March 6, 2024 • Third-Party Platform Regulations

Florida Legislature Passes Senate Bill 676

On March 6 2024, the Florida House of Representatives voted unanimously to pass Senate Bill 676 by Senator Bradley – a bill marketed as common-sense regulations of online delivery platforms.  This legislation is an important first step in solidifying the necessary regulations needed to protect restaurants from unfair business practices.

The Digital Restaurant Association is proud that SB676 includes provisions that we have advocated for on behalf of Florida restaurants, including:

• Prohibiting food delivery platforms from taking or arranging the delivery or pickup of orders from restaurants without the restaurant’s consent;
• Requiring that any agreement between the delivery platforms and restaurants must clearly state all fees, commissions, and charges that the restaurant is expected to pay, as well as the platform’s policies on marketing, menus, pricing, payment, insurance, sales taxes, etc.; 
• Prohibiting unreasonable limitations on the value or number of transactions that may be disputed by a restaurant; and
• Eventually providing real connectivity between restaurants and their customers with a means for restaurants to contact customers during the food preparation and delivery window.

However, these provisions are only the first step in what is needed to protect small, independent restaurants from abuse by large delivery platforms. These restaurants continue to suffer from anti-competitive practices, and remain largely shut out from building a meaningful relationship with their patrons. The bill also includes state preemption, which means that local governments will no longer have recourse to address concerns around restaurant delivery, including questions around health and safety of delivery drivers. 

The Digital Restaurant Association, a non-profit coalition of restaurants, will continue to promote additional protections to restaurants and consumers in Florida, including best practices that have been implemented in other areas like fee transparency, improving restaurants’ control over the customer experience, and enhancing information sharing to better serve customers.