The commerce ministry has sought from police details about the e-commerce platforms with court cases to facilitate payment of the frozen funds to the affected customers.
The decision came at a meeting on the problem-ridden e-commerce issue with additional secretary AHM Shafiquzzaman in the chair on Tuesday.
"We've asked the police to let us know details about the list of e-commerce companies with having cases," Mr Shafiquzzaman said.
The ministry will forward the list to the central bank for the next course of action, according to another high official.
The government is expected to introduce unique business identification number (UBIN) in favour of e-commerce platforms within January 31.
The authorities concerned are scrutinising the cybersecurity-related issue on UBIN, Mr Shafiquzzaman says.
The introduction of the UBIN gets delayed for doing more homework on the security-related issue, he adds.
The ministry wrote to the police on Tuesday, seeking the full list of the dotcoms with court cases, he said.
Last week, the Bangladesh Bank (BB) moved to refund the stuck money to the affected consumers and merchants.
However, the money disbursement initiative stumbles as it has requested a fresh list of consumers and merchants to start such disbursement.
The central bank instructed the scheduled banks to pay back the trapped funds to the victims.
Currently, more than Tk 2.14 billion remains stuck in different payment gateways. This amount was paid in advance by customers against their ordered goods.
On June 30, the central bank introduced an escrow service on payments to e-commerce platforms.
Since the issuance of a circular on 14 October over the botched e-commerce issue, over Tk 5.05 billion was paid to such gateways against the ordered goods.
Of the amount, payment gateways have already settled over Tk 2.91 billion to the online marketplaces.
The rest Tk 2.14 billion got stuck in different service-providing firms, including SSL, shurjoMukhi, Foster, bKash, Nagad and Southeast Bank Ltd.
Of the amount, over Tk 1.65 billion of Qcoom online shopping, paid by its customers against ordered goods, remains stuck with Foster Payments.
Again, over Tk 485 million has been stuck in other payment gateways, according to a central bank letter.
In a special meeting on October 25 with commerce minister Tipu Munshi in the chair, the government sought to refund Tk 2.14 billion in three months.
But complexities cropped up in payback of the money due to shutdown of operations of the e-commerce portals concerned, the BB letter mentioned.
"The e-commerce companies may claim the amount to be paid to clients if it's proven that they supplied earlier products to the customers concerned," it says.
The agencies concerned are working to pay back the money from July 01 until October 14, the letter writes.
The amount of Tk 2.14 billion was blocked at payment gateways for not delivering goods to customers who paid in advance for the same, a BB official said.
The government authorities have taken multiple steps in the wake of scams by dubious e-commerce entities like Evaly, E-orange, Dhamaka Shopping and Sirajganj Shop.
The cabinet division and commerce ministry have already formed a high-powered committee to bring discipline in the sector through resolving the problems it faces now. Top officials of scam-hit e-commerce sites are now behind bars.
The government has made a move to set up a regulatory authority for the e-commerce sector which, experts say, holds high prospects if not squandered.
