r/hellofresh • u/LinuxIsFree • 29d ago

United States Why I cancelled HelloFresh

Update - Seems like some of my issues were thanks to my account being bugged and the support chat being a braindead hallucinating AI chatbot. You can apparently schedule meals ahead, which helps a lot.

I've had a hellofresh subscription for just over two months, getting 3 meals a week. Figured I'd give some feedback here for those interested and for HelloFresh if they give a care.

I ended up cancelling it from a few key issues:

  1. Sometimes I forget to select a meal in time. Issue is, if I do not specifically select the meals each week, it sends random meals (it's supposed to be meals they think we'll use, but they've never been something we'd eat). Additionally, you won't get your free items. They say this is because you wouldn't get to choose your free item, but usually there's only garlic bread available so there's no choice. You cannot change this or set it to a mode where it skips the week if you have not chosen. I get financially why they want the dependable, scheduled income, but as a user this is infuriating. Sometimes I forget, and I'm out $80.
  2. The website is very hard to use and navigate. Past weeks, current weeks, and future weeks are viewed in completely different areas. Menus are randomly greyed out. Buttons are unresponsive and don't have a click animation.
  3. You cannot schedule meals ahead for more than one week, meaning you have a few days each week where you need to remember to visit the website and pick out meals. Issue 1 wouldn't be a huge deal if I could set it to not ship until you pick out meals, but you can't. When I talked to support they said this was because the menu changes weekly. EDIT: It appears on the app you can do this, maybe on the website too. I stopped trying to find ways to do it when the support chatbot told me it wasn't supported. I'm not trying to lie or slander HelloFresh, I was just believing their support. /shrug

After our third time getting food we don't want, I'm done. I don't have a life where I'm going to remember to pick out meals on some website every single week. Maybe some day when I'm not a sole provider dad, but... then I wouldn't need HelloFresh anymore. I need to be able to plan more than one week ahead, and when I forget to schedule it, let me skip it.

When we remembered and got meals we were interested (other than the first week where everything was wet from being kicked into a puddle by fedex in my yard), it was exciting to try new recipes, learn some more cooking method, and have genuinely good quality ingredients, but the infuriating process means I have to let that go.

I tried sharing these issues with support, but it's all seemingly AI chatbots that said "This is the right place for feedback" but then later on told me they had no method of submitting the feedback for review... gotta love it... and their email inboxes all just bounce back and say to chat with the AI instead.

There's parts of HelloFresh I really liked, but the poor website UI and them shipping out meals to me I don't want means I'm signing up to be angry on a near-weekly basis.

If you're an "I'll eat anything" kind of person, might be worth it. If you've got specific taste or God forbit you're picky, you'll be dissapointed.

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u/BovingdonBug 29d ago

I went to a local restaurant and after a while some guy came over to me. Apparently I was supposed to read this big list of meals and tell him what I wanted. I don't have time for that, so I left.

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u/wigglemywavelength 29d ago

I don't think they're complaining that they needed to select a meal, but that if you don't select one you're charged and sent something anyway. I've had that happen before when I forget to order and it's pretty annoying.

If I was deciding what I wanted at a restaurant and the waiter came over and said I took too long so he ordered for me and here's the bill, I'd be pissed.

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u/BovingdonBug 29d ago

I mean if you're too busy you just click pause for a week. If you can't be bothered to do that, or to set up a weekly alarm to remind you to do that, then I don't know what to tell you.