Well I have been the customer of Flipkart for almost over 2 years. Purchased over more than 10 items. and satisfied with almost 8 items till now.
When should u Go for Flipkart -
When u find a huge difference in Price go for it. For an example, if u find a camera which cost about Rs.3000 on flipkart but costs Rs.5000 at shops, Check with the retailer reviews and go for it.!
Why should u go Flipkart -
1) Low pricing when compared to other online shops and at actual shop.
UPDATE - Currently even Amazon and ebay offer low pricing. This is comparable. I mean, some product are high priced here and some are low.
2) Fast Shipping on select Sellers and quick delivery as promised with them. Basically the sellers Labeled "Flipkart Advantage" have fast shipping.
UPDATE - This was till last year, but now only a few sellers like WS Retail have fast shipping.
3) Because they offer COD for all products they sell.
4) Good packaging with most products and no chance of missing any Accessory inside the package like invoice, handsfree, etc. If Invoice is not there, they will mail you on request. UPDATE - Now they have introduced the instant billing system as of 2015. Also now they send Invoice only through email for most of their selling.
5) U only get "Brand new" Products on flipkart. NO USED PRODUCTS at all.
6) If u want Product on Same day(Only for Select Cities, Select sellers and Select products) and on next day.
What Flipkart can do more -
They should allow the products to be opened and checked by the buyer right in front of the courier guy and then only should receive the payment and get sign for the product. If the product is good, Buyer can receive. The Product is not as expected Which includes damages, Loss of Product, etc, buyer can return the product back to courier guy and claim for replacement or refund. This process can not only save buyers from getting into unnecessary problems but also will save couriers time and money, as they don’t have to come back for pick up the product to be replaced. This process can also increase the Flipkart’s reputation further more.
If they miss the promised time of delivery, they should call up the buyers and ask for grace time. For an example, I got the sms for Flipkart stating that "My product will be delivered before 7pm", but they actually made me to wait for 3 more hours and got my order delivered by 10pm. Due to this, I missed an important obligation/event. They could have called me up told they would be little late.
Why you shouldn’t u go Flipkart -
1) Worst Customer Support. Let that be Chat, email or Facebook. They have a copy paste answer format for all kind of question. Its very irritable.
UPDATE - There is nothing called "Chat support" with Flipkart. I think its just a prototype and not for customers. Also email service is a crap. They almost never reply.
2) They have added some new Sellers(as of 2014 & 2015) who are not not capable to keep up flipkart’s history which the basic sellers like WS Retail have created so far. They are making this Site Dirty.
3) Shipping for most other product are very late(other that Advantage Sellers). Just like ebay, they take more than 3 days just to pack the item.
4) Information provided for most of the products is very less. Especially the new Sellers. Infact they are giving wrong & irrelevant information about the product.
The Flipkart Website -
Really the Fastest one of all the online shopping site available. Even Amazon is slower.
The Search design/menu is very user friendly. I could find the products very easy on this site.
The Check out design is also very simple. Just three simple steps to order a product.
Has the option of "Compare" between the products under same category. I don’t think amazon or snapdeal has this unique design.
VERDICT - So finally I would say, if you are going to buy a cheap product from flipkart below Rs.1000, you have to compromise things like Shipping delay, price, etc. Buy Expensive product only with the seller "WS RETAIL". He is trust able and Fast seller at Flipkart.
And also remember, why should’t u go ahead and order for an expensive product on flipkart? Becoz, U can not be lucky all the time. So be careful.
Do a lot of research before u order a expensive product online.
AGAIN, NEVER CONTACT THEIR CUSTOMER SUPPORT AT ANY COST. THEY ARE NOTHING MORE THAN JUST A PIECE OF CRAP.
But other than this - "FLIPKART IS AMAZING". Love ur service. Seller "WS RETAIL" is also excellent and Reliable.
Cheers:)
UPDATE in 2022
After Flipkart purchased Ebay and its Seller, it has become complete dustbin. Infact when ebay was separate, it was much better, but now Flipkart is way worst.
The Points below makes evident why Flipkart is good for nothing as of now -
Website UI - Not user friendly at all. No proper description, irrelevant & no enough picture description, Search engine is nothing and page keeps repetition page to page.
Reviews - Your if you buy a product you can add review for Product, but no option for adding review to seller. And if you dont buy the product, you can only read reviews. And most reviews are given by uneducated people. So not proper.
Deliveries - This is one of the worst part. They deliver mostly Damaged Items, Wrong item, missing items or low quality items. I might have done atleast 1300 order since 2014 till date. Till 2019, it was all fine. But from 2019 April all issue started. I would made atleast 80 orders since 2019 and of out which almost 50 orders has all the above issues and I had to return eventually, wasting all my time to source them and order them.
Return - Return happens quick, but the most annoying way. I usually return due to issues mentioned in above point. When the return guy picks the item, he tells "Sir this is not item you received", "Or order is damaged sir"! The issues are actually different and damaged product and hence the return, but those guys annoy me asking those question.
Refund - At was all happening fine. But now Refund is also an issue. They dont refund even if you cancel the order within 30 min! I lost Rs. 3000 because of this and have not received the refund the same till date. Cheaters.
Customer Support - As mention my review before, they have never changed or evolved but they did not change the sentence saying "We are sorry for the inconvenience cause to you sir". They are partially educated, Inexperienced and are of no use. If you have an issue, you have to forget the issue as it will never been resolved.
Any upgrades in these 8 yrs? - NO. Amazon India has evolved a lot. They brought up Prime, Amazon Pay and so on. But Flipkart. NOTHING. Lazy team.
They dont have their own payment system, Their customer support talks only in English & Hindi, No Chat support system, NO GROWTH.
There are actually a lot of issues for Flipkart, but this above are the most important points.
I have finally decided to quit Flipkart and buy product only from Amazon. Even Snapdeal is better. But Flipkart, "Even Dustbin is better". Good bye Flipkart, You just lost a customer.