In the war for delivery speed, Flipkart, which was lagging behind others for long, has launched a new innovation – scheduled delivery.
Under the facility, all customers can specify the time at which they want a package to be delivered.
“Customers can choose delivery slots as early as the next day – a feature currently not available with any other e-commerce player in India,” the ecommerce site said.
Flipkart’s scheduled delivery is currently available in Bangalore, Delhi, Mumbai and Kolkata and will be extended in other cities soon, the company said.
Other players like Snapdeal and Amazon offer fast delivery, but often at a charge of about Rs 50-100. The ‘normal’ delivery often takes about 2-4 days. However, packages usually reach in a couple of days.
“This service, which is free of cost for Flipkart customers, will initially be available for the large appliances category and will get extended to other select categories with time,” Flipkart said.
It will soon offer its customers installation along with delivery during the pre-selected slots for large appliances. Flipkart had exited the large appliance market a couple of years ago, after finding it unprofitable and difficult to manage.
“Schedule Delivery as a feature, serves to enhance the online shopping experience, especially in metros where time constraints are a huge bottleneck for customers. While this is especially true of large appliances – we intend to extend this benefit to other categories soon,” said Rahul Chari, VP – Supply Chain Engineering, Flipkart.