Amazon India to Sell ‘Essential Items’ Only, Delists Other Goods

The online retailer is asking people to cancel their existing orders and they will get a refund for prepaid items.

Amazon on Tuesday has confirmed that its India shopping site will only sell items that come under the ‘essentials’ category. This mostly includes items like household staples, packaged food, health care, hygiene and personal safety among others. Every other product segment is now listed unavailable for consumers on the platform.

“To serve our customers’ most urgent needs while also ensuring safety of our employees, we are temporarily prioritizing our available fulfillment and logistics capacity to serve products that are currently critical for our customers,” Amazon India pointed out through this statement.

The company mentioned the temporary changes have come into effect from Tuesday 24 March, and it will update users about resuming its normal operations later.

With many parts of the country put on lockdown amid the coronavirus pandemic, the company claims to have seen an increase in demand for basic goods on its platform, which is why these steps are being taken.

But these changes come at the cost of disabling shipment for items that categorise as low-priority. “This also means that we have to temporarily stop taking orders and disable shipments for lower-priority products,” the company added in its statement.

So what happens if you’ve ordered a TV or other heavy items through Amazon in the past few days? Amazon says it is letting users decide if they want to cancel the orders, after which they will get refunds for prepaid items.

“For all pending customer orders on lower-priority products, we are reaching out to customers and giving them a choice to cancel their orders, and receive a refund for prepaid items.”

Amazon India

This might affect other retailers in the e-commerce sector but Amazon is clearly prioritising the need for daily items. Having said that, the company along with other delivery-centric brands must ensure the local authorities offer their full support and allow delivery staff to operate in full capacity.