DoorDash Chicago Lawsuit Settlement: Who Gets the $18M

Chicago’s lawsuit against DoorDash and its subsidiary Caviar ended in November 2025 with an $18 million settlement that pays out to Chicago consumers, restaurants, delivery drivers, and the city itself. The DoorDash Chicago lawsuit settlement resolves claims that the platform listed restaurants without permission, buried fees at checkout, labeled a company surcharge the “Chicago Fee,” and used customer tips to cover its own guaranteed pay to drivers. DoorDash also agreed to stop adding Chicago restaurants to its platform without consent.¹

How the $18 Million Is Divided

The settlement, announced November 14, 2025, splits the money into five pools:²

$5.8 million in delivery commission and marketing credits for eligible restaurants currently on DoorDash. Restaurants originally listed without consent that later joined voluntarily get an additional share.
$3.25 million in cash for restaurants that were listed without consent and are no longer on the platform.
$4 million in food delivery credits for eligible Chicago consumers with active DoorDash accounts.
$500,000 for delivery drivers who were active in Chicago as of September 2019.
$4.5 million to reimburse the city’s costs and legal fees.

What Chicago Customers Get

If you have an active DoorDash account in Chicago, your share of the $4 million consumer fund is applied to your account automatically. You do not need to file a claim, submit paperwork, or contact anyone. The credits became available starting January 28, 2026, and can be used on food delivery orders through the platform.¹²

The consumer portion of the settlement is paid in platform credit, not cash. There is no cash option disclosed in the settlement announcement.

What Restaurants Get and How to Claim

Restaurants fall into two groups, and DoorDash contacts each directly rather than through an outside claims administrator.¹

Restaurants currently on DoorDash will receive information from the company about their share of the $5.8 million in delivery commission and marketing credits. Restaurants that were listed without consent and are no longer on the platform will receive instructions from DoorDash on how to sign up for their share of the $3.25 million cash fund. If your restaurant falls in either category and you have not heard from DoorDash, that is the channel to watch.

What Drivers Get

The $500,000 driver pool is limited to people who were delivering for DoorDash in Chicago as of September 2019, the last month the company used the tip-subsidization pay model. Atticus Administration, LLC is handling the driver payments.²

This payment is meant to supplement, not replace, a separate $11.25 million settlement that Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul reached with DoorDash in November 2024 over the same tipping practice. That state case, People of the State of Illinois v. DoorDash, Inc. (Case No. 2024 CH 10011), covered more than 79,000 workers who made Illinois deliveries between July 2017 and September 2019. Claim forms for the state settlement were due February 10, 2025, with payments scheduled to begin shortly after March 4, 2025, by ACH, Zelle, PayPal, Venmo, virtual Mastercard, or check.³⁴

What the City Said DoorDash Did Wrong

Chicago filed suit on August 27, 2021, alleging violations of Municipal Code provisions against deceptive practices and consumer fraud.⁵ The complaint grouped the conduct into a few distinct problems, and each one maps to a piece of the settlement.

Unauthorized Restaurant Listings

The city alleged DoorDash scraped menus and hours off the internet to list restaurants that had never signed up. The listings often carried wrong information, which produced cancellations and complaints that the restaurants had to handle themselves. One Lincoln Park doughnut shop was singled out as an example of the reputational damage this caused.⁶ The listings also implied a business relationship between the restaurant and DoorDash that did not exist.⁵

Hidden Fees and Higher Menu Prices

The complaint described a “bait-and-switch” fee structure: DoorDash advertised a low delivery fee, then added a “Service Fee” at checkout that functioned as a second delivery charge. The fees were often grouped with taxes on the checkout screen, which blurred the line between a company charge and a government one. Menu prices on the platform were also frequently higher than the restaurant’s own prices, without disclosure.⁵¹

The “Chicago Fee”

After the City Council capped delivery platform commissions at 15 percent of net sales in November 2020, DoorDash added a flat $1.50 surcharge it called the “Chicago Fee.” The name suggested the city had imposed the charge. The fee did not appear until the checkout screen and was often bundled under “Fees & Estimated Tax.” Social media posts quoted in the complaint showed consumers who believed the charge came from the city. DoorDash said the word “fee” rather than “tax,” along with a tooltip, made the source clear. The charge was applied from roughly December 2020 through mid-April 2021 and again from July through August 2021, and was later renamed a “regulatory response fee.”⁷⁸

Tips That Did Not Reach Drivers

Between July 2017 and September 2019, DoorDash told customers that “100% goes to your driver” while using those tips to cover its own guaranteed pay. A larger tip meant DoorDash contributed less; a zero tip meant DoorDash paid the full guarantee. For most orders, tipping did not change what the driver took home. DoorDash dropped the pay model in September 2019.⁵

What Changes Going Forward

Beyond the money, DoorDash agreed to stop listing Chicago restaurants on its platform without their consent. If you run a Chicago restaurant and find your menu on DoorDash without having signed up, that is now a settlement violation as well as the original Municipal Code problem.¹

1
City of Chicago. DoorDash Practices Settlement
2
NBC Chicago. Chicago DoorDash Users May Soon Receive Credits Under New $18M Settlement
3
Illinois Attorney General. Attorney General Raoul Announces $11.25 Million Settlement Agreement With DoorDash
4
IL DoorDash Settlement. FAQs
5
Cohen Milstein. City of Chicago v. DoorDash, Inc. and Caviar, LLC
6
The Counter. Chicago Sues DoorDash, Grubhub Over Deceptive Business Practices
7
City of Chicago. City of Chicago v. DoorDash Complaint
8
Cohen Milstein. Order, City of Chicago v. DoorDash, March 9, 2022