Flipkart.com lies about items being "In Stock"
- Thread starter tvarad
- Start date
malhotraraul
Skilled
watching this thread since some time, want to share something
wanted to buy some products from flipkart, hence added them in the cart & was to buy in 2 - 3 days, suddenly 2 out of 3 products was out of stock.
most important thing was that the prices was also reduced after putting it out of stock.
these are 2 ex amazon sorry a$$ guys who are running this, site like letsbuy also got merged to flipkart, but at the end of the day, they are INDIANS, I guess brothers.
service comes last & the customer is always wrong.
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And this is one bounce to the ropes, fourrrrrrrrr
wanted to buy some products from flipkart, hence added them in the cart & was to buy in 2 - 3 days, suddenly 2 out of 3 products was out of stock.
most important thing was that the prices was also reduced after putting it out of stock.
these are 2 ex amazon sorry a$$ guys who are running this, site like letsbuy also got merged to flipkart, but at the end of the day, they are INDIANS, I guess brothers.
service comes last & the customer is always wrong.
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i have a brand new sealed ES-18 can offer for same price as flipkart
And this is one bounce to the ropes, fourrrrrrrrr
greenhorn
Patron
like others said, they operate on a just-in-time model. they may not actually carry the inventory, but rather procure the stuff as and when the need arises, so when you place the order, they raise an order with their supplier, and they get the delivery, and then they deliver it to us. If they can't manage it, then this sort of snafu arises.
I could think of two possible reasons
1. their supply chain sucks (doubt it)
2. they're having problems paying their creditors/suppliers, and hence source stuff. This would be bad
harry_houdini
Adept
I had once escalated( some higher level employee or senior rep I guess ) a delay caused , she told the following
In Stock - Its in their warehouse , so they dont waste time in procuring , just pack and ship .
Available - its not in their warehouse , they procure it from a distributor , and then ship it .
She said they are always efficient and on time , its the distributors that are unreliable . She felt that it was unfair on my part to blame them totally for the delay , it was the distributors fault . I requested her to talk to him , she said she personally had a chat with them but thats all they can do , they cant force them , they cannot hamper their business relations . After a lot of headache , I received my product the next day .
Was I really unfair ? . Do I really care whose at fault ? . The thing is its for fk to sort out things with the distributor , not mine .
When am dealing with them , am dealing with them , I dont wanna know whose doing what , getting delayed because of whom , for me fk is the culprit .
Say it has happened once or twice , we can understand but tons of cases of delay to be heard currently .
In Stock - Its in their warehouse , so they dont waste time in procuring , just pack and ship .
Available - its not in their warehouse , they procure it from a distributor , and then ship it .
She said they are always efficient and on time , its the distributors that are unreliable . She felt that it was unfair on my part to blame them totally for the delay , it was the distributors fault . I requested her to talk to him , she said she personally had a chat with them but thats all they can do , they cant force them , they cannot hamper their business relations . After a lot of headache , I received my product the next day .
Was I really unfair ? . Do I really care whose at fault ? . The thing is its for fk to sort out things with the distributor , not mine .
When am dealing with them , am dealing with them , I dont wanna know whose doing what , getting delayed because of whom , for me fk is the culprit .
Say it has happened once or twice , we can understand but tons of cases of delay to be heard currently .
Metalspree
Skilled
I ordered a IEM on 10th of September and they are yet to ship it. Bunch of idiots do not even bother calling customers an informing them it will be delayed. Time to cancel the purchase.
A friend of mine is a supplier for FK. They havent paid him over the last 3 months. So much for India's so called No 1 online retailer
A friend of mine is a supplier for FK. They havent paid him over the last 3 months. So much for India's so called No 1 online retailer
manoja2k
Disciple
Luckily, for me, this issue (cancellation of the order because item is out of stock) has never occurred to me with Flipkart. I have been dealing with Flipkart for last three years (I must have given them revenue of more than 1.5L). So it is still the most preferable site for me.
I have faced this issue with almost all major e-com sites - Yebhi, infibeam, indiaplaza, theitdepot, gadgets.in, times shopping, futurebazaar, rediffshopping and even in ebay.in. Listening to recent stories re. Flipkart I half expect to face this issue pretty soon. But then is there an alternative to this? I don't think so.
I have faced this issue with almost all major e-com sites - Yebhi, infibeam, indiaplaza, theitdepot, gadgets.in, times shopping, futurebazaar, rediffshopping and even in ebay.in. Listening to recent stories re. Flipkart I half expect to face this issue pretty soon. But then is there an alternative to this? I don't think so.
greenhorn
Patron
Thought so. Happens to almost every other startup
. They're running out of VC money now, the Nasper deal nothwithstanding. The 'fabulous' service they gave was because of the money they had to burn, not because of their superior operating model. Now they are cash starved, I wonder if they are intentionally using hapless customers to raise working capital. I can imagine the amount of interest free cash they could raise this way by promising cheap prices, sitting on the cash for a week, and then refunding it after a while.
I am waiting for Wallmart in India !
Please don't.
Last time when I was in US, I visited Wallmart multiple things. Every single time, Amazon beat them in the pricing.
Their store price were higher than their online price( may not be true for all items though). So except for groceries; I ended up buying every other thing from Amazon.
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Thought so. Happens to almost every other startup
Which sucks
, they were never giving huge discounts like LetsBuy et. al. So I was thinking they should be able to manage it fine even in long run. But it seems that is not the case.(I am yet to experience this first hand though). I wonder what is killing all ehops?
LetsBuy gave huge discount, got lots of customer(with multiple IDs
), and shutdown.FlipKart OTOH is totally opposite, never give on cheap, boost about high level of service. So I thought they should be well established after so many years.
greenhorn
Patron
I think ecommerce is more a long run thing, and as long as you get new players trying to jump in and provide discounts to get more customers, it would be hard to run it profitably. Eventually - and I don't see it happening any time soon - there will be a shakeout, and the stronger companies - the ones that either have a sufficiently loyal customer base, or a strong niche of their own, or economies of scope/scale will consolidate. But the question is, how many will survive till then?
malhotraraul
Skilled
^ Amazon, eBay, Newegg etc give huge discounts frequently.
Guess Indian Market is different & difficult ?????
Guess Indian Market is different & difficult ?????
malhotraraul
Skilled
I am waiting for Wallmart in India !
Mulayam Singh Yadav is against FDI, but he has welcomed Wallmart in Lucknow
greenhorn
Patron
Internet retailers in the US are rather mature, and have the market power and economies of scale that they can compete with brick & mortar retailers.
Yes, Indian market is a bit more difficult because retail is still not very developed. There is a lot of price cutting, and more importantly, its harder for the consumer goods companies to enforce the pricing in india than in the US.
In india, it is much harder to monitor the retail channels. For example, if I were samsung, there is not much I could do to make sure that some hole in the wall shop in some city is not selling phones at nearly the prices they are buying them for (managing trade promotions is an entirely different beast), much less know what the price the phone is selling for on the street. The best it can do is enforce the prices in the authorised channels.
For example, Nikhil can give more info on this. Changemytyre was an online tyre seller - a first of its kind shop.When they tried to match their prices with street prices, a lot of tyre manufacturers shut them off. Now while they have popular brands, their prices are no longer competitive, they focus mostly on brands which currently do not have conventional distribution systems in india
That way, yes, the discounts offered online sometimes tend to be not that great compared to the local retailer prices.
EDIT: I get a mail today saying that my cash will be refunded in another 7~10 days :S. That makes it almost 3 weeks from my payment date. Jeez!
sharktale1212
Skilled
Thats an Indian tradition. Muddy the arguement with an unknown third party. Best part is some "loyal" customer get confused by this. Recently had a similar experience on TE itself. "Loyal" users think its not end-point store issue to do their job properly rather an unknown third party(government/distributor).
You forget market penetration in India is an issue. US is a huge market for online shopping. You can look up Google adwords for proof, even the most obsure words will have a good bid/payout.
FP ran many ads to gain more customers but people are still apprehensive buying online.
This year I bought all my clothes online from Yebhi! . Now every damn new piece of cloth I wear and my office colleagues all go YEBHI!!
Online shopping is still a mystery about "what if it doesn't arrive/fit/exchange" fears.
I blame some of it on Ebay too. Their lethargic response in handling buyers has drove many people away from online buying. Personal experience: there was a hack in between where a 128MB on windows partition could show 4/8GB. Ebay was flodded with mp3 players with such drives. Best part of it was, you could momentarily see the actual storage after formatting the disk before a program sitting within the bootsector reverted the 128mb to 4gb. Cost me over 2k a huge sum during my student days. Ebay did nothing and took me 3 yrs to do my next online purchase.
malhotraraul
Skilled
This year I bought all my clothes online from Yebhi! . Now every damn new piece of cloth I wear and my office colleagues all go YEBHI!!
Same here, my all clothes, inner wears, shoes, perfumes, deos are from Yebhi
Now Yebhi has gone to the dogs, stupid discount on items no one wants to buy.
Wish they had introduced EMI facilities then
Which might be true as well. I ordered an ipad and an xperia as soon as the deal went online and got both product in 3 days flat. But yeah it sure felt bad.
harry_houdini
Adept
See there is a difference .
If someone like a retailer promises in writing that he will help in case of an RMA , then he is obliged to help . But if he has not promised anything we cant blame him .
I recently purchased parts keeping the firm in mind rather than the shop . Because times change , people change , things change . But if its a company policy they are obliged to help . For eg : Take Corsair , they claim they provide great warranty . So when something goes wrong , they are obliged to help . They claim it in written ! .
Asus talks about great motherboards and features they provide , they never talk of warranty because they know its shit worldwide .
But still they are bound by law to provide support .
Now Flipkart clearly mentions without mincing words , 6-8 business days . So they have to deliver on that . I heck care whats going wrong behind the scenes . If its one time everyone am sure is that human to adjust , but not many times . In this case after declaring available in 8 days , they fail to deliver , its them who are at fault .
They should not be giving excuses , if the distributor is a permanent problem , they should put it as available in 12 days to be on the safe side .
A female friend purchases clothes regularly from some site , it always says 3 weeks :scared14: . Sometimes its delivered in 3-4 days but to be on safe side they always say 3 weeks .
Once it did take that long , they called and apologized when they did not have to , they had mentioned it can take that long .
That time they said , we mention it too long because the people we procure from are unpredictable .
So whose stopping flipkart from doing the same . Mention 12-15 days , and if it comes at the 15 day , I wont be angry .
But then such a long waiting time is a deterrent for most . I mean who choses to wait that long , I have known friends who chose to pay a 100 bucks more rather than wait a week more . So flipkart is being shady , what else .
sharktale1212
Skilled
Brother I totally agreed with you even the previous comment
I never said you were incorrect in demanding they be answerable. What I meant is Indian sites/shopkeepers keep to the tradition. Ask for reason for less gas at a retail agency, he'll blame the distributor. "Saar, if they fill less what should I do?"
harry_houdini
Adept
Brother I totally agreed with you even the previous comment
Ask for reason for less gas at a retail agency, he'll blame the distributor. "Saar, if they fill less what should I do?"
Oh sorry I guess I conveyed myself wrong to you .
I also agree to you , just that I tried to brief it a bit
. I totally understand what you meant to say . I have seen such shop keepers myself . I totally agree that sometimes these people try to find a way out by blaming someone else .
I bought a case which has a dent .
Hope the dealer does not say , Corsair is responsible for it .
Lets see what happens , he is a big name too . I will not disclose it at the moment considering the matter pending .