r/PapaJohns • u/tryharderthistimeyo • 8d ago
Call center and uber
I've loved Papa John's for a long time. Ive eaten their pizza religiously over the years, and will turn down gourmet/restaurant pizza for a good cheese. Ive been working one of their offices(I will not name) just to work for the pizza place I love.
But man, the modern changes have made the customer service experience so poor over the last couple of years. I've learned a few things since being in the office. • stores are beginning to not hire drivers and will be transitioning to Uber eats and doordash • All stores for phone ordering are transitioning to a foreign call center. • The quality of topping and cheese will eventually be lowered, as they are trying desperately to find cheaper options.
The first two alone have been enough for me to not want to eat here anymore. If any of the stores had quality standards, the food might still be okay. The problem is the average Papa John's food quality is lower than that of Little Caesars, and the service is no better.
CORPORATE CUSTOMER COMPLAINT LINE: 1-877-547-7272 OPTION 4
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u/Tangboy50000 8d ago
They should really learn from Pizza Hut. Start using cheaper ingredients, and people stop ordering. People stop ordering, so you start using DoorDash to deliver. I’m not even going to guess at the percentages, but you will be remaking or refunding a shit load of orders. People will not deal with that, and they silently go elsewhere. We do not order delivery from any pizza places that use delivery services, because it’s been stone cold every single time. Pizza leaves the restaurant that’s less than 10 minutes from the house, 45-60 minutes later it arrives with zero explanation as to why it took so long, and it’s never in a hot bag. All these places claim they won’t hand over orders without a hot bag, so I’m guessing that’s either BS, or the driver immediately removes it from the bag when they get in the car, so they have the bag for other orders they’re picking up before they get around to delivering.
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u/RampantOnReddit 6d ago
I agree with most of your statement as an insider. I note too that about 90% of dashers bring a hot bag inside with them and do bag the order, with a small amount not doing so and I’ve heard “it’s going right down the road, if it gets cold because I’m taking it 5 minutes that way you guys are doing something wrong” as one of the excuses for that. The people that don’t use one are simply ignorant. A lot of locations will ban drivers like that. Mine is too busy to deal with that most of the time. I think the main reason you may feel that way is simply the pizza does not remain at that lovely melty point after a while and once it’s removed from the heat rack it cools rather quickly. PJ driver bags are thick and insulated,, DoorDash bags are rarely insulated but do contain a Mylar lining, still they lose heat much quicker than a PJ bag and a habit that I had personally as a driver was to remove the food from the bag as I exited my vehicle that way I did not need to struggle with removing the bag from around the food at the door(I dropped an order one time and never did it again).
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u/Temporary-Night-5456 7d ago
Our 3 stores have a google review rating of 2.6, 2.5 and 2.2. Getting rid of pappa screwed this business. They areaking the number one mistake. You dont save a food company by cutting costs. Better service, better ingredients, make a better pizza experience. They have forgot this as greed is running the show. RIP pappa johns.
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u/1GloFlare Driver 8d ago
A call center lol. I love having to leave a full screen because the phone's ringing /s
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u/Familiar_Marzipan_46 8d ago
So you can read them every single item on the menu and have them say they will call you back.
Or even better. Say they just wanted a salad lol
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u/kanec_whiffsalot 8d ago
Why are you calling in an order? The call center exists because the last people still ordering by phone take longer to articulate their order than it takes to get it ready.
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u/Sad_Solid_115 8d ago
I can't believe how many times a 1-2 pizza delivery order becomes a 10 minute plus ordeal because they have to ask about every menu item or have no idea where their card is or can't stop talking to people in the room with them. I honestly think the stores could benefit from removing the option all together at least at high volume locations so we can completely focus on getting orders out correctly. Ive had dashers who are thieves find out who the shift leaders/managers are so when they see they are busy on the phone they can try and take orders that aren't there's or get free drinks from the less experienced employees. Even customers that will argue they already paid if they think they can get away with it.
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u/Infamous-Lab-8136 8d ago
We always loved, after being read the menu, when they'd only then start figuring how many pizzas the family needs and who eats what
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u/tryharderthistimeyo 8d ago
The stores can benefit from making callers pay when they get there as opposed to over the phone. I always pay in cash. And to address your second half, Papa John's is ramping up doordashers. Like I said, the goal is to not hire any more drivers in the next year or so.
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u/kanec_whiffsalot 8d ago
The Doordash Drive program is a direct result of insurance premiums, and as such it's usage varies by state and franchisee. Fix insurance costs for us, and that one goes away.
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u/Temporary-Night-5456 7d ago
The CEO Robert Lynch was paid 6.7 million last year. This isnt about some BS insurance costs. They could do like dominos and provide the car then they get a better rate. This is about corporate greed and pinching pennies on the bottom to make the guys on top more and more money. They are riding the ship down and making every dollar while they can. Foreign call centers, door dash drivers. Its BS to cut cost. Being instructed to make the crust wider to make the useage of material less. Its all pennies that go uphill while destorying the employee's earing potential.
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u/kanec_whiffsalot 7d ago
As the guy going through the pnl every month, yer dead wrong. Getting insurance quotes is nightmare territory for some operators. This year's HNOA policy won't allow my store more than 10 drivers on staff and it still costs more than my rent. What's the option if I need more drivers than I can schedule? What do we do next year if it gets worse (like every year)?
Corporate make their money on stores ordering food from the commissaries, and royalties in sales. shrinking portions would make PJI less money. Your local store may very well be skimping you tho, because bad leadership exists, and not every franchisee is a good operator. Big stupid crust is poor technique at the dough station. Period. If that's training or sleaziness at your local store I can't guess
Rob Lynch is not CEO anymore. VC guy is out, new guy seems genuinely interested in improving product.
Any other information you would like corrected or addressed?
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u/Decent-End-4682 7d ago
The restaurant looses tactile feedback when they are disconnected from actual customer interaction. Large orders, plan ahead, catering and folks with certain requests are better handled over the phone.
Over the phone I can give more accurate wait times. Immediately let the customer know of items I am out of. I can quickly discern what is a prank or bullshit complaint.
The call center can be helpful but it should not be the first and only option. Papa John’s team members havebeen reduced to pizza making factory workers getting paid minimum wage or just above. They don’t need any customer service skills anymore. They don’t need to know how to route and dispatch orders. They just need to STFU and make pizzas and the pay reflects that skill set.
The restaurant crew doesn’t need to interact with the customer at all, if they want to talk to someone let them talk to someone in the Philippines, use 3rd party drivers, close your eyes and hope everything will be ok.
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u/kanec_whiffsalot 7d ago
When have PJ team members ever made much over minimum wage? The calls have changed, not the staff. The average phone order is now 10 times the length it used to be. Online sources outnumbered phone calls before the call center was introduced, despite our site being objectively one of the worst to navigate among similar restaurants and services.
Carryout focus needs to be the new model, honestly. Delivery is so expensive and is only getting worse, I don't see it lasting another decade on its current trajectory without a major upheaval somewhere.
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u/Decent-End-4682 7d ago
Whatever cost savings that was to be had with Papa Call, DoorDash and the other 3rd party aggregators got absorbed at the top. The pay is shittier than ever and remaining employees are just expected to do more with less.
TBH I would rather have more in-stores and drivers. Papa call and Door dash don’t grab the registers, fold boxes, prep, dishes, slap, cut, make pizza, sweep and mop.
Dominos is still 100% using their own drivers even in high minimum wage California and other high wage west and east coast states. Some areas even have mandated health care and they are still in business. IDK dominos is doing something right their market cap is more than 10x that of PJ.
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u/kanec_whiffsalot 7d ago
Domino's has been the larger chain since PJ was founded, that hasn't changed. They run lower food costs for sure, and generally more efficient delivery areas. I don't know their cost stack at all tho.🤷
Your perception that there was a cost save on those services is a bit skewed. Certainly they cost less than the staffing now, but all it's done is put us back to the cost levels from a few years ago. The margins have still gone down, not up. From an hours/product produced perspective we are more efficient than ever, but all in labor (in store, driver, door dash, PapaCall) we are at best even, and in most stores spending higher as a percentage of revenue than a decade ago.
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u/tryharderthistimeyo 8d ago
It doesn't help if the call center people can't understand what you're saying. I call in my orders because they are never correct on the app. I would rather just call the store and tell them what I want. The same that I do with every other pizza place that exists as well as Chinese food places, gyro shops, and Mexican food. So many people call in orders, they chose to outsource it.
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u/kanec_whiffsalot 8d ago
If you order on the app and your order isn't correct, that's because you ordered it incorrect. Sounds like we are narrowing down the source of the problem...
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u/tryharderthistimeyo 8d ago edited 8d ago
Every time I order on the app I pay extra for extra cheese, sauces, and I normally get a half and half pizza.
It never comes out half and half and they next to never have my sauces that I paid for. How do I mess that up?
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u/kanec_whiffsalot 8d ago
If your pizza doesn't match your order, the crew is screwing it up, and that's independent of how you ordered it. If the order doesn't match what you wanted, that's you messing up your own order. I can't tell you which is the problem, and I really shouldn't have to figure this out for you. Nevermind that you're complaining about the crew messing up your order, while insisting that they also be the ones to take your order on the phone. Why think when you can yell at people I guess?
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u/tryharderthistimeyo 8d ago
I do not ever yell at customer service people.
People have taken pizza orders over the phone since the inception of pizza restaurants. What an odd Hill to die on.
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u/KindlySchedule7984 4d ago
The PJ franchise I worked for was all about faster service and delivery times which cut into quality and eliminated inhouse drivers in favor of doordash. The problem with DD is their drivers hate PJ orders because they don't think they get paid/tipped enough on them. So many orders go unclaimed by DD and die under the heat lamps, sitting for hours. When a dasher actually claims the order the customer may not get the whole order or anything at all! One customer kept our GM and AM on the phone for 3 hours with DD customer service because the dasher refused to give him change! Sometimes it takes hours for the dasher to pick up the order. It's ridiculous. Also, when you call the store, you can route your call directly to the store and avoid the call center by choosing the option to talk to a manager. Never deal with the call center because they are bound to screw up something on your order or delivery instructions and they don't apply discounts like the store will.
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u/dyingdays2020 4d ago
I'm pretty sure Papa John himself wouldn't have let this happen. Domino's and Marco's are the only ones I enjoy anymore. Their quality is reasonably consistent.
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u/evasarah3838 8d ago
I hate when they ask what kind is pizzas do you have. Like how the F do you not know what you want to order 🥴