Technical glitch hits Ola Electric’s online sale of electric scooters

Ola Electric's much-anticipated electric scooter was launched on 15th August [Image: Twitter/@bhash]

A technical glitch marred Ola Electric's hyped online sale of its electric scooters -- the S1 and the S1 Pro – on Wednesday.

The company had planned the sale from 6 pm on September 8, as part of its plan to bypass the showroom model and go completely digital.

The sales window did open at 6 pm, but thanks to a technical glitch, people had to wait for hours.

ALSO READ: How to get Ola’s electric scooter home-delivered

Co-founder apologises, announces new date:

Ola Electric co-founder Bhavish Aggarwal later took to Twitter, apologised and announced a new date -- from 8 am on September 15.

The scooters were officially launched on August 15, at a starting price of Rs 99,999. Online bookings were opened before a month, and the company had seen 1 lakh bookings. These pre-bookings, which can be made via the website for Rs 499, are the first step in getting the electric scooter home-delivered.

"I want to apologise to all of you who had to wait for several hours. The website was just not up to expectations on quality. I know we disappointed you and I sincerely apologise to each one of you for what was clearly a very frustrating experience," Aggarwal tweeted.

Ola, he said, had built a completely digital purchase journey, which would include a fully digital loan process without any paperwork, for customers.

“Getting you the right experience will take us another week. I want to let you know that we will now be starting our purchase on 15 September, 8 am. Your reservation and your position in the purchase queue remains unchanged, so if you reserved first, you will still be able to buy it first," Aggarwal said. "Our delivery dates also remain unchanged," he mentioned.

Online sales marred:

On the eve of World EV Day, Ola Electric commenced its online sales for customers. However, hours after the sale was supposed to go live, the website faced issues, which plagued the buying purchase of of Ola S1 and Ola S1 Pro electric scooters.

According to the details, those logged onto Ola's website to purchase the scooters, saw that prices of the electric scooters were higher than the ones advertised by the firm.

Following this, several people took to the microblogging site Twitter and posted the screenshots pointing out the difference in prices. Some buyers even asked if the firm if they should cancel their bookings. Though MoneyControl could not ascertain if these people had booked the S1 and S1 Pro scooters or not.

Ola S1 or S1 Pro pricing:

Ola Electric officially launched Ola S1/S1 Pro on August 15, 2021. The SoftBank-backed firm has priced S1 at Rs 99,999 (ex-showroom price) and S1 Pro at Rs 1,29,999 (ex-showroom price). Ola Electric has liaised with a multitude of leading banks (HDFC, IDFC etc) via Ola Financial Services. EMIs for the Ola S1 start at Rs 2999 per month and the S1 Pro at Rs 3199 per month. EMI is applicable for a maximum period of 48 months.