A delivery is about more than the journey between a restaurant and someone’s door. It involves professional activity, food and a vehicle. The joint inspection carried out in Luxembourg City on 23 September 2026 illustrates how these responsibilities overlap.
Fifty-one couriers inspected
According to the authorities’ joint statement, 39 of those inspected were working as self-employed couriers and three as employees of delivery companies or subcontractors. The other nine were using an account registered in someone else’s name. Phones were seized to allow checks to be carried out.
These figures describe the operation conducted that day. They are not a representative sample of all couriers in the country and do not make it possible to calculate a national rate of fraud.
Several types of findings
The administrations reported three self-employed couriers without a business permit, two deliveries seized over cold-chain or hygiene problems, and five electrically assisted bicycles seized for failing to meet technical requirements. Two orders to stop work were also issued in connection with residence or work permit situations.
The categories should not be added together as though they necessarily involved different people. The statement does not provide this breakdown. It says that reports will be drawn up and that administrative or, depending on the case, judicial proceedings will follow; it does not report any final convictions.
Behind the app, a chain of responsibilities
The operation brought together Customs, the Grand Ducal Police, the Luxembourg Veterinary and Food Administration and the Labour and Mines Inspectorate. This diversity explains why inspections concern professional status, road use and the conditions in which food is transported.
To monitor the sector, the next question will be what happens next: regularisation, administrative decisions and any judicial decisions. A snapshot can reveal problems; only ongoing information can measure how they evolve.
It would therefore be excessive to suggest that all couriers are affected by the irregularities identified. The value of this review lies elsewhere: in making visible the obligations and material conditions behind a service that has become familiar.
Sources
Sources consulted on 1 October 2026.
