Common

At times, when you buy a product online and it is defective / not working as expected, the online store will compensate you by offering the following:
1. Refund – with no compensation for the inconvenience you have faced while ordering the item
2. Gift voucher – you are obliged to spend an equivalent amount at the store, despite having an unpleasant shopping experience
3. Replacement

The unlucky buyer has to spend time and money returning the item, and if the timelines / procedure for refund are not clear, it is better to keep the defective item and try to get it repaired locally.

Though forums are littered with complaints about E-commerce websites, many of these should be taken with a pinch of salt. There are some e-commerce companies who are professional in their dealings with customers and you can expect the same level of service consistently over a period of time. There are other companies which take undue advantage of the customisation that e-commerce offers to deliver poor quality products to unsuspecting customers.

The easiest way to check if a customer complaint is genuine is to ask the customer for an order reference number. Most e-commerce websites follow a particular sequence in order numbers
Some of the reasons a customer complaint may not be real are
1. Fake complaint by a competitor
2. Customer has received the product but claims he or she has not received it, to claim a refund.

In any business, it is well known that it is easier to retain an existing customer than acquire a new customer by various methods (acquiring a new customer online is said to cost an e-commerce website between Rs 500 to Rs 2000) . However many e-commerce websites do not care too much about retaining existing customers.(for reasons best known to them)

Some of the mistakes e-commerce websites (or their vendors) make.
1. Send defective items that do not work at all
2. Send poor quality items that will stop working after a few days
3. Delay shipping the item – deliver it 30+ days after order placement
4. Customer support does not reply to emails
5. Cancel the order without assigning a reason
6. Have poor quality photos on the website (the actual product differs significantly from the photo displayed)
Any e-commerce website which overcomes the above problems is sure to be a success in India