtotal for the food and a flat R5 delivery fee, with the option to set a donation for KFC’s “Add Hope” charity.

Although this model of charging more on every item is similar to third-party delivery services like Mr D and Uber Eats, there is one key difference to consider — Mr D and Uber Eats charge restaurants a commission on every order.

Therefore, restaurants have no choice but to increase the prices they charge on delivery apps to cover the commissions these services levy.

However, this also means that item prices for collection and delivery are generally the same on these apps.

While KFC might not be surfacing its additional delivery charges — at least it doesn’t add the delivery premium to collection orders.

MyBroadband compared the prices from a cross-section of KFC products — including burgers, Streetwise combos, large meal combos, and buckets — to see how much extra the fast food restaurant charged for delivery.

The analysis showed that KFC added close to 16.7% across the board, with the markup percentage fluctuating between 16.67% and 16.71%.

We compared several locations in Johannesburg, Centurion, and Cape Town, and the prices seemed to be the same between the three cities.

The tables below summarise the results of the comparison.

CollectionDelivery
ProductCollectionDeliveryDifferenceReal delivery charge
Colonel Burger / ZingerR49.90R59.9016.7%Below minimum
Crunch BurgerR29.90R35.9016.7%Below minimum
Double Crunch BurgerR59.90R71.9016.7%R17
Dunked Crunch BurgerR34.90R41.9016.7%Below minimum
Dunked Zinger BurgerR54.90R65.9016.7%Below minimum
Dunked Double CrunchR64.90R77.9016.7%R18
Dunked Crunch MasterR64.90R77.9016.7%R18
Streetwise Two + ChipsR39.90R47.9016.7%Below minimum
Streetwise Five + ChipsR99.90R119.9016.7%R25
All in One FeastR164.90R197.9016.7%R38
9 Piece BucketR149.90R179.9016.7%R35
15 Piece BucketR234.90R281.9016.7%R52
21 Piece BucketR299.90R359.9016.7%R65
Real delivery charge includes R5 flat delivery fee KFC charges on all delivery orders

The effect of the pricing changes highlighted above is that KFC customers using the company’s own website to place orders are paying much more for deliveries than they might know.

To illustrate the impact, consider the minimum and maximum order values the fast-food restaurant allows on its online platform.

KFC requires a minimum delivery order value of R70 and limits orders to a maximum of R1,000. It also adds a flat R5 delivery fee.

An item that is close to the R70 minimum is a Double Crunch burger. It costs R71.90 when delivered and R59.90 when collected. Add the R5 fee, and the total delivery charge is R17.

On the other end of the scale, a hypothetical R1,000 delivery order would cost roughly R857 to collect instead. Therefore, with the R5 delivery fee, the total delivery charge is R148.

One way to look at this approach is to assume that KFC’s delivery drivers get paid a set monthly salary.

Customers who place larger delivery orders then contribute a greater proportion towards paying the drivers than those who place smaller orders.

Only once a driver has performed enough deliveries to cover their monthly salary would any excess delivery charges go towards KFC’s bottom line.

In that sense, one might argue that a percentage-based delivery fee system is fair.

However, the real question is whether customers will consider the convenience of delivery worth a 16.7% price increase, especially on larger orders.

For most people, there is a price at which they would rather collect an order themselves than pay for delivery.

If more customers realise how much extra they are paying for deliveries, they might reconsider using the option — or even select a different take-away place.

MyBroadband contacted KFC for comment, but it did not respond by publication.

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