All the hype created around the recent popularity of Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC) made us eager to try it ourselves.
ONDC is a platform that has been gaining much attention and becoming popular. It is a platform that will completely transform the e-commerce industry’s functioning. It is a beneficial platform for both buyers and sellers; it will especially empower new businesses/startups by allowing them to grow their businesses online through an open protocol.
The Advantages of Ordering from ONDC are as Follows:
1. Variety of Product Categories Availability
ONDC offers various services in multiple categories, including food, grocery, and home decor; this makes it very useful for customers to have a one-stop location to get their different needs sorted in the same platform. It also gives tough competition to other platforms providing the same services, but ONDC stands out due to its cost-effective facilities, enabling us to get reasonable offers.
2. Diversity in Restaurants
We explored the platform to check the diversity of the available restaurants, and what impressed us about ONDC was the availability of local stores and products. In addition, we were introduced to many different eateries nearby, which were unexplored, giving us a chance to try our hands at new places. It also includes popular restaurants that customers love buying from. This offers an excellent opportunity for small-scale businesses to grow widely and reach out to more customers.
3. Ordering Process
To use ONDC, one must first use Paytm or Magicpin and other applications. Through the application, they can search for ONDC and then use it. Its ordering process is simple, which involves you mentioning your desired food items and location just like any other delivery app.
4. Payment Options
We saw multiple payment options, which were quite impressive. This helps them reach out to a broad range of customers. It includes payment options like Paytm balance, prepaid, debit and credit card, UPI, and net banking; this helps people make payments from the choice of mode they trust.
5. Delivery
The delivery time coated to us for our order was 40 minutes. However, after placing our order, we were neither sent any order confirmation nor any other details regarding our order. Therefore, after waiting for 40 minutes, we did not receive our order. Consequently, using ONDC will be more trustworthy for customers if they provide better facilities, like offering them assistance with an order confirmation and other required details properly and enabling order tracking for a smooth ordering process.
Disadvantages of Ordering from ONDC:
1. Pricing- Discounts
What caught our attention were the pricing and discounts offered by ONDC! We further compared the prices while ordering from ONDC comparing it to other food delivery apps.
Example 1
2. Payments details:
In the above picture from the ONDC payment, we can see both the delivery and packaging charges applied to our order. The results vary despite ordering the same item from different platforms. Both the platforms provided us with discounts. But we found a better deal on Swiggy when compared to ONDC.
Example 2:
We tried ordering from another restaurant
ONDC Results:
Swiggy
In both our cases we found higher prices on ONDC when compared to Swiggy.
Here are a few pros and cons:
Pros | Cons |
Local and popular eateries are easily available. | Limited food restaurants are available. |
Good offers available | In some cases, the price is higher when compared to other food delivery apps. |
Easy ordering process | No order tracking details or confirmations on orders. |
Can write up and connect through E-mail. | No customer support or assistance is available. |
Multiple online payment options | Cash on delivery is not available. |
Our ordering experience:
Why did we have an unsatisfying ordering experience?
At first, when we tried to place an order, we were unable to order from our location.
The second time we tried ordering, we placed our order through a restaurant closer to our location (Not too far) and made an online payment of the amount too. The quoted delivery time was 40 minutes. During the time of order, we received neither any confirmation of the order nor any other assistance like order tracking etc. But after 40 minutes, we tried contacting the restaurant itself, where we received a response that no order had been placed. But our payment was already made.
After hearing this, we immediately tried contacting them, but they had no customer support. So, we further contacted Paytm customer service, which was not helpful. Later we texted them on their social media and even sent them an e-mail about this. Even after 48 hours we still haven’t received any response from their side.
We look forward to hearing a positive response soon!
We also found a comment like our case under their social media post
Future Scope:
ONDC is still a new platform that will continue going through its trial and error and keep evolving in the coming time. However, we see scope for its improvements and future advancement and look forward to using the platform for our daily convenience. We feel the platform is facing teething problems (Issues in its early stage) in its business that will be resolved soon. Furthermore, it will fix the customers’ current issues on the platform and keep improving.
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