AI agent for food delivery: where is my order, handled

Who this is for

This page is for businesses that run their own delivery: a ghost kitchen, a multi-site restaurant group with its own drivers, a meal-prep company, a grocery or catering delivery service, or a local courier for food. Platform marketplaces such as the big delivery apps have their own support, so the agent here works on your own channels: website, WhatsApp-style messaging, SMS and email.

Restaurants that mainly take dine-in bookings and takeaway phone orders are covered on the restaurants page. Delivery has a distinct pattern. Timing is the product, so a delay becomes a complaint within minutes, and support volume tracks dispatch problems.

What we build

• An order-status agent that looks up the live order, states the stage and estimated arrival, and tells the customer honestly when the driver is delayed.
• A complaint agent that handles missing, wrong and cold items by asking for a photo, applying your credit rules and issuing a small credit or refund up to a cap you set.
• A dispatch-support agent that watches open orders, flags those at risk of lateness, and suggests a reassignment or a customer message to the dispatcher.
• A menu-sync agent that updates item availability and prices across your site, ordering system and listings when the kitchen marks something sold out.
• A driver-support agent that answers drivers' questions about pay periods, addresses and pickup instructions from your own guidelines.

It can connect to ordering and dispatch tools such as Square, Toast, Olo, Shopify, Tookan, Onfleet or a custom backend, where an API exists. Customer channels can include WhatsApp Business, SMS and web chat.

Complaint types and who decides

Any message mentioning allergies, illness or a foreign object triggers a fixed path: the agent expresses concern, does not argue, and sends the case to a manager with the order details. We test this path thoroughly before launch.

Rules and customer data

Delivery involves addresses, phone numbers and sometimes allergy notes. Privacy law applies, for example state laws in the US and GDPR in the UK and Ireland. Food safety and allergen information rules differ by country, and the agent should state allergens only from your menu data. Check with your local food authority or lawyer about what you must say and record.

Text and message consent matters. The FCC publishes rules on automated texts in the US, and WhatsApp has its own business messaging policy. The agent sends proactive messages only to customers who opted in and logs each one. See our AI agent security checklist for how we protect order data.

How the project runs

1. Count your ticketsWe review a month of support messages and tag them. Order status usually dominates.
2. Connect live order dataThe status agent reads orders and driver locations through your API.
3. Dinner-rush testWe run it beside your team across a busy Friday so the agent is judged in real conditions.
4. Add refunds within a capCredit powers are switched on only after the status agent is reliable.

We work from Pune with offices in Coventry and New York, and plan calls outside your lunch and dinner peaks. A short demo follows each week.

What it costs

Projects start at $1,500 and our rate is $30 an hour. An order-status agent on one channel is a small project. Price rises with the number of channels, how real-time your data is and whether refunds and dispatch support are included. You get a fixed quote within one working day of a short call. See what an AI agent costs and AI agent development. If your orders come by phone, an AI voice agent for restaurants covers that.