Food delivery unicorns Zomato and Swiggy, which dominate the fast-growing market in India with a combined share of 95%, on Wednesday reported a nationwide outage due to “technical issues”.
Customer support handles of both firms responded to messages of complaints, which flooded social media as users were unable to place orders or browse menus and listings.
“Hi, we are facing a temporary glitch. Please rest assured that our team is working on it and we will be working on it soon,” Zomato wrote on Twitter.
Swiggy Cares also said on the microblogging site: “…we are experiencing a temporary technical glitch. Please rest assured that at this point in time our best minds are working to resolve this issue as quickly as possible.” Please stay with us till then.”
The Competition Commission of India (CCI) has said that both Zomato and Swiggy are also being investigated for alleged unfair business practices.
The order to probe the firms comes months after the National Restaurant Association of India (NRAI) filed a complaint.
However, the firms had reportedly denied the allegation when NRAI filed a complaint with the CCI in July last year.
The NRAI, which represents over 500,000 restaurants across the country, had asked the CCI to probe both the companies for allegedly giving priority to certain eateries.
The association has also alleged that both companies offer discounts after charging “excessive commissions” from restaurants.
The CCI said the companies’ agreements with restaurants could create “entry barriers to new platforms, without earning any profit to consumers”.
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