Is a FoodPanda PandaPro Subscription Worth it? | Malaysia

In view of the likely lockdown in Malaysia due to coronavirus, I’m taking a look at the FoodPanda subscription PandaPro, as more people will likely be going back to working from home and looking for daily meals.

Update: (12/02/2021) I’ve updated the post slightly to reflect 1 month of me actually using the subscription. I used bold and italics for the part I changed.

Update: (05/07/2021) As of tomorrow, Foodpanda has changed the terms of their PandaPro offering to being the same price but with a fixed 12x free delivery/month (as opposed to unlimited delivery previously). This makes it less appealing to people who use it regularly - but I would think for most people, it shouldn’t be TOO BIG of a change.

I was drawn to the idea of PandaPro when I first saw it quite simply because it is advertised as having the following features:

• Free Delivery

• Extra 5% off pickup (on top of the usual (most of the time you can get it) 15% you save with pickup)

• 15% off and up on restaurants (unlimited)

• Vouchers for PandaMart

So, I’m here to ask the question, is it worth it to pay RM14.90 a month for a FoodPanda subscription. Important to note: It goes by when you start your subscription - i.e. if you start in on 10th of January your next payment is on the 10th of February (it’s not like if you pay on 15th of January you’re paying only for January) - just important to take note in case you’re waiting for the next month).

Credits: FoodPanda

So, for starters, the free delivery. Important to note here that the terms and conditions for this are that it is unlimited, with the caveat that the order must be above RM25 - otherwise you don’t gain any benefits from this. What this means is that it’s probably better to order two meals in one (even if it means saving one meal in the fridge for those staying alone) just to get the benefits of PandaPro.

The extra 5% off pickup is actually quite neat if you consider the fact that there is no minimum price threshold that you must pass - so I guess if you want to buy meals for one person and not need to pass the RM25 threshold while also maintaining the benefits of PandaPro, this is how you do it (yes, this is a long criteria list from benefitting as a single person).

What I think is important that you must note about this PandaPro “15% off and up on restaurants” is that it DOESN’T include ALL RESTAURANTS. In fact, it hardly includes any restaurants. MOST RESTAURANTS don’t have an additional discount with PandaPro at press time. Where I am, there are NO PANDAPRO additional discounts. I checked around in other districts (KL), and there are only 3 or 4 restaurants among hundreds that have additional PandaPro discounts (and it’s a measly 5% if that really interests you).

In summary, don’t get it if you think you’re getting a 15% discount on all the restaurants. That’s a straight-up scam if you ask me - quite simply because of the way it is advertised.

You also get 2 additional 10% off PandaNow vouchers that you can use for buying convenience store goods but with a minimum threshold of RM25 (I’m not quite sure when I would even use this) but it’s there if you like this kind of thing.

But, the caveat is that if they have monthly promotion codes (normal FoodPanda), you can use those promotion codes as well and get a discount on top of everything else. My strategy has generally been to order lunch and dinner together before 11 am (because the promo code runs out around 5 pm on weekdays, around noon on weekends) and it actually comes out quite cheap.

So Who is PandaPro for?

I’m just going to do the maths for you guys if you guys are too lazy to do it. Quite simply, the maths works out to be if you order 4 meals a month which total to a bill of RM25 or more (assuming a delivery fee of RM4 because some may be more or less), only THEN is PandaPro worth it. I think that the other features are quite useless if you want me to be perfectly honest (as I said before I see pickup as a way that you get an equal value back in comparison to the delivery fee so I see it as the same).

From personal experience, I try to eat each meal for under RM10. It is incredibly hard to get a bill to RM25 for two meals (which is kind of the maximum I would ideally like to store delivery food in my fridge for). At the end of the day, it is just the strategy to get you to spend more - for example, if you end up with a bill of RM24.90, you’ll probably just top up with something else because otherwise, you need to pay ~RM5 for the delivery anyways. Short summary: much more worth for families who order delivery, not as good for individuals.

NOTE: You can order an RM25 meal and use a promo code and even if it is under RM25, you will still get the free delivery. So eating sub RM10 meals is actually possible. I’ve honestly changed my mind, this is a pretty good deal IF there are discount codes. Otherwise, it is meh.