The country’s competition watchdog – Competition Commission of India (CCI) has given a clean chit to Swiggy disposing a complaint that alleged that the food delivery platform abused its market dominance through unfair pricing.The Informants – Prachi Agarwal and Tushar Sharma – had claimed that Swiggy was customers had to pay much higher prices if ordered through Swiggy than what...
The country’s competition watchdog – Competition Commission of India (CCI) has given a clean chit to Swiggy disposing a complaint that alleged that the food delivery platform abused its market dominance through unfair pricing.
The Informants – Prachi Agarwal and Tushar Sharma – had claimed that Swiggy was customers had to pay much higher prices if ordered through Swiggy than what they would have paid if they had directly ordered from the restaurant. In support of the allegations, the Informants also submitted bills of restaurants and screenshot of Swiggy website to indicate the difference in prices of same dishes being ordered at the restaurant and from the Swiggy platform. The Informants have alleged that Swiggy acted in contravention of Section 4(2)(a) of the Competition Act, 2002 by imposing unfair price on the customers.
Swiggy on the other hand contended that with respect to dominance, Swiggy is not dominant in the relevant market and Zomato is its nearest competitor. Swiggy also claimed that since 2018 there have been several changes in the online food delivery market, such as Zomato acquired Uber Eats, Ola acquired Food Panda and also Amazon has plans to enter Indian food retailing sector in the next five years and therefore Swiggy is not in a dominant position.
In its order, the CCI noted that Swiggy has entered into contractual arrangement with its various Partners (restaurants) seeking them to maintain a uniform price of food items sold by such Partners to customers when dealing with them directly or through the platform of Swiggy.
The CCI said, “Further, it is evidenced that Swiggy, as and when it has received complaints pertaining to price differentia from its customers, has taken up the matter with the concerned Partner. This indicates, that allegations against Swiggy do not appear to be substantiated in the present case.”
Swiggy acts only as an intermediary and its role is limited to providing access to a communication system over which information made available by third parties is transmitted. Hence, there is no contravention under Section 4(2)(a)(ii) of the Competition Act, which related to abuse of dominant position, the CCI said.
The CCI concluded, “Having been satisfied with the averments of Swiggy that it has no role to play in the pricing of the products offered by the Partners on the platform, the Commission finds that no prima facie case of contravention of the provisions of Section 4 of the Act is made out against Swiggy.”