Dish operators liable for poor service

BETWEEN the television channels that provide the content and the consumers who view it, is an important intermediary, or the service provider, who brings this content to the doorstep of the consumer. This intermediary maybe your neighbourhood cable man, who provides you the service through his network, or it could be a "direct to home" service provider, or even the more sophisticated IPTV ( the Internet Protocol Television Service) provider. In other words, unlike before, today people have a fairly wide choice of technologies and also a choice of service providers. Equally important today is a regulator in the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, who has formulated norms for the quality of service and also for the service charges. Yet, despite these very positive developments, there is considerable dissatisfaction with the services and the way the service providers treat clients and their grievances.

Most of these complaints pertain to poor quality of reception, the service provider not attending to it promptly, lack of transparency about charges, or charging for services not asked for, delay in activating the service even after collecting the money, to quote a few examples. Well, a recent order of the apex consumer court should gladden the hearts of all those who have been having problems with their service providers. It should also send out a clear message to all service providers that courts will take a very serious view of such deficient and negligent services, besides unfair trade practices.

The order has its origin in the complaint filed by Kamla Lall. Her allegation was that on seeing advertisements promising excellent services, she ordered for two Tata Sky connections on December 28, 2006. The very next day, two set top boxes were delivered at her residence by Choudhary Agencies, who informed her that Tata Sky engineers will energise the system on December 31, 2006.

However, no one came on that day, and when she called up the service provider’s helpline on January 1, she was promised that someone would definitely come on January 2, but even this did not happen. Eventually, when she threatened to return the set top boxes, the engineers turned up on January 4, but could activate only one set top box. The district consumer disputes redressal forum, in response to her complaint, held the service provider guilty of deficient service and directed that the consumer be refunded the cost of the set top box, being Rs 3774, and also paid a compensation of Rs 15,000.

In its revision petition before the national commission, the service provider argued that the complainant was not a consumer of Tata Sky Limited as no payment had been made to them, but to Chaudhary Agencies for the purchase of set top boxes. The lower courts were, therefore, wrong in asking Tata Sky to refund the cost of the set top box. As far as the installation of DTH service on the second television of the client was concerned, it was technically not possible to do so as the set was incompatible with the digicomp purchased by the complainant. In so far as the first set top box connection was concerned, there was a slight hitch, but that was set right and that cannot be described as deficiency in service.

Dismissing these contentions, the apex court pointed out that the complainant had called the service provider’s helpline and asked for the service. At no time had she gone to the market or approached Chaudhary Agencies for the supply of set top boxes. She may have paid for the set top box to Chaudhary Agencies, but the receipt clearly indicated that each box contained a viewing card, the ownership of which remained with Tata Sky Limited. That apart, some of the provisions in the agreement with the customer clearly showed that the set top boxes were being manufactured according to the exact specifications of Tata Sky and being supplied only on their instructions. And a consumer who availed the DTH service of Tata Sky had no option but to go for a particular digicomp, the commission pointed out.

As far as the service was concerned, there was deficiency and the state commission had correctly described the compensation awarded as very modest, "and we fully agree with it," the national commission observed (RP No 3044 of 2010, decided on January 14, 2011).

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