Demonetisation: Both Flipkart, Snapdeal now allow cash on delivery to improve sales

Even as retailers continue to face the prospects of subdued sales due to ongoing liquidity crisis, their online counterparts Flipkart and Snapdeal are taking steps to win back customers. Both the ecommerce majors have resumed cash on delivery (COD) option for goods sold to customers on their marketplaces, said a Business Standard report.  The online giants have started COD service amid the severe cash crunch in the market following the government’s decision last week to demonetise old currency notes of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 to flush out fake currencies and curb blackmoney menace. “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 have been working closely with our users since last week to ensure there is no lapse in their experience, and they have responded by swiftly adopting alternative payment modes, especially the wallet on delivery option,” BS report said quoting a Snapdeal spokesperson said. “We will continue to monitor the situation closely, and ensure it is business as usual on our platform, the Snapdeal spokesperson added. “We significantly ramped up our card on delivery facilities, covering a majority of pin-codes including remote towns. The government’s decision has given a big push to adoption of digital instruments like e-wallets and Unified Payments Interface (UPI), a Flipkart statement said. “In the last few days, we witnessed a lot of movement towards electronic transactions and we 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 company’s statement said. In the wake of lingering cash shortage in the market, the country’s ecommcerce companies, too, have witnessed fall in sales. Although, Flipkart founder Sachin Bansal supported the government’s decision to root out blackmoney from the system, he felt the the withdrawal of high value currency could have been planned instead of being carried out arbitrarily. Flipkart Executive Chairman Sachin Bansal suggested that arbitrary problems and knee jerk reaction to the announcement could have been anticipated with more ground research and roping in of experts at the early planning stage. “Firstly we should appreciate it….the idea behind it is very good, thought behind it is very good and the intent is very good. I’m hoping that this is not just one of thing and we get to see more often such things in the future,” Bansal said in response to a question on demonetisation. The Bengaluru-headquartered company said it has been educating its customers and giving them more time to procure cash, the BS repor added. Pointing out that payments is going to be the largest bet from technology point of view, he said “digital payments are going to become enabler for whole set of other developments…..” Bansal in response to a question said post announcement of demonetisation, “almost the entire” business for Flipkart has been through electronic means of payment. He said “before the announcement it used to be half, which means 50 per cent electronic payment and 50 per cent through cash.” With PTI inputs