Telecom operator fined Rs10K for deficient service

Tribune News Service

Chandigarh, July 18

The District Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum has directed a private telecom operator to pay Rs10,000 to a local resident for deficiency in service.

In a complaint, Payal Garg, a resident of Sector 48-B, Chandigarh, submitted that she was using a mobile connection of Airtel. Vodafone Idea Limited (opposite party) floated an advertisement that if any consumer would pay Rs499 per month in the post-paid connection then the company would issue the insurance of their handset for 12 months. Accordingly, the complainant ported her connection from Airtel to Idea and started using its services since September 16, 2018.

The handset of the complainant stopped functioning and accordingly, the father of the complainant approached the opposite party on March 2, 2019, with a request to consider the handset under insurance. At that time, the representative of the opposite party told the father of the complainant that the handset was covered under the Nirvana plan and requested him to wait for 2-3 days and in the meantime, they would send their technical expert to collect the defective handset.

The father of the complainant waited sufficiently, but to no avail.

In reply, the opposite party pleaded that there was a set process of subscribing to the Idea Phone Secure service and the complainant never completed the said process of registration on the Idea Phone Secure App. The opposite party was only a medium between the insurer (New India Assurance Company Limited), the insured and the beneficiary/user.

The forum observed, “If the opposite party can charge the amount for the purpose of alluring its customers to get them ported from any other portal to their own, it was the foremost duty of the opposite party only to get in touch with its consumer (complainant herein) whether she has been properly registered with the insurance company or not.”

The complainant was never in touch with the insurance company rather the services were provided by the opposite party only, stated the forum and directed it to pay Rs10,000 on account of deficiency in service and causing mental and physical harassment to the complainant and to pay Rs7,000 as cost of litigation.