Zomato asks restaurants to serve 45 days notice before exiting Gold programme

Zomato that runs the popular Zomato Gold programme has asked its restaurant partners to serve a notice of 45 days if they wish to opt out of the same. This move comes after hundreds of restaurants in Delhi, Mumbai and Gurugram pulled out of the programme amid growing unrest between the restaurant industry and online ordering platforms.

Zomato wrote a mail to its Gold partner restaurants and said that they were required to give a 45-day notice to ensure smooth transition for its users. It also added that if these members wish to sign back, then they would be required to pay a sign-up fee.

According to a report in Livemint, Zomato wrote in its e-mail, "The decision to join and continue with this partnership has been completely yours just like all the other decisions you make to run your business effectively and efficiently. With a view to make sure we protect user experience, we would request you to let us know proactively in case you are thinking of going off the programme for a brief period, as we will not like your users to have a poor experience when they visit your restaurant. As per the contract, you are required to give us a 45 days notice for this change to ensure a smooth transition for users."

Led by National Restaurant Association of India (NRAI), as many as 300 restaurants in Gurugram on Thursday said that they would pull out of the membership-driven dining apps including Dineout, EazyDiner (Prime), nearbuy and magicpin. This move is aimed to end steep discounting practices implemented by such platforms.

According to the daily, platforms other than Zomato have expressed that they are willing to have a dialogue with the restaurant partners.

Zomato Gold has 1 million subscribers and around 6,500 restaurant partners. The company had recently also introduced Infinity Dining for its Gold members that allows the users to have unlimited a la carte at the partner restaurants.

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