The takeaway is sacred. To mess with it? Unforgivable.

We place enormous trust in the men and women who drive, cycle and trek through rain, hail and wind to bring us precious sustenance when we're feeling tired or hungover or have already changed into our jammies. But it turns out that we'd probably be better off getting up off our arses and picking up our orders ourselves. Over a quarter of delivery people admit to sneaking some food they were dropping off. Yes - 28 per cent of the respondents in a new survey said that they had dipped in to some grub while at work. Over half of the delivery people queried said that had been tempted by the smell of the food, meanwhile, but managed to hold off tasting any. But customers are wising up to their pilfering ways. One in five takeaway fans who took part in the research said that they suspected their food had been meddled with. A massive 85 per cent of customers said they wanted restaurants to use tamper-proof containers to make sure no-one could get into their order before it's delivered. The survey of 497 delivery people and over 1,500 customers was carried out in the States by US Foods. "By learning more about what consumers crave in their off-premise dining experiences, restaurant owners and operators can better cater to their customers’ needs while making smarter business decisions," the researchers said.