What a UK restaurant can reasonably ask a delivery platform for
Restaurant chains get poor results from account managers partly because of what they ask for. Some requests are narrow, checkable and within the platform’s power, and those get answered. Others require a report that does not exist or a commitment nobody is authorised to give, and those produce polite deflection that operators then read as indifference. Separating the two makes the relationship considerably more productive without changing anything on the platform’s side.
What can they actually answer?
Six requests, ordered by how reliably you get an answer.
Confirmation of a specific incident, if you supply the site, date and window. Which eligibility criterion a site is currently failing. The status of a document or onboarding step. What a particular closure state means and who can lift it. The written version of a policy referred to elsewhere. And a commercial adjustment, where there is evidence and discretion.
Each of those is narrow enough for one person to resolve in one message.
What can they usually not answer?
Three, and pressing on them repeatedly damages the relationship without producing anything.
A full availability history for a site over a period, because the internal tooling is built around support cases rather than merchant reporting. Your ranking position for a customer in a given neighbourhood, because that is computed per query and not stored per merchant. And any commitment about future ranking or promotional placement, because nobody is authorised to give one.
Those are limits of the system rather than refusals, and treating them as refusals is a common and costly misreading.
How should a request be phrased?
Narrow, dated, and with the obvious things already eliminated.
“Our Cardiff site shows as unavailable on 12 and 14 August between 19:00 and 22:00. The tablet was online and no pause was set locally. Can you confirm what state was applied and by whom?” is answerable. “Can you send us our downtime for August?” is not.
The first version also signals that you are measuring, which changes how the rest of the conversation goes.
What should I be bringing to a quarterly review?
A dated list of interruptions by site and platform, a short list of the mechanisms behind them, and one specific ask.
That is a different document from a complaint. It shows the relationship’s operational cost in a form that can be discussed instead of defended, and it moves the conversation from anecdote to pattern.
Most groups arrive at these reviews with revenue figures and a general sense that things could be better. The list described above is a Kitchain (kitchain.co) export, and the reason to bring it is that every one of the six answerable requests begins with a site, a date and a window.
What is worth asking for that operators rarely do?
Three, and none of them costs the platform anything.
The written policy behind any rule you have been told verbally, which is useful later and free to request now.
Advance notice of changes that affect eligibility, which platforms sometimes agree to at account level even without an obligation.
And a named escalation route for out-of-hours closures, because the biggest single improvement in most estates is being able to reach somebody at nine in the evening instead of nine in the morning.
Does the European position help me here?
Only as a model for what to ask for, since we have not verified an equivalent UK duty.
In the European Union, Regulation 2019/1150 requires a statement of reasons on a durable medium before or at the time a restriction takes effect, a free internal complaint system, and named mediators in the terms. We have not verified what applies in the United Kingdom, so treat that as a menu and not as a right. All three can be asked for as a matter of account practice, and some platforms will accommodate them.