TikTok delivery driver banned from McDonald's in Worthing after viral video

Mum-of-one Atlanta Martin, 22, quit her job at Gatwick Airport in 2021 to deliver takeaway food full time.

Atlanta takes millions of people along with her for the ride by documenting her life as a delivery driver on social media, with tens of thousands of followers on TikTok and YouTube.

In her most successful video – which was viewed 2.7-million times on TikTok – Atlanta walked out of McDonald’s in Liverpool Road, Worthing, after waiting more than 25 minutes for an order.

In the video, she said: “I give up. They are getting nothing ready. There is no one doing deliveries. I’ve got a Starbucks order instead so I’ll go and do that.”

More than 1,300 people commented underneath the viral video, which was ‘liked’ more than 140,000 times.

During her next visit to the fast food restaurant, Atlanta was told by a member of staff: “We are not allowed to give you your orders anymore.” Scroll down or click here to watch the moment itself.

McDonald’s, however, said there was a different reason for the ban. A spokesperson for the fast food chain told SussexWorld that staff asked the delivery driver to stop filming crew members at work ‘on more than one occasion’.

‘As the filming continued’, the restaurant requested that delivery partners ‘turn off McDonald’s deliveries for this particular courier’ to ‘respect the wishes of our people’.

Atlanta disputed this and said she would have stopped filming if asked. She added that she ensures that staff members’ faces are never included in her videos, adding: “The staff in McDonald’s have always watched my videos. They’ve never had a problem with it and have commented on them before.

"In the video, I didn’t say anything myself that negative. It was after I waited 25 minutes for an order, I walked out as no one was talking to me or anything.

"There were thousands and thousands of comments from other local people agreeing with me.

“I kind of knew it was going to happen so I didn’t really respond. I just walked out.”

Atlanta said she thinks she was banned because the video went viral, and it was filled with comments criticising the restaurant.

"I contacted McDonald’s [head office] and they said they could not override any decision of the store. I’m not going to bother going into there to try to talk to them.

"I think I’m allowed to order for myself but I’m not going there out of principle.”

Atlanta said as far as she was aware, she has been permanently banned from picking up orders.

She added: “It was a bit of a shock, I suppose. I ended my shift early. It annoyed me for about a week after but now it is what it is.

“I posted my opinion – not even that, the facts of what happened. I can’t control the comments.”

Atlanta used to be a flight dispatcher for EasyJet when she began documenting her part-time job as a delivery driver. Shortly after her video content took off in March last year, she decided to quit her day job to focus on ferrying food to hungry Just Eat, Deliveroo and Uber Eats customers. Click here to read more.

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