This morning I woke up to yet another ecommerce launch and this is the much hyped entry of Amazon in India. People may like, hate or justify the current model that Junglee (Amazon) has adopted, and we can all speculate on what the future would be. But as a consumer, a retailer and a user of the same ecommerce sites for over 10 years, I am saddened to see that Amazon makes a mistake that the Indian ecommerce scene has long forgotten.
The very first mobile listed on Junglee.com, a Samsung Galaxy SII is priced at Rs 28,400 on the homepage. A quote lower than what Pricebaba shows for Mumbai and given that most reputed sites list it over Rs 30,000, this appears to be a fantastic offer. But wait, click on the thumbnail, and then click again on the seller information page of the lowest bidder and you shall see this
… and if you happen to click on ‘Visit Seller Store’ instead, you will notice this only on the checkout page of a site that is at best, Web 1.0.
Charging extra for shipping is fine. Charging extra for a credit card transaction is ok, but after several clicks, quoting me Rs 1998 as Tax is not. Lucrative advertising with hidden charges is a practice most e-retail players gave up sometime back. Amazon has work in hand to curate the experience I get on Junglee. The ‘we are a platform’ phrase hasn’t helped eBay compete with the ones who are really delivering a good experience, there is no reason Junglee would be an exception.
Welcome Junglee, You Have Work To Do!
Annkur P Agarwal is the Founder of Pricebaba, an upcoming online venture that focuses on price comparison, and has been a retailer since 2002. He shares with us, his views on Junglee.com’s artificially low price quotes and hidden charges which are only revealed at the time of checkout.
Disclosures from Mr. Agarwal: a) Pricebaba is my venture b) My company Kratee e-commerce and consulting Ltd consults in the online retail domain.
The views expressed above are those of the author, and not necessarily representative of the views of MediaNama.com