Flipkart to reduce fake branded products with online spies

The ecommerce industry is continually tainted with the selling of counterfeit products online, which is not only affecting the buyer who receives a sub-standard product but also the seller who gets a bad reputation. Even the big online marketplaces such as Flipkart is not immune to the problem, despite sending out numerous warnings. There were incidents like thespeaker case as well as the Camera scenario which made the wrong kind of headlines for Flipkart. This may be all set to change!

Ecommerce leader Flipkart who is currently involved in the Big Billion Days sale, is taking bold steps to cut done on the number of counterfeit products being sold on its marketplace by deploying spies to check the goods. Amazon conducted a similar mystery shopper initiative this year.

In-house espionage

Flipkart will carry out the espionage mission by deploying its own staff as mystery customers, who will purchase products on the platform and report the findings. Flipkart plans to reward the loyal staff who conduct this voluntary task with shopping vouchers and other exciting incentives.

“With rising customer concerns around fake and counterfeit products online, we have rolled out the Flipkart mystery shopping programme where employees can act as Flipkart secret agents to identify fraudulent sellers on our platform. This initiative aims to ensure optimum quality, uniformity and fidelity of all the packages delivered to customers,” said Manish Maheshwari, head and vice-president, seller ecosystem, at Flipkart.

Once delivered to them, Flipkart’s ‘secret agents’ will have to send in photos of the:

• Packaging
• Labels
• Products

Punishing the guilty

The product will be passed on to the trust and security team who will make a detailed assessment. The seller will then be reprimanded if the product, packaging or service is found to be fake or lacking the desired quality. Flipkart will either send the perpetrators for mandatory training workshops or in the more serious cases bar the seller from selling on the marketplace altogether.

So there you have it, Flipkart is doing their bit to clean up the image of the industry. Lets hope it works.