Alesha Mart yesterday started providing refunds over the non-delivery of goods to the customers who had placed orders making payments in advance.

At a programme organised by the commerce ministry's Digital Commerce Cell (DCC) on its premises, 10 consumers got back Tk 28.36 lakh from the e-commerce platform.

A total of 7,000 customers will be returned Tk 300 crore in phases by June 30 this year, assured Manjurul Alam Sikder, chairman and managing director of Alesha Mart.

Tk 230 crore will be needed to be "managed" from different means, such as the sale of properties, he added.

A few e-commerce platforms have been involved in an unhealthy competition by giving unusual "subsidies" in the marketing of products and they have tarnished the image of the growing sector, he said.

Alesha Mart, a subsidiary of Alesha Holdings, was launched on 1 January last year eyeing the rapidly expanding online market, making promises of fast deliveries, quality products and hefty discounts.

Similar platforms had mushroomed since mid-2020, taking advance payments pledging discounts of as much as 70 per cent to 80 per cent.

They all ended up failing to provide neither the products nor refunds.

The number of such unscrupulous e-commerce platforms is believed to be 16 while the amount awaiting return to customers is Tk 3,000 crore.

Since July 1, the advance payments have remained in escrow accounts of the gateways of payment service providers, payment system operators, and mobile financial service providers as per a Bangladesh Bank directive.

Escrow is the use of a third party, which holds an asset or funds before they are transferred from one party to another. The third-party holds the funds until both parties have fulfilled their contractual requirements.

Yesterday Sikder claimed that Alesha Mart was able to attract 17 lakh customers in just three months.

He believes the annual domestic e-commerce sales would surpass Tk 70,000 crore in the next five years if the confidence can be restored among consumers.

Qcoom have refunded 2,518 consumers Tk 23 crore so far and the process is continuing, said Rafeza Akhter Kanta, a deputy general manager of the Bangladesh Bank.

"We, at the central bank, are also trying to aid the refund process of other companies," she said.

Apart from Qcoom and Alesha Mart, eight e-commerce companies will also start providing refunds as soon as possible as a technical committee is working on it, said AHM Shafiquzzaman, chief of the DCC.

Alesha Mart will provide refunds of Tk 42 crore in the first phase, of which Tk 32 crore was recovered before July 1 last year and Tk 10 crore after, he said.

The company has already submitted a list of 485 consumers who will get Tk 10 crore and it will submit another to the commerce ministry for refunding Tk 32 crore within one month, he added.

On Evaly, which drew the most furore among customers and whose case was being heard at the High Court, Shafiquzzaman said if the High Court provides the directive, the commerce ministry would start providing refunds to their customers.

Tapan Kanti Ghosh, senior secretary of the commerce ministry, said all of the unscrupulous e-commerce companies would have to provide the refunds as the ministry and other technical teams were working on it.

"Business is run under the law of the land and anyone affected can also file cases," he said.