Terms, Privacy & Customer Policies

1. Terms of Use

Ashta Express is a sole proprietorship registered in Ashta, Madhya Pradesh, with its operational office at Kannod Road, Main Market, Ashta, Sehore, Madhya Pradesh – 466116. In these terms, “we”, “us” and “the platform” mean Ashta Express; “you” means the person using it.

By creating an account, browsing, or placing an order, you agree to these terms. If you do not agree with them, please do not use the platform.

What we are, and what we are not

Ashta Express is a hyperlocal marketplace. We connect you with independent local stores, kitchens and sellers in Ashta, and we arrange delivery. Except where a listing identifies us as the seller, the contract of sale for the goods is between you and that seller. The seller is responsible for the product, its quality, its description, its price and any applicable warranty. We are responsible for running the platform, for the delivery service we provide, and for handling your complaints under section 9.

A single order may include items from more than one seller. Where that happens, each seller’s part of your order is a separate contract of sale, even though you pay once and receive one delivery.

Who can use the platform

• You must be at least 18 years old to place an order. If you are under 18, you may use the platform only with the involvement of a parent or guardian, who will be responsible for the order.
• You must be able to receive deliveries at an address inside our service area (see section 5).
• Age-restricted products carry their own, stricter conditions — see section 6.

Your account

Accounts are created and secured using your mobile number and a one-time password. Keep access to that number secure: anything done through your account is treated as done by you. Tell us immediately if you believe someone else is using your account.

Please give an accurate delivery address and a phone number you will answer. Most failed deliveries are caused by an incomplete address or an unreachable phone.

Things you must not do

• Place orders you do not intend to accept or pay for.
• Misstate your age to obtain an age-restricted product.
• Misuse an offer or coupon, including by creating multiple accounts for it.
• Abuse, threaten or harass a delivery partner, a seller or our support staff.
• Attempt to disrupt, probe or gain unauthorised access to the platform.
• Copy or reuse our content, branding or listings without our written permission.

We may suspend or close an account that breaches these terms. Where we do, we will tell you the reason, and you may contest it through section 9. Money already owed to you is refunded regardless.

Availability

We aim to keep the platform available and our catalogue accurate, but we do not guarantee uninterrupted service. Listings, prices and stock change frequently. If a seller cannot supply an item after you have paid, that item is refunded to you under section 4.

Liability

Nothing in these terms limits your rights under the Consumer Protection Act, 2019, or any other right that cannot be excluded by law. Subject to that, we are not liable for losses that were not reasonably foreseeable, and our liability in connection with an order is limited to the value of that order together with any delivery charge you paid on it.

We are not responsible for delays or failures caused by events outside our reasonable control, such as severe weather, floods, strikes, civil unrest, power or network failure, or a government restriction.

Changes, governing law and disputes

We may update these terms; the date at the top shows when they last changed. Changes apply to orders placed after they are published. Continuing to use the platform means you accept the updated terms.

These terms are governed by the laws of India, and the courts at Sehore, Madhya Pradesh will have jurisdiction. This does not affect your right to approach a consumer forum where the law allows you to do so.

2. Who You Are Buying From

Under the Consumer Protection (E-Commerce) Rules, 2020, you are entitled to know who is actually selling to you before you buy.

• Every product page names the store fulfilling that item. Your cart and your order confirmation group items by store, so you can always see which seller each item came from.
• Sellers are onboarded by us and must give us their business name, address, contact details and — where their category requires one — their FSSAI registration or licence.
• If you want a seller’s full business details before or after ordering, ask us at support@ashtaexpress.com and we will provide them.
• Sellers set their own prices. We do not give any seller preferential ranking in return for payment, and we do not manipulate search results to disadvantage a seller.

Some items are sold by us directly rather than by a partner store. Those listings identify Ashta Express as the seller, and for them we carry the seller’s responsibilities described in section 1.

3. Pricing & Payments

Prices

• All prices are in Indian Rupees and include applicable taxes unless a listing says otherwise.
• Before you confirm payment, the checkout page shows the full breakdown — item total, delivery charge, any handling or packaging charge, and any discount applied. You will never be charged more than the total shown there.
• A struck-through price shown next to a selling price is the maximum retail price or the seller’s usual price for that pack, not a price we have invented.
• Weight-based fresh items may vary slightly from the listed weight. Significant shortfalls are covered by section 4.

How you can pay

We currently accept two methods:

• Cash on delivery. You pay the delivery partner when your order arrives.
• Direct UPI transfer. You pay to our UPI details and submit the UTR (transaction reference) with your order. Our team verifies that reference against our bank records before the order is released. Verification is a manual step, so there can be a short delay between your payment and your order being confirmed.

We do not ask for, collect or store your UPI PIN, card numbers, CVV, net-banking credentials or any other payment secret. No one from Ashta Express will ever ask you for a PIN, an OTP for a payment, or remote access to your phone. If someone does, it is not us — please report it to us immediately.

Offers and coupons

Offers carry their own conditions, such as a minimum order value, a validity period, or a limit of one use per customer. Unless stated otherwise, offers cannot be combined, and we may withdraw an offer at any time — though never after you have already placed an order that qualified for it.

4. Cancellation, Returns & Refunds

Cancelling an order

• You can cancel free of charge until the seller has accepted your order and begun picking or preparing it.
• After that, a cancellation may not be possible, because fresh produce and prepared food cannot be restocked. If you still need to cancel, contact us and we will do what we reasonably can.
• We may cancel an order ourselves — for example if an item turns out to be unavailable, if the delivery address falls outside our service area, if we cannot reach you, or if we reasonably suspect fraud. If we cancel, you are refunded in full.

Checking your order at the door

Please check your order while the delivery partner is still with you. Groceries, fresh produce, dairy and prepared food are perishable, so problems are far easier to resolve at that moment than later.

If an item is damaged, spoiled, missing, past its use-by date, or simply not what you ordered, tell the delivery partner or contact us the same day. We will replace it or refund it. For hygiene and food-safety reasons, perishable items cannot be returned once accepted and taken inside, unless there is a genuine quality problem.

Items that cannot be returned

Sealed personal-care, hygiene and medicinal products cannot be returned once their seal is broken, unless the item was defective or incorrectly supplied. Age-restricted products cannot be returned or exchanged once handed over.

How refunds reach you

• Paid by UPI: we transfer the refund back to the UPI ID you paid from. We aim to initiate approved refunds within 2 working days and to complete them within 5 to 7 working days.
• Cash on delivery: we transfer the refund by UPI to an ID you confirm to us, on the same timeline.
• Partial refunds: if only some items were affected, we refund those items and any delivery charge attributable to them, and you keep the rest of the order.

Refunds are processed manually by our team, so they are not instant. If a refund has not reached you within the window above, raise it under section 9 and we will trace it.

5. Delivery

• Where we deliver: Ashta, Madhya Pradesh and the localities immediately around it. If your address falls outside the area we can serve, checkout will tell you before you pay.
• How long it takes: most orders arrive within 15–35 minutes. Any time shown in the app is an estimate, not a guarantee — traffic, weather, order size and how busy a kitchen is all affect it. A delayed delivery is not by itself a ground for refund, though you can always contact us.
• Delivery charges: shown at checkout before you pay, and waived or reduced on orders above the threshold displayed in the app.
• Being available: the delivery partner will call the number on the order. If we cannot reach you or nobody accepts the order after a reasonable wait, the order may be returned. For prepaid orders we will refund it, less any cost already incurred on perishable items; for cash orders it is simply cancelled.
• Leaving an order unattended: only if you ask us to. Once left where you asked, the order is your responsibility.
• Age-restricted items are never left unattended and are never handed to anyone who cannot prove they are 18 or over — see section 6.

7. Food Safety & FSSAI

• We require every partner selling food to hold and maintain a valid FSSAI registration or licence, and to give us the number during onboarding. We ask for proof, and we remove partners who cannot produce it.
• Sellers are responsible for the safety, hygiene, freshness and correct labelling of what they prepare and pack, including use-by and best-before dates.
• We require prepared food to be packed in tamper-evident packaging, and we ask delivery partners to keep hot and cold items separated in transit.
• Check the use-by or best-before date at delivery. If an item is past date, spoiled, or its packaging is broken, section 4 applies — we will replace or refund it.
• Ingredient, allergen and nutrition information is provided by the seller. If you have an allergy or a strict dietary requirement, please confirm with us before ordering; we cannot guarantee a kitchen is free of any particular allergen.

A food-safety concern is treated as urgent. Raise it under section 9 and we will take it up with the seller immediately.

8. Privacy & Your Data

This section explains what personal data we collect, why, who we share it with, and what you can ask us to do with it. It follows the Digital Personal Data Protection Act, 2023 and the Information Technology Act, 2000.

What we collect, and why

We do not collect your PIN, card details or banking credentials, and we do not ask for documents we have no reason to hold.

Who we share it with

We do not sell or rent your personal data, and we do not pass your contact details to advertisers. We do share the minimum necessary with:

• The seller fulfilling your order — the items ordered, and the information needed to prepare and pack them.
• The delivery partner assigned to your order — your name, delivery address and phone number, so the order can reach you.
• Our SMS and messaging providers — your mobile number, to send OTPs and order updates.
• Our hosting, database and image providers — who store platform data on our behalf under contract.
• Our payment gateway partner — when you pay online, your payment amount and order reference are shared with an RBI-authorised payment gateway to process and verify the transaction. Your card, UPI PIN and net-banking credentials go directly to that gateway and are never seen or stored by us.
• Authorities — where we are legally required to disclose, or where it is necessary to establish or defend a legal claim.

How long we keep it

We keep order, payment and invoice records for as long as tax and accounting law requires. Account details are kept while your account is open. When you close your account we delete or anonymise what we no longer need, and retain only what the law obliges us to keep.

A date of birth given for age verification is kept while your account is open, because it is the record of how we established your eligibility for a restricted sale. If you close your account we erase it, unless an ongoing regulatory enquiry requires us to keep it until that enquiry ends.

Keeping it safe

Access to customer data is restricted to staff who need it for their work. Sensitive actions in our admin tools are logged. No system is perfectly secure, but if a breach affects your data we will notify you and the Data Protection Board as the law requires.

Your rights

Under the DPDP Act you can ask us to:

• tell you what personal data of yours we hold and who we have shared it with;
• correct or complete anything inaccurate;
• erase data we no longer need for the purpose you gave it for;
• withdraw a consent you previously gave — this is as easy as giving it, though some withdrawals mean we can no longer take your orders;
• nominate someone to exercise these rights on your behalf if you die or become incapacitated.

Write to support@ashtaexpress.com and we will respond. If you are not satisfied with how we handle your request, you can complain to the Data Protection Board of India.

Children

The platform is meant for people aged 18 and over. We do not knowingly collect data about children, and we do not profile children or show them targeted advertising. If you believe a child’s data has reached us, tell us and we will remove it.

Cookies and similar storage

We use browser storage to keep you signed in, remember your cart and your chosen delivery area, and to make the app work offline. Clearing your browser or app storage removes these, and you will need to sign in again.