Numerous cases have been surfacing online about customers’ ordeal with regards to online shopping websites and the courier companies in between. In the past we have heard about Flipkart and Snapdeal customers being fleeced into paying for what they did not order—stones, wood, soap and mangoes instead of laptops, smartphones and other electronic goods. Here is another case where a drummer from Mumbai received a smartphone shipment with no handset inside. He claimed that the smartphone was either stolen in transit or the theft was carried out at the shopping website’s storehouse.
Customers have been fleeced in the past by big names in the online shopping industry. From smartphones to laptops, electronic goods being ordered online tend to vanish or replaced by heavy useless objects, either in transit or by the staff at the shopping company itself. There have been reports about online shopping websites shipping mangoes and soap bars instead of smartphones, and stones and wooden slabs instead of laptops.
Mumbai resident Kunal Kundu, a professional drummer and freelance journalist by profession, had ordered an Asus Zenfone worth Rs 10,000 for himself and was looking forward to receiving it at the earliest. He sold his older phone to since it was not working and decided to opt for a new one and shopped for it on Snapdeal. “On 30th June 2015, I had placed an order for a cell phone Model: ASUS ZENFONE 5 GOLD, 16GB, from snapdeal.com. The phone was priced at Rs 9470.00, and it was only available via online purchase, and not at the retail stores. I was very excited and happy to shop from snapdeal for the first time and I was waiting to receive my new phone with all my heart,” mentions Kunal.
Since he was impatient to get the smartphone, he kept checking the tracking number to know when the shipment will arrive. The moment he found out that the shipment had reached his city, he immediately called up the courier company, Velex Logistics Pvt Ltd, in Andheri East, Mumbai. He was told that the shipment has arrived into the city, but will reach him only next day. Without waiting and losing another day, he decided to go to the courier company’s office and pick the shipment himself. When he received the shipment at the courier office, he was shocked to see that the parcel had the handset missing. The parcel was neatly repacked in bubble wrap, but the original box of the Asus smartphone was neatly unsealed, only to remove the smartphone from inside. The only contents of the box remaining was the manual, charger and cable.
“When I received my parcel from the people present at their office, I saw my parcel was sealed from outside neatly with a blister packing. When I tore off the blister pack, I saw the lids of the carton box open and the phone box was'smartly cut' and seal opened. To my surprise when I finally opened the box of the Asus Zenfone5, I saw just a charger and its cable along with the warranty book lying inside,” claimed Kunal, when he personally went to receive the courier.
Kunal wasted no time and immediately started clicking photos of the situation and the product and its packing, as valid proof. He was fortunate that the product was ordered with the COD option (cash on delivery), so he did not pay for the shipment. However, he also stated that if he were to pay for it online, he would have had lost the entire amount.
“It was indeed a close shave and a horrible experience for me. Is this the way people will continue to get fooled and robbed by these online shopping portals? Is this the 'customer satisfaction' a man gets after he orders a commodity worth almost Rs 10,000?? What a shame it is for the e-commerce industry in India,” says Kunal.
The situation puts three departments into the picture where the theft / scam could have taken place. Either at the original vendor who passes the product to Snapdeal, the storehouse at Snapdeal where the products are packed into Snapdeal’s boxes or the courier company who ships the product to the customer.
Kunal has shared his photos and the video he managed to shoot while at the courier service’s office.
With a lot of similar scams about Flipkart and Amazon’s delivery issues surfaced in the past, we advise you as customers to opt for online shopping orders with COD as a safer option.
