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Strangest supermarket substitutions revealed
From sanitary towels instead of sandwich wraps to fish steaks for cupcakes, Which? reveals the strangest supermarket substitutions received by grocery shoppers.
A small number of sensible substitutions can be welcome if the alternative is going without, but shoppers reported plenty of bizarre swaps in our annual supermarket survey.
Read on to find out which supermarkets are most likely to substitute items in your order and which sent the oddest replacements.
The supermarkets most likely to send substitutions
When we quizzed grocery shoppers who order online from the UK’s biggest supermarkets, three in 10 reported receiving a replacement item in their most recent order.
According to our results, Asda shoppers were most likely to be sent substitutions according to our survey, with nearly half of of shoppers in our survey telling us they received a replacement item. It only earned two out of five stars for its choice of substitutions in general.
Morrisons and Iceland shoppers in our survey also gave just two stars for their choice of substitutions, and no supermarket earned more than a middling three stars.
Ocado and Waitrose customers had the fewest items substituted - only around one in five received a replacement in their latest order.
The table shows the breakdown for each supermarket, plus star ratings for their choice of substitutions in general.
| Supermarket (links take you to their website) | Percentage of online shoppers who received a substitution in their most recent shop | Choice of substitute items |
| Asda | 47% | |
| Sainsbury's | 32% | |
| Morrisons | 31% | |
| Amazon Fresh | 27% | |
| Tesco | 26% | |
| Iceland | 24% | |
| Waitrose | 21% |
Table notes: Results based on an Oct-Nov 2024 online survey of 1,062 members of the public who are solely or jointly responsible for grocery shopping in their household. Respondents were asked to rate the supermarket's 'choice of substitute items' on a scale of one to seven where one equals very poor and seven equals excellent - our star rating is based on this. Star ratings are out of five. *We only asked about Amazon Fresh deliveries (Amazon's grocery retailer), but you can also buy groceries from Morrisons, Co-op and Iceland on Amazon, so some survey respondents may have been answering on those. Aldi and Lidl aren't in our table as they don't have a delivery or click-and-collect service.
The strangest substitutions
Shoppers also told us anonymously about the strangest substitutions they had received in the past 12 months.
A Morrisons customer told us they'd received sanitary towels instead of sandwich wraps, while another said fish steaks had been replaced with lemon cupcakes.
A Sainsbury’s shopper reported being sent beef dog treats instead of beef steaks. Another bewildered customer told us they had got leeks instead of flowers.
The oddest substitutions Tesco customers told us about include orange-flavour vitamins instead of a Terry’s Chocolate Orange and toilet rolls in place of tissues.
Asda shoppers told us they had received a roasting tin instead of roast potatoes and bananas instead of pizza.
A baffled Iceland shopper said that pasta was delivered in place of a 24-pack of Pepsi Mango, while an Amazon Fresh customer told us six bags of jelly sweets were delivered instead of free-range eggs.
Worryingly, we also heard from several survey respondents with special dietary requirements who had received unsuitable substitutions. One ordered lactose-free cheese and was sent ordinary cheese, while another’s gluten-free item was substituted for a product with gluten. Others complained about getting meat products instead of vegetarian or vegan alternatives.
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Supermarket substitution policies compared
Some supermarkets charge you if a substitution costs more, while at others you only pay the price of the original item.
The table shows how supermarket substitution policies differ, including which allow you to opt-out.
All the supermarkets in our table allow customers to hand back unwanted substitutions to the delivery driver or when they pick up a click-and-collect order in return for a refund.
| Can you opt out of substitutions? | How customers are told about substitutions | What if the substitute costs more? | What if the substitute costs less? | |
| Amazon Fresh | Yes, but you'll need to opt-out for each order | By email and/or text message | You pay more | You pay less |
| Asda | Yes, but you'll need to opt-out for each order | By email and staff member | You don't pay more | You pay less |
| Iceland | No, but you can reject them on the doorstep | By email | You don't pay more | You pay less |
| Morrisons | No, but you can reject them on the doorstep | By email and staff member | You pay more | You pay less |
| Ocado | No, but you can reject them on the doorstep | By email and/or text message | You pay more | You pay less |
| Sainsbury's | Yes | Email and order paperwork | You pay more and get a voucher for the difference | You pay less |
| Tesco | Yes | Staff member | You don't pay more | You pay less |
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What the supermarkets said
We asked the supermarkets about the bizarre substitutions shoppers told us about.
Asda told us: ''We always let our customers know when their order contains a substitution, and customers are able to opt out of receiving any at all. We always do our best to ensure that the customer receives a relevant sub if an item is missing, and we have colleagues to ensure that the best substitutions are being made. Our own data shows the vast majority of substitute items are accepted, and overall customer satisfaction is high, so we have asked Which? to provide us with the details of these orders so that we can investigate what may have happened in these instances.'
Sainsbury's said: 'If a product a customer has chosen for their groceries online order is no longer available, our colleagues are trained to pick an alternative that’s as close as possible to the original item. We’re sorry that on the rare occasion this might not be quite right, our customer satisfaction scores tell us that our substitutions have improved over the last few years.'
Amazon Fresh, Iceland, Morrisons and Tesco didn't comment.
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