E-commerce major Flipkart and Snapdeal have resumed cash on delivery (COD) for goods sold on their platforms, even as a currency shortage continues across India.
Both are also encouraging customers to adopt e-wallets, for digital payment. Snapdeal says it is also allowing customers to defer taking of deliveries till they get the required cash for payment.
“We support the demonetisation effort by the government, and are committed to making this transition as frictionless and convenient as possible for our consumers. We worked closely with our users through last week; they have responded by swiftly adopting alternative payment modes, especially the Wallet on Delivery option,” a Snapdeal spokesperson said. “We will continue to monitor the situation closely and do as required to ensure it is business as usual on our platform.”
E-commerce entities have seen sales fall after the government’s move, with Flipkart founder Sachin Bansal on Wednesday saying the withdrawal of high-value currency could have been planned better.
“The biggest problem that I see is that some of the calls made after the announcement have been very arbitrary in nature and could have been anticipated or avoided in the first place. In hindsight, I would have done more research and would have roped in experts earlier on in the idea stage itself,” he'd said.
Flipkart says it has reached out to its customers whose orders were in flight to educate them and offer additional time to procure cash.
“We significantly ramped up our card on delivery facility and covered a majority of pin-codes, also reaching remote towns. The government's decision has given a big push to adoption of digital instruments like wallets and UPI (United Payments Interface). In the past few days, we witnessed a lot of movement towards electronic transactions and expect the economy to further support this change. To encourage customers to adopt other payment modes, we also introduced wallet cashbacks, which are being actively used by multiple sellers and brands," the firm said.