Mar 16, 2020
Complaints against food apps up 100%
NEW DELHI: Complaints over food quality and hygiene standards against online food ordering and delivery platforms look set to double during the current financial year with 1,955 grievances lodged between April 2019 and January 2020, as against 1,053 during the 2018-19 fiscal year.
The consumer affairs ministry said online food ordering and delivery services have increased during the last three years. “Some instances of sale of sub-standard food being delivered through online food delivery service platforms have come to notice of FSSAI. Whenever any [such] instance is received, the same is taken up with the commissioner of food safety of states/UTs. The Food Safety and Standards Act and Rules & Regulations framed thereunder have provisions to ensure food quality and hygiene,” the ministry said.
Most complaints lodged against e-commerce firms, House told
The ministry recently gave the details of complaints in response to a question in the Rajya Sabha.
The complaints were registered through the National Consumer Helpline set up by the government. The details accessed from NCH show that one-fourth of the 5.65 lakh complaints registered till January this year were related to e-commerce. In response to another question in the RS in December last year, the consumer affairs ministry had said that the top five firms against whom the maximum complaints were registered between April and September 2019 included two major ecommerce firms — Flipkart Internet Pvt Ltd and Amazon Seller Services Pvt Ltd.
The other three companies were from the telecom sector — Reliance Jio, Bharti Airtel and Vodafone. NCH data also show that 18% of the complaints against e-commerce firms between April 2019 and January 2020 were related to no refund of paid amount and in 12% cases of wrong goods being delivered. According to a report, the maximum complaints were received from UP (14%), followed by Maharashtra (13%) and Delhi (11%).
Consumer complaints against food apps like Zomato, Swiggy almost double in FY20 so far
Some instances of sale of sub-standard food being delivered through online food delivery service platforms have come to notice of FSSAI," said Consumer Affairs MoS Danve Raosaheb Dadarao.
XConsumer grievances in FY20 are heading towards a 100 per cent increase from FY19.
Even as online food ordering and delivery services sector in India, which has Zomato and Swiggy as the leading players, continues to grow on the back of growing customer base for online players and serving new markets, the customers’ grievances with respect to food hygiene and quality standards are also on the rise. According to the government data, such grievances in FY20 are heading towards a 100 per cent increase from FY19. The number of complaints filed with the National Consumer Helpline has increased from 1,053 in FY19 to 1,955 till January FY20, according to the data shared by the Ministry of Consumer Affairs, Food and Public Distribution MoS Danve Raosaheb Dadarao in Rajya Sabha earlier this month. That’s already an 85 per cent increase from FY19.
“Some instances of sale of sub-standard food being delivered through online food delivery service platforms have come to notice of FSSAI. Whenever any instance of sale and supply of substandard food items through such platforms is received, the same is taken up with the concerned Commissioner of Food Safety of States/UTs,” Dadarao said in a written reply.
However, interestingly between April 2019 and September 2019, out of the top five companies against which 34,991 complaints were filed with the National Consumer Helpline, Flipkart Internet and Amazon Seller Services topped the list with 11,028 and 7,203 complaints respectively filed against them. The other three companies were Reliance Jio Infocomm, Bharti Airtel and Vodafone. Most of the complaints were resolved by these companies, data showed. The total number of complaints resolved stood at 34,342.
“Different Regulatory Bodies look into different products such as the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India is concerned with food products, the Central Drug Controller with medicines/cosmetics to check for counterfeit and sub-standard products in the market on regular basis and if any deficiency is found, manufacturers are penalised as per the provisions in the related Acts,” the minister said.
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