HelloFresh

It pains me to write a negative review for HelloFresh as my husband and I are great fans of their food. However, we have had a simply terrible experience getting them to deliver our boxes in a place where they won't get stolen! We live on a busy street in Chicago, and our boxes are often taken off the front porch by the time we get home from work. We have asked HelloFresh numerous times to arrange for the boxes to be delivered to our back door (safe out of view from the main street), but they continue to ignore our pleas. So, we find ourselves at wit's end.

Bottom Line: No, I would not recommend this to a friend

We have only been receiving HelloFresh for about four weeks. The third week we had trouble with delivery time. Today's meals came with servings for two instead of four. We signed up for this service to reduce stress not add to it.

I called the customer service line, and she acknowledged it was their error and offered next week to be free of charge. I agreed but let her know that we wouldn't be paying for this order either for two people. Not only do we have to now find a time to meal plan and get groceries, but why would we go to all the trouble of cooking meals for two? The lady explained that if she refunded this week that they couldn't offer anything for next week. She sent me to the person above her, and she was rude. She said she couldn't give us what we were asking for. I said she could pick up the order or send the other half. She said no.

Now, remember this is a company that inundates your email all week asking you to send emails to all your friends for free weeks of food. I said we would be canceling our service and she very sarcastically said ok. Beware if you're looking for any type of stress reduction with this service.

Bottom Line: No, I would not recommend this to a friend

So I have been a regular consumer of HelloFresh for the past few months. There were a few bad ingredients but for the most part not bad until this week.

On Monday my usual delivery did not arrive, so I reach out and they say it should be there by 8 pm. We are bummed and starving but decide to have a snack and eat late. 8 o'clock comes and goes and no delivery. Tuesday I reach out again, they say they are very sorry and it will be there by 8 pm. Need I repeat the scenario? Nothing arrives, and we once again are ill-prepared, and it's late, and we have no interest in going out to eat at 9 pm.

Fast forward to today (Wednesday) still no food and HelloFresh is still sorry that there is a problem with the delivery. At no point am I told definitively if the food is coming eventually, if at all.

Customer service tells me that they are very sorry and they will apply this week's payment to next week's order, like it was some kind of gift. At first, I'm thinking at least I'm getting a free week, but wait a second, no, I'm not! It's my money! So I get completely screwed this week, and for my trouble, I will just pay next week as usual. Customer service continued to make it sound like a credit or a gift. Do they think I am stupid? I said no thanks, I would try Blue Apron and their response was "Ok, sorry to see you go."

I am sorry I passed on their cards to my friends, and I will be really embarrassed when they get screwed over.

Bottom Line: No, I would not recommend this to a friend

I have tried in vain to get HelloFresh to minimize the amount of trash that is generated by their products, but they refuse to change. The food comes wrapped in unrecyclable plastic bubble wrap. The other food is wrapped in unrecyclable packaging. They need to use a recyclable cardboard, and other packaging that is recyclable or bio-degradable.

Bottom Line: No, I would not recommend this to a friend

We were given three HelloFresh meals by my sister. We tried it and didn't like it. A week later we got a $59 credit card charge by HelloFresh and a note that they were sending us more meals, which we had not chosen and we had not ordered and had not yet received. Calling their customer service did no good. They refused to cancel the order or refund the charge. Told us that the free order has some fine print that it is "auto-renew" unless you cancel. Since we had not seen the fine print, we were stuck. Beware of "free" HelloFresh meals. They aren't.

Bottom Line: No, I would not recommend this to a friend

A friend submitted my information for a "free" coupon for HelloFresh. I was super busy and HelloFresh was not a priority, so I didn't act on the offer. HelloFresh sent me emails and correspondence constantly until I gave in to check it out.

I went to their website and started the process, to evaluate whether or not it was for me. When I got to the point of choosing my food, everything I wanted was going to cost an additional $10. This seemed deceptive, since everything prior to that point had indicated a set price without extra charges. Since the company had broken my trust (in my opinion), and the choices that were included without extra charge were not what I would choose, I decided it was not for me, and never submitted my order.

SURPRISE! I opened my front door to find a HelloFresh box! It has been 90+ degrees, the inside of the box was not cool, one of the cooling gel packs had leaked all over, and since I didn't know what day it came, I had to throw it away. Last night, I happened to look at my PayPal account to find that HelloFresh charged me $59.94 yesterday!

Confused, I called today, and was told that they couldn't do anything for me because the deadline had past days ago! (even though the charge just went through yesterday). So, by the time I was charged, it was too late to do anything about it! I asked to speak to a supervisor, and was told the same - no refund. No partial refund. They won't do anything for me. I asked to escalate to that person's supervisor and was told that they don't take calls.

I was also informed that my account was ACTIVE, so I logged in and canceled it. But they will do nothing to make this right. In the end, I have wasted food and a charge for a service, even though I never completed a request for food. I was also charged an additional $1 for some random reason.

Bottom Line: No, I would not recommend this to a friend

I reached out to HelloFresh as soon as I received an email stating my first box was on the way. I never chose a meal or start date.

I emailed customer service right away, stating there must be a mistake. I received responses from their customer service that was beyond rude!

One person even canceled my account without speaking to me, and I asked for a supervisor to reach out to me so we can correct the mistake and this same representative told me that I didn't need to speak with a supervisor and that my card would stay charged. Unbelievable that they would say that to me.

I do NOT recommend HelloFresh as they are reputable and their customer service needs an extreme makeover.

I gave them four chances to rectify this problem and they have chosen not to correct it. So I will let the world know how awful they are as a company.

Choose another company for your meals.

Bottom Line: No, I would not recommend this to a friend

HelloFresh is using the ruse of a free week's worth of meals with free delivery to cheat customers out of $60.00 each. You receive an email, follow the prompts in the email, create an account, and get told your account has been credited the cost of one week's meals, but you are charged for the meals anyway. This was my experience with HelloFresh.

A colleague had forwarded this offer to me via her HelloFresh mobile app. I checked my bank account immediately after placing the order to make sure I wasn’t charged, but I was. I called the company but was answered by an exacerbated woman. She instructed me to forward her the email (she didn’t believe there was no coupon code provided) and she would issue a refund, which I would get in 3-5 business days. I called the next day to verify the refund was processed and was told it was. Nothing else was offered. No additional discount for future orders was offered for the trouble I had encountered. It’s like they didn’t care if I continued to order or not.

If I hadn’t immediately checked my account for the charge, it may have gone unnoticed because it is an auto-renewal delivery. By the time I would have balanced my checkbook, I would have thought the charge was for the next week's order. I don’t know if the email was intentionally misleading or if it was an error in coding, but either way, it was not handled well by customer service.

Bottom Line: No, I would not recommend this to a friend

I'm sad to write this because I used to really like the convenience of HelloFresh, but I had preselected meatless meals after going vegan and realized the day before shipping that the system had totally reset my choices. It had done that before but I caught it sooner. I wrote to the company to try to get it fixed or block shipment and they told me there was nothing they could do and it was too late - this, before shipment.

PayPal reversed the charge, then I got a collections notice from HelloFresh. They deny any wrongdoing and tell me that I must pay the balance and then they'll give me a $15 credit, to my canceled account. So basically I must agree to buy another box to even use this credit. That's such a scam, and very sad.

Bottom Line: No, I would not recommend this to a friend

I usually get my boxes on Thursdays. I was showing someone what I had coming. One meal wasn’t what I ordered. I checked my account, and I was charged twice.

I called their customer service. I got someone I couldn’t understand. She told me I had set up two accounts and had my box I ordered coming on Thursday and another box coming on Friday! I said why would I set up two accounts and order the same thing to come on Thursday and then the same box coming on Friday? She said people do it all the time! She said she couldn’t give me my money back but would give me one free meal ($17.95). After she charged me $56 twice. No way!

The customer service was in no way helpful partly due to the language barrier! I ordered from Blue Apron and had a problem, but they were really helpful and accommodating. Customer service is everything to a business!

Bottom Line: No, I would not recommend this to a friend

I recently joined HelloFresh and had a terrible experience! I had tried other home prep food delivery services and thought I'd try HelloFresh. My first red flag was that they didn't provide all of the ingredients for my meal like other services such as Blue Apron do. Sure it was just small things like garlic, butter, and oil, but sometimes it can make or break a meal if you don't have it at home. My second my delivery date somehow got changed without me knowing until it was being shipped, and was too late to change.

The customer service I received was horrible. Sure they responded quickly, but it was like "we're sorry(not sorry) that this happened. Oh well! They did absolutely nothing to help me and seemed to be responding with autogenerated messages. They never explained how it happened or expressed regret or tried to make it better. It was just "sorry you just wasted $60, and there is nothing we can do! Do yourself a favor and order from Blue Apron or Purple Carrot instead!

Bottom Line: No, I would not recommend this to a friend