Flipkart brings new policies for sellers, claims 25% cut in operation cost for vendors

E-commerce company Flipkart on Tuesday announced new policies to make doing business on its platform easier for sellers and claimed the measures will help vendors cut operational costs by 25%.

The company said it introduced a flat return cost for products to improve the customer experience and provide affordable packing options for sellers. “We have introduced the second phase of the Flipkart EDGE initiative to ensure sustained growth and ease of doing business online. The future of business is digital, and the initiatives and innovations we have introduced will help our MSME and seller partners take important steps towards making their business more resilient, profitable, and future-ready,” Flipkart Senior Director and Head, Marketplace Jagjeet Harode said in a statement.

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He said the measures will lead to a 25 percent reduction in operational costs for sellers and up to a 15 percent reduction in return costs. Also, catalog creation through an artificial intelligence-led image editing solution will reduce photo shoot costs by 80 percent. The company claims to have developed a simplified rate card that will help sellers understand their profit margin, commissions, fixed fees, and shipping fees.

Sellers on the platform will not face complications due to various pricing criteria based on location, shipping fees, and payment mode, the statement said. “Sellers will get one assured settlement value irrespective of service profile, zone or payment mode. This will bring a high degree of predictability for the sellers, thus making it easier for them to operate online,” the statement said.

Flipkart claimed that steps it took in April, including an onboarding process through mobile phones, resulted in a two-fold increase in onboarded sellers and a four-fold jump from the sign-up stage.