Tesco to introduce click-and-collect surcharge on non-food orders under £30

Retail Week can reveal that the supermarket giant will start charging customers £2 to pick up general merchandise orders made through its Tesco Direct website, unless the order value is £30 or above.

The move mirrors a similar switch by John Lewis last July. The department store chain called time on its free click-and-collect service after unveiling plans to charge shoppers £2 on orders under £30.

It also comes six months after Tesco revealed plans to increase its minimum spend for grocery deliveries on online orders from £25 to £40.

Tesco shoppers now have to pay a £4 surcharge in addition to the existing delivery charge, if they order a basket of goods worth less than £40.

A Tesco spokesman said: “To ensure our click-and-collect service remains sustainable for the future, from February 2 we will be introducing a £2 surcharge on all Tesco Direct click-and-collect orders under £30.

“We want to provide customers with a great online experience and continue to offer customers the convenience of our click-and-collect service at every Tesco store across the UK.”

Fulfilment changes

The supermarket giant is not the only grocer to have made changes to its fulfilment options as retailers continue to grapple with the costs of their delivery and click-and-collect services.

Last January, Tesco’s big four rival Asda upped the minimum grocery spend for home delivery from £25 to £40.

In October, Sainsbury’s online boss Robbie Feather claimed that grocers had “destroyed” the value of their ecommerce propositions by under-charging for deliveries.

Feather told the IGD Online and Digital Summit: “We’ve managed, in this country, to create the world’s best online grocery industry, and yet we’ve also single-handedly managed to destroy most of the value in that channel by removing the charge for the work that we do to pick the product for the customer and deliver it to their homes.”