Zomato Adds Cash Fee: Your Order Just Got Costlier

Food delivery platform Zomato has implemented a new 'Pay on delivery fee' of Rs 5 exclusively for customers choosing cash on delivery for their orders. This charge is displayed separately on the bill and aims to monetize transactions where online payment methods are not used. Customers opting for digital payment methods like credit cards or net banking are exempt from this additional fee.

The introduction of this fee occurs as the food delivery market experiences heightened competition, with various players expanding their services and startups securing new funding. While the per-order fee is minimal, Zomato's large operational scale suggests significant potential revenue generation. Projections indicate that a Rs 5 charge across all daily orders could theoretically yield over Rs 400 crore annually, though this represents an upper-bound estimate as cash transactions form only a segment of Zomato's overall order volume.