Slice Adds a $1.99 Service Fee at Checkout, Even on Pickup Orders: A Virginia Hidden-Fee Investigation

What Slice shows you, and what it charges you

In October 2026 we started a pickup order through Slice at a pizzeria in the Richmond area. We chose one pepperoni slice listed at $4.50, shown as $4.27 after a 5% online discount.

Nothing on the restaurant's menu page mentioned a fee. Nothing on the item screen mentioned a fee. The cart showed one slice for $4.27 and a Checkout button.

The fee appeared only on the final checkout page, the screen with the contact fields, the card fields and the Place Order button. There, below the subtotal and the tax, was a line reading "Service Fee" for $1.99. The total for one slice came to $6.64.

• Price shown on the menu and in the cart: $4.27
• Service fee first shown on the final checkout page: $1.99
• Total charged with tax: $6.64

On this order the service fee was more than 40% of the price of the food. A customer could not remove it, and there was no version of the order without it.

Some customers have also reported a second mandatory charge, a $0.95 "support local" fee, added at the same final step on their orders.

A fee for pickup, and a fee that is easy to mistake for the pizzeria's

A delivery app at least has a story for its fees: someone has to drive the food to your door. Our test order was for pickup. The customer walks into the shop and carries the food out, and the pizzeria's own staff hands it over. Slice's FAQ says the pizzerias handle their own deliveries and pickups and that Slice is not involved in that part of the order. The $1.99 service fee was charged anyway.

Three parties sit in every Slice order. The pizzeria sets the menu prices. The customer picks the pizzeria. Slice runs the checkout. But the customer sees one screen, one total and one charge, and Slice's FAQ says the card charge appears under an abbreviated version of the pizzeria's name. A customer reading their statement has no easy way to tell that part of what they paid went to Slice and not to the shop.

The explanation Slice gives for the fee adds to the confusion. The small info icon next to the fee says that a portion of every order supports the services that power "our pizzeria." A customer ordering from a local shop could easily read that as money going to the shop.

What Virginia law requires of an advertised price

Virginia law requires a business that advertises or displays a price to show the total price, including every mandatory fee, clearly and conspicuously. Virginia also has specific rules for online services that take orders for many restaurants: the service has to disclose its fees clearly when the customer chooses the restaurant or the item, and show them on an itemized subtotal before checkout. A fee that first appears on the final payment screen does neither.

The key word is mandatory. A charge the customer chooses to add, like a tip, can be offered when the customer reaches it. A charge the customer cannot avoid is part of the price, and the law requires it to be shown as part of the price.

Virginia and a number of other states (California, Colorado, Connecticut, Minnesota, Oregon and Massachusetts) have enacted statutes that expressly require an advertised price to include every mandatory fee, and a claim is most direct in those states. But we believe the tactic is improper in all 50: every state has an unfair and deceptive trade practices law that prohibits a company from advertising a price the consumer cannot actually get.

Slice is based in New York, and its terms say New York law governs disputes with customers. New York's consumer protection law also prohibits deceptive business practices, and a company that tells customers it adds no fees to menu prices and then adds one at checkout has a hard time squaring the two.

Who qualifies, and what a Virginia customer can recover

This claim is open to consumers 18 and over for orders placed on or after July 1, 2025. It is most direct in Virginia and the other states with express pricing-transparency laws, but we believe the practice is improper in all 50.

Your actual damages start with the fees you paid that were not in the price you were shown: $1.99 per order for the service fee, plus any "support local" fee charged on your orders. One order is a small number. A household that orders from its regular pizzeria through Slice every week or two for a year paid that fee dozens of times.

Virginia law allows recovery of your actual damages or $500, whichever is greater, along with your attorney fees. If the violation is found to be willful, the court may award up to three times your actual damages, or $1,000, whichever is greater.

Slice's terms require customers to bring claims in individual arbitration. We handle that process for you, and you will not have to go to court.

You do not need a receipt to sign up today, although we will ask for one later. Slice emails an order confirmation and keeps an order history in your account, and either one will show the fee lines. Signing up takes about a minute and costs nothing. We work on contingency, so there is no fee unless we recover for you.

What They Showed You* vs. What You Actually Paid*

Figures shown are illustrative examples, not records of an actual transaction; your amounts may differ.

Frequently asked questions

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