In 2015, an incident occurred on Amazon India when an error in an Excel spreadsheet turned a pack of Surf Excel worth 185 rupees into an item priced at 82,740 rupees. Within 40 minutes, 90 buyers placed orders, resulting in revenue of nearly 74 lakh rupees, which the company had to cancel. None of these items were delivered to the customers.
Anubhav N, Head of Business at Amazon, reported the incident in a LinkedIn post. According to Anubhav, Amazon had launched the home and personal hygiene category several months prior, and products and their pricing were handled by Cloudtail, one of the largest sellers on Amazon India.
Anubhav explained that in the evening, someone uploaded an Excel sheet where the date column was shifted into the price column. Because Excel has strict rules regarding dates, it inadvertently converted one of them into a number. Consequently, a modest Surf Excel, usually sold for 185 rupees, appeared for sale at the price of a two-wheeler motorcycle.
Although such an unusually high price usually deters buyers, in this case, the product listing was shared on Twitter along with advice for customers to purchase the product, keep their invoices, and seek compensation through consumer protection lawsuits. As a result, as Anubhav noted, orders began coming in.
He recounted that at 6:20 PM, while he was having a quick meal, a customer service agent called to report the emergency. The next half hour was spent determining the cause of the glitch and resolving the issue. By then, 90 packs had been sold at 82,740 rupees each, totaling 74 lakh rupees of detergent in 40 minutes—the best evening statistic for his category on paper. However, canceling these orders proved to be a more complex task.
After the price was corrected, the hardest part was preventing the delivery of these goods to customers' homes. Returning the 90 packs took 12 hours, contradicting the system designed for fast customer deliveries. Anubhav specified that 55 orders had not yet reached the warehouse and were canceled without major issues. Another 15 packs arrived at the warehouse and required multi-level management approval before they could be stopped. Twelve packs had already been packed and were ready for shipment, forcing Anubhav to wake up his category director at 1 AM to get permission to halt these shipments.
Eight packs had already been sent out for morning delivery, requiring authorization from the Amazon country head to intercept. Two more packs were with couriers who were preparing to start their delivery routes. The Amazon operations team eventually located these two couriers and asked them not to deliver the products.
For Anubhav, this incident also had personal consequences. He stated that the experience made him lose trust in Excel when dealing with dates. He also recalled that this was the only time during his tenure at Amazon that he was praised for ensuring that goods were not delivered.