BigBasket uses Ezetap's services; More ecommerce players to embrace Mobile POS?

Ezetap today announced that Big Basket, the ecommerce portal for groceries, has introduced the Ezetap Card on Delivery service, allowing customers to order groceries online and pay at the time of delivery using plastic currency. The service had been piloted for several months and is now available to all customers across Bangalore, Mumbai and Hyderabad.

The Ezetap card reader turns mobile phones into secure payment terminals. Designed and manufactured in India, Ezetap is certified according to all global standards specified by the Payment Card Industry.

“Already more than a third of our customers prefer using Card on Delivery, and this number is growing”, said Hari Menon, CEO of Big Basket. “Our Customer Experience Executives (CEE) use our own delivery application using Android Smartphones. The Ezetap service was easy to integrate into our existing application. The integrated solution significantly reduces the operational challenges of exact change & cash reconciliation, as well as the security risks of cash handling & fraudulent notes”.

“Our vision is to have an Ezetap payment terminal in the hands of EVERY retail service delivery agent”, said Abhijit Bose, Co-Founder and CEO of Ezetap. “We are delighted to work with Big Basket in enabling our Card on Delivery payment service to online grocery shoppers. With the introduction of our new, low-cost Chip & PIN device, we now enable Anytime-Anywhere Card Payments across all card holders, bar none”.

Initial impressions; More ecommerce players to follow?

The use of a POS in grocery is an interesting proposition as the average cost per individual for online groceries is significantly higher than other product verticals. Most consumers might not have that much dispensable cash and as Hari Menon, CEO BigBasket, has shared, that over a third of their customer base has moved to "card" on delivery. Ezetap's other ecommerce clients, like Myntra, and redBus also fit this criterion.

Matrix Funded M Swipe, a competitor in the mobile POS space, is a little behind on client acquisition in the ecommerce category, but it does have notable names such as MakeMyTrip on it's client list. Hyderabad based Aasaanpay (Formerly MobileCozy) is another player in the space. Client information is not available about them.

With about 250 Million plastic currency holders in India and growing at significant rate, and the ever growing scope for ecommerce India, this might just be the first of many more ecommerce players adopting mobile POS solutions.