Sneaky Ways Fast Food Restaurants Are Scamming You

In this day and age, we're always on the lookout for scams. Our inboxes are filled with an endless stream of phony emails requesting banking information and passwords. Our telephones ring off the hook with calls from would-be con artists pretending to be the IRS. Even knocks at the front door prompt a chain of warnings across neighborhood social networks. It can feel like everywhere you turn someone is trying to swindle you.

But it can't be all bad — there's got to be some rest for the weary, say when you walk into your neighborhood burger joint. You can let your guard down knowing they're going to take good care of you, right? Sorry, but nope. Unfortunately, fast food restaurants are not the safe haven you might be hoping for — they've been known to take advantage of their customers, too. Whether it's shady business practices or misleading advertising, here are all the ways your favorite eateries might be scamming you.

Do you get the cup of soup or the bowl? Do you go for a child's shake or indulge in a regular? Bad news: The items might be the same size. Even worse news: One might cost more than the other. Thanks again to Reddit, we now know we should be paying more attention to container sizes. 

"The cup of soup and bowl of soup were the exact same size," one Redditor warned. "People would pay more for a bowl, and just get a cup of soup in a bowl that was shorter and wider at the bottom than the cup." While the reference is vague, commenters maintained that Steak 'n Shake is guilty of this practice, claiming, "100% they do. I've poured water into one after eating and then poured it out into the other and they're the same."

Shakes, too. "Where I work the child's milkshake goes into the normal child's cup which is 12oz. The regular milkshake goes into a milkshake cup which looks bigger because of the shape and the dome lid but still only holds 12oz. However the child's milkshake is cheaper than the regular," another Redditor confessed. But what about potential lawsuits? "We never actually claim they are different sizes. The only place where we state the size is on the nutritional board and they are accurate on that. The sizes available when asking for one is 'kids,' 'regular' and 'large.' So technically the company isn't falsely advertising anywhere."

Ordering pizza for delivery has never been easier, thanks to the internet. You don't even have to talk to a real person! But one downside to all this technology is that systems can be manipulated, and not in the customer's favor.

Take the Domino's Tracker. This webpage allows you to see the exact status of your order — the problem is that it can be a bit misleading, according to one Redditor. "Domino's pizza tracker isn't accurate. Employees can enter s**t on the computer to make your order to appear at a different stage than it actually is... Apparently some stores show where the driver is, those are to my knowledge pretty accurate. The thing the employees change is the step in the series of steps to make and deliver your pizza. For example, the manager doesn't like the orders sitting on the shelf. The tracker says its passing quality inspection (sitting on a heated rack). So he will dispatch the order before a driver is there to take it. It makes the stores out the door time more impressive for the OERs [Operations Evaluation Report]."

Now if you've been waiting for a pizza that supposedly left the store an hour ago, you know why.

Would it ever occur to you to count the pieces of food in your delivery order? According to this former Domino's employee, there's a good reason to start doing just that. "Was a delivery driver for Domino's. I never did this personally because, well I just didn't lol but a few of the drivers ate the customers food in transit," they explained on Reddit. "[The drivers] wouldn't take a slice of pizza obviously because that would be noticed. But did you order 16 wings? You may end up with 14. 32 parmesan bread bites? Count again, there are 27. They'd also pick toppings off the pizza."

Unfortunately, unless you're willing to wait for a whole new order to be delivered, you're probably just going to settle for fewer wings and bread bites — but at least next time you'll know to tip accordingly if you get the same driver. 

Everyone remembers the McDonald's pink slime scandal — you know, delicious burgers made out of beef trimmings treated with ammonia? Mmm. Since then, fast food companies have tried to put their best foot forward when it comes to transparency and quality of ingredients. McDonald's even invited a former Mythbuster into their facility to witness the patty-making process, and have assured all their customers that their beef is now free of pink slime. According to their website "every patty is 100% real beef with no fillers, additives or preservatives."

Not all companies have followed suit, though. Taco Bell admitted that their seasoned meat contained just 88 percent beef after a lawsuit alleged it contained only 35 percent. The company did disclose exactly what the remaining 12 percent is made up of — fillers, seasonings, emulsifiers, and thickeners — but aside from the clarification of ingredients in their seasoned beef, there came no promise to improve or make changes. In fact, according to NPR, Taco Bell actually released a statement saying it would not be making any changes to its products. So it's really up to you, now that you're informed — but is 12 percent non-beef really worth never having a Chalupa again? 

Would you ever guess that the size of your soda cup could trick you into ordering more food? It can, and it does. Leave it to the fast food companies to figure out how to squeeze a few more dollars out of you.

Dr. Lisa Young, an internationally recognized nutritionist, wrote in Huffington Post that customers who order a medium soda will often give themselves a pat on the back for not ordering the large (make that obscenely large) soda, and then reward themselves with an extra food item, like French fries. But here's the thing: That medium soda that you're so proud of yourself for ordering is probably a whopping 20 to 30 ounces, which is at least twice as big as medium sodas once were. So not only are you drinking way more soda than you probably realized, you're also eating (and paying for) another item. Doesn't sound like such a win now, does it?

It can be hard to resist the temptation of fast food when we're constantly inundated with advertisements featuring perfectly made burgers. You know the ones — gooey melted cheese, the ripest tomato, the crispiest bacon. But the letdown is immediate when what you get in real life looks nothing like the picture promised, and unfortunately, that's probably never going to change.

Consumer Reports checked out seven fast food restaurants (including Subway, who was subsequently crowned "worst offender") to see how the pictures on the menus compared to what they actually ordered. For the most part they were — unsurprisingly — disappointed in the results. So if this is a universally recognized problem, why can't we expect a change? Isn't it false advertising?

Elizabeth Lordan, a press spokeswoman for the Federal Trade Commission, told CR that "truth-in-advertising laws do apply when restaurants show menu items in print and television ads... But the FTC hasn't pursued any cases alleging that food ads are deceptive based on photos," she said "That isn't surprising. The commission is unlikely to take law-enforcement actions in cases where consumers can easily evaluate the product, it's inexpensive, and it's frequently purchased." Sounds like we're all better off adjusting our expectations.

Once upon a time McDonald's had two Quarter Pounder options on their menu — one with cheese, and one without. The cheesy option justifiably cost more than the naked burger, as is the practice on most restaurant menus. But at some point, Mickey D's removed that cheeseless option, and your only recourse now is to order a Quarter Pounder without cheese, while still paying 30 – 90 cents for those fine slices of American that you don't actually get. 

A lawsuit was brought against McDonald's over this very practice, claiming that "customers have been forced, and continue to be overcharged for these products, by being forced to pay for two slices of cheese, which they do not want, order, or receive, to be able to purchase their desired product."

The company blames this overcharge on their desire to satisfy customers — which seems a bit counter-intuitive — telling USA Today, "The advertised Quarter Pounder burger comes with cheese. We try to accommodate our customers' requests by allowing them to customize their orders, such as a Quarter Pounder with no cheese." 

The obvious question is, why can't a bazillion dollar company take the 30 cent hit, instead of passing it onto the customer?

Fast food salads are made of lettuce, and since lettuce is good for us, salads are the best option at a fast food place, right? Wrong. These "healthy" menu items can be seriously misleading.

According to a 2009 study, it turns out — because brains are super weird, apparently — that the mere presence of these menu items can make you feel better about your fast food choices, even if those choices are ultimately a greasy burger, greasy fries, and a large chocolate shake. The phenomenon is called "vicarious goal fulfillment," and just seeing those leafy green options "satisfies your goal to eat healthy." Sounds like the perfect diet plan, doesn't it?

Another misconception is that these "healthier" options really are healthy, and — spoiler alert — they're not. How many times have we been warned that fast food salads can have more calories, fat, or sugar than a double bacon burger? Fordham University Assistant Professor Beth Vallen, one of the study's authors, explains, "It always drives the question of healthier versus healthy. [Burger King's] Satisfries, for example, are healthier than normal french fries. But they're not healthy."