Honest Review of Kroger Pickup (Formerly Kroger Clicklist)

I’ve tried Kroger’s pick up 3 times now and will never again. Every time they have been out of stock of way too many items (and not notified me when I was placing my order…meaning I still had to go do more shopping), twice I have been charged double for multiple items, and one of those times that I was charged double for meat, it was missing from my order! When I’ve gone back to the store to get it fixed, the customer service is great, but they shake their head like it’s something they have repeatedly experienced too with the online shopping. Plus, I always have to wait almost 30-45 minutes for my order once I am at the store! I have used Walmart’s pick up since it started and rarely have a bad experience.

I’m so glad you’ve had good experience with Kroger pick up.

It’s not the same here. I have tried to pick up about 15 times over the past two years, and it’s never been worth it.

We do have paper receipts, but we don’t have a way of knowing substitutions ahead of time. I’m doing well when my order is 1/2 to 2/3rds completed.

The wait for our store is 20-25 minutes; since it normally only takes me 30-35 in store, I choose to shop myself so I can take advantage of markdowns. I’ll save the pickup for if we’re sick or headed out of town.

I’ve heard of others having great service, and I’m happy for everyone who does. As for me, I’ll stick to Walmart or Aldi pickup. Less hassle and time for me.

For Ibotta, take a picture of your receipt right from your computer screen! My Purchases > Purchase Details > View Receipt. I’ve never had an issue with this method and saves me from having to keep track of the paper receipts.

For the buy 5, if I suspect an item is popular and might be out-of-stock, I add a comment that I’d like them to sub something that counts towards the buy 5, which they’ve always done.

Thank you so much for your honest review. I live in Utah and Smith’s is a Kroger affiliate. I’ve used the pick up option several times over the last year and while it is more convenient in some ways, I’ve had issues with at least 1-2 items on every order. Sometimes, they say they are out of something and so I just don’t get it. Another time, they gave me fresh parsley when I ordered fresh cilantro (a tad frustrating). I prefer shopping in store, but sometimes I’ll deal with the other frustrations because life is full or I’d prefer not to tote my small children through the store.

I’ve been doing grocery delivery/pick-up for years. I’ve used Instacart, Shipt and Walmart and Sam’s grocery pick up.
(Cons:) There is definitely a loss of ‘control’ over the items you get (quality of produce, substitutions etc). I also don’t think it is reasonable to expect to pay the same amount for grocery services as you do when you shop yourself. You can always find markdowns at the store. You can use more coupons when shopping yourself. Also, I do pay extra to tip my shopper that delivers the items to my house.
(Pros:) With that being said, I absolutely love the convenience that grocery pick-up/delivery provides. To me, the little extra I spend saves me in time, gas and back pain (haha.) I can easily work at home while my groceries are being shopped for. I don’t have to brave the snow or rain. Not to mention no impulse buys with kids, etc.
I am fortunate to have some pretty good shoppers with Instacart and Shipt. I can decide ahead of time if I want an item substituted or refunded if my store is out of something. I can also chat with my shopper if I forget to put something on my list. This has saved my life a time or two!
Again, this service may not be for everyone if you like absolute control of what goes into your grocery cart and want to pinch every single penny, but for me, the pros outweigh the cons. 🙂

You can view your Kroger receipts on the Kroger App. I don’t know how long it takes but since we track our budget with groceries separate from paper products, it is helpful to know the cost to split up that total. I don’t know if you could print them or add them to ibotta that way.

Your insight is excellent . I believe each person has to do what is best for them. I never had issue using pickup and I was not worried about Subs because I set aside enough money for my budget. Curbside works for me because I not worried about Markdowns. I used it alot and it worked for me. Each Kroger store is different when it comes to curbside.

I agree that the inability to get all my normal discounts is a reason I don’t like using the curbside. I’ve used it once in order to space out trips when case numbers were high locally. I didn’t have many many discounts as it was my last minute Thanksgiving trip and included my perishable “must haves”. I did allow for substitutions and found that everything that was marked down was free. Free milk, free cottage cheese, free whip cream, etc. I was okay with that! Might not happen every time, but it was a nice surprise.

I have done over 85% of my grocery shopping via Kroger pickup within the last year (and almost all the rest still online). Building the order online is relatively easy, although I am not able to move items from a list directly into a cart. Using e coupons has dramatically improved in the last year. I almost always get a paper receipt when I pick up. Maybe it has to do with substitutions. (It’s rare for me to get everything on my order.) Lately, I have had to make sure I have a $35 minimum order to waive the $4.95 fee. This is a relatively new change in my area. I do like that there are several stores near me, so if one store is out of an item I want, I immediately put the item back into my cart and change the store so I can get it on my next order (which is often the next day to get whatever I couldn’t get the first time around). Although this is annoying, at least I can get what I want/need since I am not shopping in the stores these days.

I have had some unusual things happen with substitutions:
1) If you order a multipack of some item, they will not substitute the same number of individual items. I once tried to get a 4-pack of beans. They were out and they wouldn’t substitute 4 single cans (same size, even). That was really frustrating. I’m sure it has to do with their computer systems, but it seems like the person filling the order could figure that out.
2) The substitutions are sometimes TOO generous. I was told I would get a 12-14 lb. turkey on my pickup the weekend before Thanksgiving. I got my order, went home, immediately unloaded, and…no turkey at all. I immediately went back to the pickup line, and some poor teenaged boy, very apologetic, told me he would go back in and get a turkey for me. About 5 minutes later, I see him in my side mirror hauling what had to be the biggest turkey ever. Poor kid could barely carry the thing! He was so proud that he had gotten me a 22-24 pound turkey to feed my family of four with plenty of leftovers. I took pity on him, not because I really wanted that much turkey, but because I just couldn’t send him back into the store lugging that giant bird around!
3) About 5-6 weeks later, I was preparing to make a bunch of freezer meals between Christmas and New Year’s. I’d ordered about $90 worth of organic meat and got my text message promptly at 20 past the hour before I was due to pick up my order informing me that they were out of all the meat. That seemed odd, but I chalked it up to the holidays and figured I’d just order it from another store and get it the next day. Well, when I got home from the pickup, I had all the meat and had not been charged for it at all. It was their mistake, but I couldn’t let that one go. So I went back to the store, and had to go in to customer service (which I was nervous about since I’ve only been in the store a handful of times since last March) and tried to explain the whole thing to the guy at the service desk. Of course, since it was through Kroger pickup, he had to walk to some other part of the store to talk to someone while I was left at the desk counting the minutes until he returned. When he came back, he didn’t really know what to do, so he charged me $50 and I was out of there!

All in all, I am grateful for the service but am looking forward to shopping in the store once again. Honestly, it has been one of the things I have missed the most the past year.

At one time you could sync your Ibotta account with your Kroger Plus account and then you didn’t have to worry about scanning the paper receipt. It hasn’t worked for several months, but hopefully Ibotta will bring that feature back soon!

In this season I’m currently in, Kroger Pickup and WalMart pick up save my sanity, lol! But, yes, you have to be super careful to not blow your budget!

Also, with WalMart pickup you don’t get a paper receipt, but Ibotta can be linked up with your WalMart account. You just have to make sure to load your Ibotta offers before you pick up your groceries. I receive my Ibotta rebates 1-2 hours after my pickup.