Two people aware of the matter, the Heavy Industries Department has asked why the company publicly claimed that all its sales stores provide after-sales service, but there is a gap between the number of sales stores and service centers.
Last month, the ministry asked Ola Electric to clarify the company’s reported sales differences and its registration for its new scooter on the Vahan portal.
In addition to commissioning the Indian Automotive Research Association (ARAI) and the International Centre for Automotive Technology (ICAT) to determine the earlier claim of Ola Ola founder Bhavish Aggarwal’s alleged all 4,000 ODD showrooms in the country, the company has a service center with a service center that addresses customer complaints.
One realised the matter said: “Share a reply with the ministry, saying about 1,400 service centers are ready and can cater to a large number of customers at present.”
In an investor speech released on April 1, the company said it has 4,436 stores nationwide. Among them, the company has 3,365, and the rest are “network partners”.
However, the service network is 1,434% of the total stores owned by the company, accounting for about 42%.
“As we are co-located with the Service Center in a new opening store in the Service Center, we have completely redefined our EV purchase and ownership experience and passed the #SavingSwalascooder campaign as a new benchmark,” Aggarwal said in a statement on December 25, 2024.
Ola Electric has faced regulatory scrutiny since October last year after thousands of complaints against its scooters. It received a notice of the performance reasons from the Central Consumer Protection Agency (CCPA), and subsequently conducted a comprehensive investigation into the company.
The company announced a rapid expansion of its sales and repair network after facing regulatory scrutiny and social media opposition.
“Our average service time, which is a service TAT (turnover time), has dropped from nearly 2.5 to 3 days in October, which is the highest issue for our service to 1.1 days,” Aggarwal said in the Feb. 7 revenue call. “The trend is continuing to decline. So we – our service experience and SLA (service level agreement) are now almost the best in the OEM industry classroom.”
Ola Electric did not respond to email inquiries.
Incentives take a hit
The government’s investigation into Ola Electric sales is also related to subsidies under FAME-II, or the second round of electric (and hybrid) vehicles and the second round of PM E-Drive. Under these plans, automakers must sell their vehicles at discounted prices, while the government reimburses the difference.
Automakers must ensure that they receive minimum warranty requirements under the plan to receive subsidies. For example, electric two-wheeler manufacturers must provide a warranty of at least three years or 20,000 kilometers, whichever is earlier. They must also ensure appropriate facilities that meet after-sales service requirements.
In October, the Ministry of Heavy Industry asked its testing agency ARAI to engage in consumer dissatisfaction with OLA Electric, as the company is expected to maintain necessary service centers for all consumer issues under PM E-Drive and FAME-II guidelines.
Arai and ICAT provide companies with the authorization certificates needed to ensure government incentives.
Mint According to reports on March 19, Ola Electric may be lost due to PM E-Drive incentives due to its vehicle registration problems. Electric two-wheeler manufacturers may receive ₹Each unit in FY25 is 10,000, which will be halved in FY26. The registration issues for Ola Electric began in February and continued until March 2025, so the company was unable to register all its sales for fiscal 25 by the end of the year, potentially reducing its incentives.
In February, the company informed that renegotiations between the two agencies undermined its registration process, even though the company claimed to have sold 25,000 units, only about 8,653 units were registered this month.
However, the company did not disclose its sales in March, relying on 23,450 registered Vahan portal data. The backlog of vehicles that have been sold but not registered remains at about 16,000, saying that this will be cleared in April.
When Ola Electric is in trouble multiple times, the competitor is about to end. In March, Bajaj Auto Ltd and TVS Motors Ltd surpassed Ola Electric, which the electrical claims to have the highest market share in February.
Bajaj Auto led the electric two-wheeler market with 34,863 new registrations in the last month of fiscal 25, up nearly 62% from 21,537 last month. Hosur-based TVS Motors Ltd recorded 30,454 new registrations, a monthly increase of 61%.
Ola Electric’s shares have fallen more than 16% since the February registration issues began, while the BSE Auto Index has fallen by 9%.
ayaan.kartik@livemint.com
