The refund process of the consumer’s money of the e-commerce platform Qcoom that has been stuck with payment gateways is facing new complications.
Earlier on January 24, the Commerce Ministry officially announced the refund of a total of Tk59.5 crore to 6,721 customers of the platform.
Although several consumers, who prepaid for products after June 30 last year using mobile financial services (MFS) such as Nagad, Bkash, and Rocket, have already been refunded, complications have now come to light on refunding consumers who paid through MFS agents.
According to Commerce Secretary Tapan Kanti Ghosh, so far Tk23 crore have been refunded to Qcoom customers as of February 17.
However, according to Foster Corporation, the payment gateway with which consumer money of Qcoom has been stuck, it is "Advisable to accept court order or approval” before disbursing the remaining Tk36 crore, as payments were also made through MFS agents.
In this regard, Foster Corporation sent a letter to the Payment Systems Division of the central bank stating the necessity of the court order.
E-commerce Consumer Association (eCAB) Vice President Shahab Uddin explained to Dhaka Tribune that the Escrow system does not allow the seller to refund money, instead, a third party disburses the funds to the consumer, in the same manner, the payment was made.
“Any advance payment is held by the third-party who either releases funds to the seller on successful delivery and its verification. If the consumer had not received the delivery, the third-party is supposed to reimburse the payment to the payee,” the eCAB official told Dhaka Tribune.
This means that when money is refunded, it is refunded to the exact wallet, so instead of going to the consumers, it will end up on wallets of MFS agents who paid from their own business or personal accounts, explained the compliance officer of one MFS provider on the basis of anonymity.
“Consumers who actually paid would not end up getting the money, and a complex verification process will have to be undertaken against invoices, order numbers, and other relevant documents to reach the end consumer, which would require much more time,” the MFS official explained.
Forecasting the rise of such complexities, the central bank, Commerce Ministry and the concerned payment gateway held a virtual meeting earlier, in which two proposals were made.
As per the proposals, Foster Corporation will collect the wallet numbers that were paid through MFS and the other is to match the wallet numbers with the mobile numbers of the customers registered in Foster.
The proposal also states that two situations could arise if implemented, where the wallet number would either match with the registered customer or buyer’s phone number or will not.
If it is a match, money will be refunded through the MFS assigned to the wallet number from which the money was sent.
However, if it is not, the mobile number of the customer registered in Foster will receive an SMS and email which will contain information on the transaction amount, purchase order number and wallet number as well as a link, which will direct the individual to an online form to be filled.
Upon information being provided and verified, the customer will have to provide a wallet number to which the refund will be provided. But, if the information provided by the customer does not match with the information in Foster, they will be further asked for information again.
Within seven working days after receiving the information, Foster will take steps to refund the money through MFS on the wallet number provided by the customer.
The whole process has to be approved by Bangladesh Bank, Ministry of Commerce and Ministry of Law to avoid legal complications, and hence, it is advisable to get an order or approval from the court in this regard, stated Foster’s letter.
However, the letter further stated that in case of any demand from any party in future, all the liability will have to be borne by the customer and the customer has to give assurance that Foster Corporation and the MFS to which money has been paid will not be liable for the refunds in future.
