In-N-Out fans are paying up to $50 extra for ‘black market’ burger delivery — and some are getting scammed on their orders

Spotting an opportunity to capitalize on hungry customers antsy for their animal style burgers, however, the independent L.A. Material publication discovered that unauthorized “burger brokers” on Facebook Marketplace are making runs to In-N-Out locations to pick up and deliver peoples’ orders — sometimes at a significant mark-up.

The outlet found 11 drivers advertising burger delivery services on Marketplace in and around the Los Angeles area — including many who offered flyers outlining their availability and locations served.

Some of the drivers told the outlet that they charged anywhere from $10-$30, while one particular delivery person charges $45. Many of these delivery people require advance payment.

L.A. Material tested the service and reached out to one person who charged them $50 extra, on top of their meal, to deliver their order. And that’s when they learned the next important lesson about dealing with “burger brokers” — one that left both their stomachs and wallets lighter.

Satisfaction not guaranteed

The outlet noted that, after sending half the delivery fee to the driver via payment app Zelle, along with their order, they never received their food. And follow-up attempts to contact the “burger broker” proved fruitless.

That’s, of course, the risk of buying fast food — or any product, really — via online marketplaces: if there’s money to be made, scammers will find a way to exploit it.

Neither In-N-Out Burger nor Meta returned Moneywise’s request for comment. But, while there’s no data specifically showing how much thieves made off of fast food fanatics via online marketplaces, the FTC reported that, last year, scams that started on social media resulted in just over $2 billion in losses.

The agency added that “people reported losing far more money to scams on Facebook alone than they reported losing to text or email scams.”

Social media scams can take different forms, from peddling fake wares on a marketplace to soliciting payment for items via crypto, gift cards or other means that make tracing or recovering the stolen funds near impossible. Others may send phishing links in the hopes that you’ll click and then offer up personal information to help the scammer access your accounts.

When it comes to your next burger order, however, you’re probably thinking, “No sweat — I’ll just use a verified delivery app.”

Well, it turns out that scammers can cook on legit delivery apps too, be it hacking into customer accounts or sending fake phishing messages from a legit app to coax your password or other details out of you.

Even the apps themselves have come under fire, with a 2024 Grubhub settlement resulting in the delivery platform paying $25 million over charges of “deceiving diners about delivery costs and blocking their access to their accounts and funds, deceiving workers about how much money they would make delivering food and unfairly and deceptively listing restaurants on its platform without their permission.”

How to have your hamburger and eat it too

Whether buying burgers or anything else online, there are easy ways for consumers to protect themselves against scammers.

Facebook itself recommends that, when it comes to its Marketplace, users should always keep the transaction conversation within the app, be wary of sellers offering deals that seem too good to be true, use only trusted payment methods, verify the existence of any item in person before purchasing and, of course, never pay in advance.