Bizarre: Flipkart delivers soap instead of Samsung smartphone

Mumbai: In a bizarre incident, a man from Mumbai has filed a case against  e-Commerce giant Flipkart for delivering a soap bar, after he had ordered a Samsung Galaxy Note 4.

According to a Hindustan Times report, a resident of Walkeshkar Anand Bhalakia was looking forward to receive his parcel but was shocked to find a bar of Nirma soap instead.

Bhalakia, who is employed with a global IT firm, filed a compliant against Flipkart, after the company initially gave him a cold shoulder.

Bhalakia said that he had ordered a Samsung Galaxy Note 4 on May 25 and got his package five days later. He had paid Rs 29,900 for the package to the delivery boy.

However, as he opened the box, he saw a bar of Nirma soap that triggered him to quickly call the delivery guy who wasn’t even 10 minutes away. However, the delivery guy refused to come back and asked Bhalakia to call Flipkart’s customer care number to lodge a complaint.

To his utmost surprise, a staffer from the company’s customer informed him that his complaint was not genuine. This forced him to report the matter to the Malabar Hill police station, where he lodged a first information report (FIR) under section 420 (Cheating and dishonestly inducing delivery of property) of the IPC.

Adding more bitterness to his experience, Flipkart had also been really ignorant about the whole issue. Bhalakia called the company’s customer care service several times after the incident had taken place but neither was a new phone sent to him nor was the money refunded.

However, after filing the initial complaint with the police and on several online forums, Flipkart finally refunded the full amount on Tuesday,” Bhalakia.

Making things clear on its part, Flipkart expressed through a written statement that the company observes zero tolerance on policy incidents that impact customers’ trust.

“We are conducting an internal investigation into this case and are putting all efforts to find out the real facts of this incident. Meanwhile, as a responsible marketplace, the money has been refunded to the customer in good faith,” the statement added.

This is not the first time that such an incident has occurred; there have been numerous episodes in the past where the company has sent rocks instead of laptops, and mangoes instead of phones. It’s high time that online portals properly examine each parcel before dispatching it for delivery.