5 reasons why prepaid orders are good for you and the economy

Did you know? Prepaid orders get processed faster

When shopping online, many customers choose Cash on Delivery as an option. While this can be a life saver in times of emergency, we list down reasons why you should consider prepaid option whenever available. After all, it is good for you as well as India’s economy. Read on:

1. Prepaid orders get processed faster as they do not require any verification. Most ecommerce companies nowadays call customers or send them SMS for confirming genuine COD orders. This causes delays in processing a COD order and leads to late shipments, besides increasing costs.

2. COD increases risk of infection since the customer needs to make physical payment using currency notes. It is certainly avoidable in current times when coronavirus is causing havoc worldwide.

3. COD deliveries are not available in certain pin codes, especially in the remote areas. We work with more than 25 courier partners in India including Delhivery, Ekart, Xpressbees, Ecom Express, Bluedart, FedEx, Shadowfax and Dunzo. Together, they cover more than 27000 pin codes all over the country. However, in our experience, almost all of them seem to have stopped COD deliveries during lockdown to several pin codes in Manipur, Mizoram, Meghalaya, Nagaland, Arunachal Pradesh, Tripura, Assam, Jammu and Kashmir. COD is also not offered in Andaman & Nicobar Islands. Prepaid orders are still getting delivered to most of these states. The reason is obvious – shipping partners need elaborate infrastructure and safety measures to ensure that collected COD money is captured accurately till the time it gets paid back to the seller.

4. COD orders put extra burden on the sellers and the economy. For every COD order, the sellers need to pay an extra COD collection fee to shipping partners. If the order does not get delivered (because the address was incorrect, or customer was not reachable, or the customer refused), the packet gets returned back to the warehouse. Sellers like us still need to incur double the shipping costs (forward and return) on a sale that was never made. This also puts pressure on our margins that keep our business afloat. If these COD fees, cancellations and returns can be reduced, ecommerce companies can pass on the benefits to customers by reducing prices of products or investing more in product and packaging R&D and employee welfare.

5. Many companies have started offering exclusive incentives, loyalty rewards and discounts on prepaid orders.

So, go ahead, and choose to pay for your next order using your debit card, credit card, net banking, UPI, mobile wallet or any other prepaid method. You will be helping not just yourself but also the growth of the economy. After all, ecommerce has expanded reach of products to different parts of the company, boosted entrepreneurship, created direct and indirect jobs, fueled innovation, and empowered customers with more choices.

Your prepaid order contributes to helping grow the economy sustainably.