Rs 150 service charge cap: Price cap may slow down your office vaccine drive

Several delivery and e-commerce startups that undertook mass vaccination drives for their employees or delivery executives in partnership with private hospitals are unclear on how the latest cap on service charge for vaccination will impact their future camps.

Earlier this week, the government announced that private hospitals can levy a maximum of ₹150 as a service charge over the fixed price of the jabs. According to industry executives, this could impact the ability of private hospitals to allocate their resources liberally for these camps. Over the last one month, several startups, besides the ecommerce ones, have organised vaccination camps at their offices for their staff.

Degree of Slowdown

Sources told ET that these firms are now expecting some degree of slowdown in arranging vaccination camps following the recent changes in the policy. They are already in touch with private hospitals over the issue of the new price cap for jabs.

"Supply is ultimately with them (hospitals). If they are restrained, it is bound to have an impact. We are still assessing how to get the second doses on time with frequent changes in vaccine policy,” a senior industry executive said.

“There was a financial incentive to earmark a significant portion of the vaccine supply for such vaccination drives with corporates and housing societies. Now that the financial incentives are gone, there is no reason for hospitals to step out of their premises,” said a senior executive at a unicorn, where most employees have got their first jab.

This was echoed by another large startup in Bengaluru. "There were 5-6 camps over the last one month but we haven't heard of new ones since the change in policy. It will slow down from what it looks like,” this person said.

Most industry executives that ET spoke with said they are in consultation with their hospital partners. Typically, one company will partner with multiple hospitals for both Covishield and Covaxin. “We asked our partners and they themselves are not sure what it means yet,” one of the people cited above said.