Cash on delivery

Collect at the door.
Settle every week.

Seven in ten online orders in Nepal are paid in cash on the doorstep. That makes COD the service we built first, documented hardest, and put the most controls around.

  • 1.5% handling
  • 7-day settlement
  • Rs 200,000 per parcel
  • Append-only ledger
Open a merchant accountSee the charges
A customer paying cash to a courier on deliveryरु

The commitment

Four numbers you can plan around

Everything else about COD is detail. These are the figures that decide whether you can run a business on it.

Day settlement cycle
7Day settlement cycleFixed weekly day
COD handling
1.5%COD handlingRs 25 minimum
Max per parcel
Rs 2,00,000Max per parcelHigher by arrangement
Delivery attempts
3Delivery attemptsBefore return to sender

The cycle

From order to bank transfer

Five steps. Four of them are ours.

The weekly cycle that returns cash on delivery money to a merchant's bankCollectReconcileApproveTransferStatement7DAYS
  1. 1

    You book

    Set the amount the rider should collect. It prints on the label and locks at pickup.

  2. 2

    We collect it

    The rider calls ahead, delivers, takes the cash, and records who received it.

  3. 3

    Ledger credited

    The amount lands on your ledger as the delivery scan happens — not overnight, not weekly.

  4. 4

    Batch cut

    At the end of the week, collections minus charges become a settlement batch you can review.

  5. 5

    Bank transfer

    Approved and paid to your registered account, with a transaction reference on the statement.

The ledger

Every rupee is a line you can read

Your balance is not a number somebody types in. It is the sum of an append-only ledger where each entry names the parcel it came from.

Append-only, never edited
A correction is posted as a new entry with its own reason. The history of what was owed and when survives any audit.
One entry per parcel
Each COD credit carries its tracking number, so you can trace any figure back to a delivery.
Idempotent by construction
Every money-moving write carries a unique key. A retried request after a timeout is a no-op, not a second credit.
A ledger listing cash on delivery credits and delivery chargesMERCHANT LEDGERCOD credit+2,450Delivery fee−285COD credit+1,180Payout−3,345Balanceरु 0

Payouts

Two people approve before money moves

A settlement batch is created automatically, but it is never paid automatically. Approval and payment are separate actions by named people, both recorded.

Approval is a decision
Someone in finance reviews the batch and approves it. A batch that nets to zero or less cannot be approved at all.
Payment is a second step
Marking it paid requires a bank transaction reference. Without one, a disputed payout cannot be traced.
Bank changes need a second approver
Changing a payout account is the most common courier fraud. It takes two people and lands in the audit log.
A settlement payout arriving in a merchant's bank accountरुरुरु+ रु48,320

Controls

Cash is the highest-risk part of this business, so it has the most controls

Not because we expect the worst of anyone, but because a system that depends on everyone behaving perfectly is a system that will eventually fail loudly.

  • Rider cash limit

    Above Rs 40,000 a rider is prompted to bank before taking more COD parcels. Nobody carries an unsafe amount.

  • Shift-end reconciliation

    Cash counted against the manifest at the end of every shift, in the app, before the rider signs off.

  • Branch deposit daily

    Every branch banks its holdings at close of day. Cash does not sit overnight in a drawer.

  • Tracked to a parcel

    Every collection is tied to a tracking number. There is no such thing as unallocated cash in the system.

  • Full audit log

    Approvals, payouts and wallet adjustments are recorded with who did them and from where.

  • No charge on uncollected money

    If the cash was never collected, the handling fee is never applied. You are only charged the return leg.

At the door

The rider calls first. Every time.

Most failed COD deliveries in Nepal are not refusals. They are a customer who did not know the rider was outside, or who did not have the cash ready because nobody told them the amount.

Amount in the SMS
The recipient gets the exact figure by SMS before the rider arrives, so the money is ready at the door.
A call before arrival
Standard procedure, not a courtesy. It is the single biggest lever on first-attempt success.
Partial refusal recorded
If the customer takes some items and refuses others, that is captured rather than turned into a whole failed delivery.
A courier handing a parcel to a customer at their door

What it costs

COD charges, worked through

A Rs 2,500 order from Kathmandu, 1 kg, at three destinations. Every line is shown on your quote before you confirm.

Worked example of cash on delivery charges by destination zone
 Kathmandu (Zone 1)Pokhara (Zone 2)Jumla (Zone 6)
Base freightRs 90Rs 130Rs 390
Remote surcharge——Rs 150
Fuel surcharge (4.5%)Rs 4.05Rs 5.85Rs 17.55
COD handling (1.5%)Rs 37.50Rs 37.50Rs 37.50
VAT (13%)Rs 17.09Rs 22.52Rs 77.36
Total charged to youRs 148.64Rs 195.87Rs 672.41
Credited to your ledgerRs 2,351.36Rs 2,304.13Rs 1,827.59

Visibility

You see the batch before we pay it

The merchant panel shows the week's collections as they happen, what has been deducted, and what the transfer will be — so a settlement is never a surprise arriving in your bank.

Live COD outstanding
What has been collected and not yet settled, updated on every delivery scan.
Ageing buckets
Anything unsettled past fourteen days is flagged, so it becomes a conversation rather than a slow leak.
Statement export
CSV of every line, ready to reconcile against your own order IDs.
A merchant dashboard showing daily parcel volume and settlementTODAYBOOKED128DELIVERED96COD DUE84k

Failed deliveries

Three attempts, then an honest answer

COD orders fail more often than prepaid ones — that is the nature of asking for money at a door. What matters is that you find out why, quickly, and are not charged for cash nobody collected.

Reason recorded each time
“Recipient refused”, “phone switched off”, “asked to deliver tomorrow” — the actual reason, on the timeline.
Rescheduling before returning
A customer who asks for tomorrow gets tomorrow. A return is the last resort, not the second step.
Return leg priced separately
You pay the return freight, never the COD handling on money that was never collected.
A parcel returning to the sender after failed delivery attempts3 attempts

For your customer

They know the amount before the doorbell

Half of COD friction is a surprise. The recipient gets the tracking link and the exact amount by SMS, so the notes are counted before the rider is on the step.

SMS at dispatch
Tracking number, amount, and the expected delivery window.
A tracking page with no login
Anyone with the number can see the status. Making a customer create an account to track a parcel is hostile.
Plain-language status
“Out for delivery from Pokhara Hub” rather than a status code nobody outside logistics can read.
A phone showing a parcel's live tracking timelineUDN26H4K2M9QPArriving today, by 6 pmPicked upAt Kathmandu hubIn transitOut for delivery

Automation

Push COD orders straight from checkout

If your store already knows the order total, it can create the COD parcel with the right amount without anyone retyping it. Retyping is where wrong amounts come from.

One API call per order
The COD amount is a field on the parcel. The tracking number comes back in the response.
Webhooks on every change
Your system hears about delivery and collection as it happens, so your order status stays true.
Idempotency keys
Send the same order twice after a timeout and you get the same parcel back, not two.
Read the API docs
Status webhooks pushed from the network to a merchant's systemparcel.picked_upparcel.in_transitparcel.delivered

Before you ship

The checks that cut failed COD in half

Most COD failures are decided at booking, not at the door. These four fields do more for your success rate than anything we can do in the last mile.

A working mobile number
The single highest-impact field on the form. No number, no call, no delivery.
A landmark, not just a ward
Most of Nepal is not addressable by street number. “Opposite the school” finds the door.
The right amount
A mismatch between what the customer expects and what the rider asks for is a refusal waiting to happen.
Confirm the order first
A quick confirmation call on high-value COD orders removes most of the fake-order problem.
A dispatch checklist being completed before a parcel leaves

Who it suits

COD works best for

It is not the right answer for everything. Here is where it earns its handling charge.

  • Social commerce sellers

    Instagram, Facebook and TikTok shops where the customer has never paid you before and will not prepay.

  • First-time customers

    COD removes the trust barrier on a first order. Convert them to prepaid on the second.

  • Outside the Valley

    Digital payment adoption drops sharply beyond the corridor. COD is often the only option that converts.

Security

What happens if something goes wrong

Cash gets lost, occasionally stolen, and very occasionally miscounted. The honest question is not whether that can happen but who carries it when it does.

Collected cash is our liability
Once a rider records a collection, the amount is on your ledger. If it goes missing afterwards, that is our loss, not yours.
Reconciled daily, not weekly
A discrepancy is found the same evening, while people still remember the route.
Insurance covers the goods
Cash liability and goods insurance are separate things, and we keep them separate so neither hides behind the other.
A shield representing parcel insurance and data security

The last mile

The rider is the whole service

Everything above is process. On the day, COD is one person on a scooter, with your customer's money and your reputation in the same bag.

Salaried routes, not pure piece rate
A rider paid per parcel is financially punished for waiting two minutes while someone finds their wallet.
Cash handling training
Counting, receipting and what to do when an amount does not match — before anyone carries money.
The app does the arithmetic
Collection totals are calculated, not mental maths at the end of a twelve-hour shift.
A delivery rider carrying a parcel box on a scooter

Questions

COD questions, answered properly

The ones merchants ask before moving their volume across.

When exactly do I get my COD money?
The amount is credited to your merchant ledger the moment the parcel is marked delivered. The week’s balance — collections minus delivery charges and any adjustments — is transferred to your registered bank account on a fixed weekly day. You can see the batch, line by line, before it is paid.
What does COD cost?
A COD handling charge of 1.5% of the collected amount, with a Rs 25 minimum, on top of the delivery charge. It is shown as its own line on every quote, so you always know what the cash handling itself costs.
What if the customer refuses to pay at the door?
The rider does not hand over the parcel. It is recorded as a failed attempt with the reason, and you see it on the tracking timeline the same day. After three attempts the parcel is returned to you, and you are charged the return leg but never the COD handling on money that was never collected.
Can I change the COD amount after booking?
Yes, until the parcel is picked up. After pickup the amount is locked, because the rider is already carrying a manifest against it and changing it mid-route is how cash goes missing.
Is there a limit on the COD amount per parcel?
Rs 200,000 per parcel by default. Above that we need a note from you in advance so the route can be planned — a single rider carrying more than the cash limit is a safety problem, not a paperwork one.
How do I reconcile COD against my own orders?
Every ledger line carries the tracking number it came from, and the weekly statement exports to CSV. Most merchants match it against their order IDs in a spreadsheet in under ten minutes.

Move your COD volume across

Open a merchant account and ship your first COD parcel tomorrow. No minimum volume, no joining fee, and the settlement terms are the ones written on this page.

Open a merchant accountAsk about high volume