Zomato rolls out new ‘pay-on-delivery’ surcharge

Bengaluru: Food delivery platform Zomato introduced a 2% fee, capped at Rs 30, for customers choosing to pay by cash or QR code at the doorstep. The new “pay-on-delivery” fee is charged on the cart value and comes on top of existing customer charges, including the Rs 14.9 platform fee.The surcharge is intended to cover the additional coordination and operational costs involved in processing doorstep payments, according to reports. Cash-on-delivery transactions account for about 20% of Zomato’s total order volume.Zomato processed an estimated 270-280 million food delivery orders in the April-June quarter, or about 2.9-3.1 million orders a day. The new fee could therefore provide an additional revenue stream for the company.Its net order value for the June quarter stood at Rs 10,769 crore, a 20% increase from the year-earlier period.Rival Swiggy has not introduced a similar pay-on-delivery fee. Meanwhile, newer players are pursuing low-fee models. Rapido’s food delivery venture Ownly has said it will not charge customers such fees and will operate without commissions from partner restaurants. Swiggy recently launched Toing in Bengaluru, which follows a similar low-cost positioning.In his recent shareholders’ letter, Zomato founder Deepinder Goyal said the company had seen limited impact from such competition. He said the newer models were relying on price-led traction that he described as unsustainable, adding that Zomato was not spending significant effort responding to them.Get the latest Business News and Live updates. Download the TOI app.