Yatra Offers Cash On Delivery In 6 Cities

Online travel agency Yatra.com now offers cash on delivery option for its customers in Delhi, NCR, Mumbai, Bangalore, Kolkata, Pune and Chennai.

Cash on delivery is being quickly adopted by travel firms such as redBus and Makemytrip. There are a couple of reasons why. One, the convenience of online booking is shadowed by the idea people have that it is not secure enough. The lack of availability of PCs and Internet in most of India is a challenge to getting people to adopt net banking. Cash cards have been tied down by banking regulations and mobile banking recently received a lash from RBI's mandate of introducing two-factor authentication for all mobile-based transactions. Now, cash on delivery appears to be the only way to reach out to consumers. The cash route is opening up online ticketing to their target market but brings with it challenges for ecommerce companies in the form of logistics and manpower.

"In our effort to reach out to a larger set of customers, we are extremely delighted to launch the COD facility. We are positive that this initiative will help us to gain popularity with the customers who have limited access to credit or debit cards or are reluctant in making use of them. We expect a significant rise in the number of transactions through this service in the coming months," said Pratik Mazumder, Head of Marketing and Strategic Relations, Yatra.com. Yatra is one of the top 3 online travel agencies in India along with Makemytrip.com and Yatra.com.

Business Standard reports that the company is looking at rolling Cash On Delivery in 14 new markets in three months and expects a resulting 5-7% increase in its total offline business. Makemytrip currently offers cash on delivery in two metros - Delhi and Mumbai.

In this context, a post on How India's Banks Killed The Future Of Commerce by Hrush Bhatt, Founder of Cleartrip is a must read.