I’ve heard of meal hacks, but this Japanese guy took it to a criminal art form over 1,000 meals, all free, courtesy of a food delivery app’s dumb refund loophole.
Meet Takuya Higashimoto, a 38-year-old from Nagoya, Japan, who found a way to live off takeout for two straight years without paying a yen. He ordered food via Demae-can, choosing contactless delivery, then immediately claimed through the app that the order never arrived.
Refund issued. Food eaten. Scam repeated.
In total, he pulled this stunt 1,095 times, setting up 124 fake accounts under false names and prepaid SIM cards costing the company around 3.7 million yen ($24,000) in losses from April 2023 to October 2025. His food trail included ice cream, bento boxes, chicken steaks, and a mountain of corporate embarrassment.
When caught, Higashimoto told police,
“I just tried it once, and I couldn’t stop after tasting the rewards.”
Authorities finally tracked him down in October after noticing suspicious activity tied to the same devices. The company has since promised tighter ID verification and algorithms to flag abnormal orders.
Yes, I know that Higashimoto broke the law, but you can’t ignore the corporate negligence that practically handed him the silver platter.
If a single unemployed man can create 124 fake accounts and eat 1,000 meals before anyone blinks, that’s more of a system failure than a scam (yeah, I hate these delivery apps).
I mean, these delivery apps love to market themselves as convenient for everyone, but behind the curtain, they squeeze the restaurants with high commissions, underpay the riders, and treat customers like data points with 0 customer support.
When someone finally flips the system back on them (even illegally), you can’t help but notice the irony. Higashimoto was wrong, but his crime exposed a truth that’s way uglier than theft: These companies weren’t built to protect anyone except themselves.
So yes, he scammed them, but he also stress-tested their greed. The fact that it worked for two years says everything about who’s really asleep at the wheel.
THE WHY: EXPLOITATION
2.5/5 stars because while Higashimoto was gaming the system, the real absurdity is that the system was designed to be gamed, and no one cared until the bill showed up.
“Look, most of us want a normal life without any drama, but life in this world is always strange, and uncertain.
I don’t need your email. I don’t want to bug you with a billion notifications. All I ask is this, if you felt something here, if this made you think, laugh, or even shake your head in disbelief, just bookmark ‘Averagebeing.com’ and come back tomorrow.
That’s it. No strings. Just you, me, and this stupid world.”
