Covid 19 coronavirus: Pizza Hut customers pay for meals which don't arrive, outlet in process of refunding

Pizza Hut is in the process of refunding customers who paid for pizzas which never arrived following problems with their website last night.

A frustrated customer told the Herald they were paying for their meal when the website crashed, taking their money and not processing the order.

Meanwhile, a social media user commented on a Herald post that they waited four hours for a pizza to arrive - it never did.

Social media users claim orders did not arrive but payments were taken from them. Photo / File

This afternoon, Restaurant Brands, which owns Pizza Hut New Zealand, said it was in the process of "refunding any affected customers".

A spokesperson said they had been made aware of issues with card transactions and they quickly notified their online payment provider.

The process to confirm cardholder credentials on the Pizza Hut's website saw a "significant spike" in traffic last night, Paymark confirmed.

"This caused a delay in its approving transactions within our usual timeframe, which resulted in a number of transactions timing out," Paymark said.

"We have since adjusted the time-out process and from 10am [Thursday] all transactions have been processed as normal."

Elsewhere, delivery service providers had been failing to show up for jobs in Auckland, Newmarket Business Association chief executive Mark Knoff-Thomas said.

Some businesses were forced to refund affected customers the cost of the food, and throw out the meals.

In another situation, the cost of the food was refunded and the customer came and picked up the meal.

"We understand complaints have been made from all sides," Knoff-Thomas said.

"The best solution right now is for consumers to book directly with their café or restaurant of choice and go and pick it up themselves.

"This will minimise delivery issues and also help the businesses, as they will not have to pay any delivery commission and therefore maximise what they earn."

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern told media today the Government would crack down on law-avoiding food outlets.

It followed allegations from Wendy's New Zealand chief executive Danielle Lendich who said others were not following the level 3 guidelines.

Speaking at the daily update today, Ardern said she expected the safety standards to be upheld by all those who were open.

"We are taking this really seriously", she said. "We will also enforce."

There had been 1035 complaints about businesses breaching level rules - most of those about physical distancing.

There were 185 breaches of under level 3 - 46 had been prosecuted, an increase of 21 people in 24 hours, Ardern said.