E-commerce Frauds in Bangladesh

E commerce Deception in Bangladesh

eCommerce is the booming subject of Bangladesh for the last two years. Many eCommerce has been founded in the past several years. Delivery of products is the most crucial part of eCommerce services. Online scams and eCommerce frauds in Bangladesh also increased due to these eCommerce businesses.

Online shops in Bangladesh mostly use the COD (Cash On Delivery) option for delivering products. People of our country are not really used to the popular online payment systems. They also do not have much trust in paying for

the products before the delivery. So it is easier for them to choose Cash On Delivery payment system.

In cash on delivery payment, customers will order products from online giving the details of their address and contact number. Then the products will be delivered to the customer's house. Finally, customer will pay the product price to the delivery guy.

Most of the eCommerce of our country do not have logistics for delivering products to the doorsteps of their customers. So they use a third party courier service to do the task for them. Many products get lost and delivered. And that is how customer lose trust for the eCommerce.

The couriers face a great challenge delivering all the products. eCommerce frauds are happening at a severe rate nowadays. Most of the orders of eCommerce services are taken by Facebook support or phone call. There is no way to verify the customer. Sometimes there are reports of fake order and products get returned to the office. Courier guys also get mugged by the fake orders from the customers. Stealing delivery guy's cycle, mugging the delivery man, taking products without paying - these type of frauds happen in Dhaka City.

Online delivery platform e courier published a map showing the most dangerous areas of eCommerce frauds happening in the Dhaka City.

How to prevent fraud

Although, fraud is a growing concern but it should not be a sustained problem. Here are the few tips to prevent fraud while running your eCommerce business:

Collect and verify details of your customer: Collect details information about your customer. When you take orders over phone, make sure your note proper address of your client and later on document it into your database.

Maintain a time-bound delivery: If you feel uncomfortable about an order, take advantage of a time-bound delivery that works for you. Probably, morning is the best time to delivery for a risky area.

Avoid Cash on delivery [COD] for big budget items: When you are selling something really expensive and of big budget, try to avoid COD and ask your customer to use either credit card/online payment or bKash.

Educate your customers: Most of the eCommerce orders come through Facebook now and many merchants don’t even maintain any order procedure which is detrimental for long term growth and causes more harm than benefits over the time. Encourage your customers to place order through your website or designated form.