Grubhub has agreed to pay $7.15 million to settle a class action lawsuit brought by restaurants that were listed on its platform without authorization. The settlement, approved in May 2025, covers not only Grubhub but also eight other food delivery platforms including Seamless, Eat24, Tapingo, OrderUp, LevelUp, AllMenus, MenuPages, and BiteGrabber. Restaurant owners who had their businesses listed on these platforms without signed contracts between January 1, 2019, and April 30, 2024, are eligible to claim compensation.
For example, a small pizzeria in Chicago that discovered its name and menu were on Grubhub without ever agreeing to a partnership would qualify for this settlement. This article explains how the unauthorized listing scheme affected restaurant businesses, what compensation is available, how to file a claim before the March 4, 2026 deadline, and what this settlement means for the food delivery industry’s regulatory future. The case, Lynn Scott v. Grubhub, reveals a pattern of deceptive practices by major delivery platforms that has resulted in enforcement actions from the FTC and state attorneys general.
Table of Contents
- What Was the Unauthorized Restaurant Listing Problem on Grubhub and Other Platforms?
- Settlement Fund Breakdown and Compensation Amounts
- Who Qualifies for the Settlement and Critical Filing Deadlines
- How to File Your Claim for the Grubhub Settlement
- The Broader Regulatory Action Against Grubhub and Its Implications
- What Restaurants Should Know About Protecting Their Listings Going Forward
- The Changing Landscape of Food Delivery Regulation and Future Implications
What Was the Unauthorized Restaurant Listing Problem on Grubhub and Other Platforms?
Food delivery platforms including Grubhub and its competitor platforms created restaurant listings without obtaining explicit permission from restaurant owners. These platforms harvested restaurant information from public sources—websites, phone numbers, menus, and addresses—and created accounts in the restaurants’ names, often with inaccurate or outdated information. Restaurant owners frequently discovered their businesses were listed only when customers called asking why their orders weren’t being accepted, or when negative reviews appeared from customers confused about why certain promised menu items weren’t available. This practice created significant operational and reputational problems for restaurants. When orders came through delivery platforms without the restaurant’s knowledge, they either went unfulfilled, leading to customer dissatisfaction, or the restaurant had to scramble to service orders through systems not designed for third-party delivery.
For example, a family-owned Thai restaurant might have found its name on Grubhub with a menu that included dishes never on the restaurant’s actual menu, leading to customer complaints and negative reviews based on items the restaurant never served. The platforms profited from commissions on these orders while restaurants bore the cost of customer frustration and operational chaos. The unauthorized listing scheme lasted for years on most platforms. Between January 2019 and April 2024, restaurants had limited ability to control their own listings, and many were unaware they were even on these platforms until issues arose. This gave the delivery platforms an unfair advantage by expanding their restaurant networks without negotiating fair partnership terms with actual restaurant owners.
Settlement Fund Breakdown and Compensation Amounts
The total settlement fund of $7,154,586 will be divided among eligible restaurants in two components. Each business receives an initial base payment of $50, plus additional pro-rata compensation calculated based on how long the restaurant was listed without a contract. This means restaurants that were listed on the platforms for longer periods will receive larger payments than those listed for shorter durations. The pro-rata component is crucial because it acknowledges that different restaurants suffered different levels of harm.
A restaurant unlisted for just a few months will receive the $50 base payment plus a smaller pro-rata share, while a restaurant that spent years fighting with platforms to remove false listings will receive additional compensation reflecting that extended harm. This tiered approach is more equitable than a flat payment to all businesses. However, individual payments will likely be modest—split across potentially thousands of eligible restaurants, the average compensation may range from $50 to several hundred dollars per business, depending on how many restaurants file claims and how long each was listed. The settlement was negotiated without requiring Grubhub and the other platforms to admit wrongdoing, a common structure in class action settlements. Defendants agreed to injunctive relief requiring them to obtain consent before listing restaurants and to fix verification procedures, changes that should prevent similar unauthorized listings going forward.
Who Qualifies for the Settlement and Critical Filing Deadlines
To qualify for settlement compensation, a restaurant must have been listed on at least one of the nine platforms (Grubhub, Seamless, Eat24, Tapingo, OrderUp, LevelUp, AllMenus, MenuPages, or BiteGrabber) without a signed contract at any point between January 1, 2019, and April 30, 2024. The restaurant doesn’t need to have been continuously listed throughout this period—even a few weeks of unauthorized listing makes a business eligible. Additionally, the restaurant must not have subsequently entered into a legitimate partnership agreement with the platform, as the settlement specifically addresses unauthorized listings, not unfair terms in authorized partnerships. The critical deadline for filing a claim is March 4, 2026. This is a hard cutoff—claims submitted after this date will not be accepted.
Any restaurant owner who believes their business was listed without authorization should act quickly to gather evidence and file during this window. The simplest evidence is documentation showing the unauthorized listing (screenshots, communications from customers mentioning the platform, correspondence with the platform requesting removal) and proof that no contract was ever signed. Documentation can be as simple as an email from the restaurant to the platform’s support asking to be removed, which the platform’s response time may implicitly confirm was an unauthorized listing. This six-month filing window is relatively standard for class action settlements but should not be taken for granted—missing the deadline means forfeiting the claim entirely. Small restaurant owners managing busy operations sometimes miss these deadlines due to lack of awareness, which is why this information is critical to share.
How to File Your Claim for the Grubhub Settlement
The official process for filing claims is managed through the dedicated settlement website at www.restaurantlistingsettlement.com. This website includes a comprehensive claim form that asks for basic information about the restaurant, the platforms where it was listed, the dates of unauthorized listing, and contact information for payment. Submitting the claim requires documenting that the restaurant was indeed listed without authorization, which can be proven through screenshots, customer communications, or correspondence with the delivery platform support teams. Required information for the claim includes the restaurant’s legal business name, the address where it operated during the listing period, the specific platform or platforms where unauthorized listings appeared, and the approximate dates or date range of the unauthorized listing. Claimants should provide as much specific documentation as possible—for instance, if a restaurant has an email from 2020 asking Grubhub to remove an unauthorized listing, this is powerful evidence.
However, if documentation is limited, the form allows claimants to provide their best recollection of the listing period. The settlement administrator will review claims and determine eligibility, which may involve follow-up questions if documentation is unclear. One limitation to understand: restaurants that later became legitimate customers of these platforms—perhaps they negotiated a deal or eventually agreed to partnership terms—may face questions about why they’re claiming compensation if they’re now benefiting from the platforms. The settlement is specifically for unauthorized listing periods, not for disputes about commission rates, payment terms, or other issues with authorized partnerships. Restaurant owners who transitioned from unauthorized to authorized listings should clearly document the transition date in their claims to distinguish the unauthorized period from any later legitimate business relationship.
The Broader Regulatory Action Against Grubhub and Its Implications
Beyond this private class action settlement, Grubhub faced enforcement action from federal and state authorities. In December 2024, the Federal Trade Commission and the Illinois Attorney General announced separate enforcement actions against Grubhub for multiple deceptive practices, including misleading restaurant listings, misrepresentation of worker pay, and undisclosed diner fees. These government actions operate independently from the private class action lawsuit and can result in additional remedies, fines, and required business practice changes. The FTC action signals that regulatory agencies view unauthorized restaurant listings as a serious consumer protection violation affecting not just restaurants but also consumers who expect accurate information about available restaurants.
When a restaurant’s menu or availability information is inaccurate due to unauthorized listing by a delivery platform, consumers suffer from broken expectations and poor ordering experiences. This regulatory momentum suggests that food delivery platforms will face increasing scrutiny on how they acquire and verify restaurant data going forward. The enforcement actions create a warning for other platforms using similar tactics: agencies are actively investigating deceptive listing practices across the industry. Smaller delivery platforms that haven’t faced public scrutiny may be operating with similar unauthorized listing schemes, and the government’s attention to this issue may lead to investigations of competitors as well.
What Restaurants Should Know About Protecting Their Listings Going Forward
As a result of this settlement, Grubhub and the other platforms are required to implement enhanced verification procedures that require explicit consent from restaurant owners before listing their businesses. For restaurants, this means future interactions with these platforms should be more transparent—if you receive a message from a delivery platform verifying your business details, it’s an actual authorization step rather than an unilateral listing by the platform. Restaurant owners should proactively monitor where their businesses appear online.
Setting up Google Alerts for the restaurant’s name paired with delivery platform names (e.g., “My Restaurant Name Grubhub”) can provide early warning if new unauthorized listings appear. Additionally, restaurants that have not authorized particular delivery platforms should periodically check the major platforms to ensure they haven’t been listed. If an unauthorized listing is discovered, restaurants should immediately request removal through the platform’s support channels and document the request in case it becomes relevant to future disputes or claims.
The Changing Landscape of Food Delivery Regulation and Future Implications
This settlement represents a broader trend toward stricter regulation of food delivery platforms. The combination of the private class action settlement, FTC enforcement, and state attorney general actions indicates that regulatory agencies are losing patience with the “move fast and ask questions later” approach that characterized early food delivery platform growth. Future growth in this sector will likely be constrained by requirements to verify partnerships before listing restaurants.
The settlement also highlights the asymmetry of power between massive platforms and small business owners. Restaurants, particularly independent and family-owned establishments, lack the resources to fight platform practices individually, which is why class action lawsuits are crucial enforcement mechanisms. As these cases accumulate and settlements grow larger, delivery platforms will face increasing pressure to change practices not only to avoid litigation but to maintain the trust of restaurant partners and consumers. The settlement amount—over $7 million for unauthorized listings alone—suggests that platforms face meaningful financial exposure if they continue deceptive practices, which may be the most effective deterrent against future misconduct.