Ministry of Consumer Affairs: Complaints against e-commerce companies increased by 54 percent

Complaints of consumer fraud are on the rise with wrong orders being received and issues with refunds and returns. Complaints against e-commerce companies doing business online have started touching 54 percent from 4.8 percent within six months. There are also a lot of fake companies cheating the consumers. Taking serious note of these complaints, the Union Consumer Ministry has accelerated the process of making strict rules. Sources in the Ministry say, 'The number of complaints that come to the National Helpline, there is a possibility of many times more cases of disturbances, which are not registered by the victims.

The ministry is trying to increase the facilities for registering complaints in view of the growth of online business. The complaints coming against the companies are being analyzed seriously, on the basis of which action has also been taken against about a dozen major companies. Several rounds of meetings have already been held by officials of the Ministry with representatives of major companies and industry associations. For this, the outline of the proposed rules has been prepared. It will prescribe the time of complaint registration, disposal period, and rate of resolution.

According to the latest data, complaints in major companies have increased a lot as compared to last year. Of these, complaints against Flipkart were more than 39 percent in the year 2021 (August to October), which has increased to more than 52 percent in the year 2022. There has been a year-on-year increase in complaints against a dozen companies such as Amazon, Myntra, Meesho, Urban Ladder, TataClick, Snapdeal and PaytmMall.