Since the pandemic began, the BC government implement a temporary cap on food delivery fees to help struggling restaurants during the pandemic.
With the ongoing inflation and pandemic challenges faced by restaurant and bar owners, BC is looking to permanently capping fees charged by food delivery companies like Uber and Skip the Dishes.
The delivery services helped get Virtuous Pie in downtown Victoria through tough times, however, now, many of their customers continue to use the service.
“People are still only ordering delivery and not coming out to our restaurant,” said Kelsey McInnes, general manager of Virtuous Pie.
Many restaurants and bars needed to increase their reliance on food-delivery companies to serve their customers early in the pandemic, the temporary 15% cap on food and 5% cap on additional fees were introduced in response to fees as high as 30% being charged to restaurants.
The cap, which was extended in September and December 2021, is set to expire December 31st of this year.
On Thursday, the province proposed legislation that would keep those fees at 20% permanently.
“As the costs of food and labour rise worldwide, BC restaurants need to be supported to ensure prices are affordable and that delivery companies aren’t charging unfair fees,” said Minister of Jobs, Economic Recovery and Innovation Ravi Kahlon.
“By introducing legislation allowing us to convert the delivery fee cap from temporary to permanent, we are able to provide more certainty to the sector and to delivery drivers.”
McInnes said they do a lot of business through the delivery apps, so bringing in a permanent fee cap gives her a huge sense of relief.
“Knowing that our delivery fees will remain constant going forward will help us keep costs down for our customers.”
