[T Y A G I]

Hello Samurai Sir,

I would only suggest you the DOT website and it will cater to you in the best possible manner.I was in Mumbai and due to some signal problems I requested Reliance to rectify the issue in Sewri ( Mumbai ) where my office was.Since the day one, I complaint and kept on complaining for 6 months hoping thats its the Reliance oldest CDMA network and they will definately hear me some day.

But all efforts in vein, then one day I disconnected it and requested them to stop billing.But again they were behaving like deaf and dumb.Then I registered the complaint with the correspondence mails evidence on the DOT site form.

And to my utter surprise, my billing was stopped in 7 days and an appology mail was received.

So, if you wanna go ahead as per my knowledge book the complaint on DOT website :: Grievance Registration Form ::
select the Department of Telecommunications as the
"Select Ministry/Department " and you will definately be heard.

Regards,
Lalit Tyagi

[sgiitk]

It is not for nothing that Airtel are referred to as Airhell on many mobile forums.

[shamanth]

Best way to get solution is to send a sms PORT <mobile no> to 1900. Within few hours your problem will get solved.

I have 3 airtel number in one account and ECS is activated for this, last month i changed the plan, they changed account number for all 3 numbers and applied ECS for only one number and then they blocked outgoing of other two numbers telling bill is not payed. Then i sent sms to port number, Airtel customer care was back of me, and with in 1 days all were included in one account and they activated all calls.

[v-drive]

There is another thing which works (or at least works in my case). When ever I am not happy with them, I tweet to airtel_presence, and raise the tempo with each passing day. No DM's for them, but public tweets. They have no choice but to respond and close. At the same time, I also publicly thank them, if they help me close issues in time without much fuss.

[noopster]

I have had immediate and effective intervention from the nodal officer when escalated to in my Bangalore days. Of course it helps when it is a genuine escalation, i.e. you have explored all options at the call centre etc.

I can't agree with those who are advocating aggression as a strategy to get this resolved. While some righteous indignation is called for, venting on a customer service executive is often counter-productive not to mention for the most part unfair. The CSE is just doing his/her job. Maintaining your cool and asking to speak to a manager is probably a better way.

Note: I may be coming across as preachy but have been guilty of venting myself in the past- it doesn't help and just upsets even someone who may want to help. An occasional stern rebuke delivered quietly and without aggression does of course help!

[mjothi]

Originally Posted by T Y A G I

So, if you wanna go ahead as per my knowledge book the complaint on DOT website :: Grievance Registration Form ::
select the Department of Telecommunications as the
"Select Ministry/Department " and you will definately be heard.

yes. I have utilized this once, and I was surprised by the outcome. And the operator in question was BSNL. So, I would guess this will do even more wonder for Airtel. Go ahead and file one, if you do not get any satisfied response from airtel.

[sgiitk]

@shamnath; Brilliant idea, is the best I can say. If that does no wake them up then nothing can or will.

[pranava999]

Seems like after the 2G scam we will now have 3G billing scams. I opted out of 3g after the very first month of trial usage and realised they could be upto a swindling exercise when on an avg my monthly bill jumped by 50%. I got back to the Rs.99 2gb plan airtel has in place...

[silversteed]

Originally Posted by v-drive

When ever I am not happy with them, I tweet to airtel_presence, and raise the tempo with each passing day. No DM's for them, but public tweets...

I did not try this option

Originally Posted by noopster

I have had immediate and effective intervention from the nodal officer when escalated to in my Bangalore days. Of course it helps when it is a genuine escalation, i.e. you have explored all options at the call centre etc.

They "intervene" but do naught about the issue - that's my experience.

I can't agree with those who are advocating aggression as a strategy to get this resolved. While some righteous indignation is called for, venting on a customer service executive is often counter-productive not to mention for the most part unfair. The CSE is just doing his/her job. Maintaining your cool and asking to speak to a manager is probably a better way.

Aggression as I meant it, happened through well-worded, detailed, strong emails. Over the phone, it's just plain talking, in the most cordial manner - I think I wrote my post too quickly to get the fact clear. Writing detailed emails is better than saying the same thing over and over again to different people. In my case, neither the customer care, nodal officer or appellate officer kept their deadlines to respond to my complaint. Even my porting request failed to turn on the pea-size brains of those concerned. However I had made up my mind by that time, to port out and luckily for me, porting was a breeze

[sj_koova]

Samurai,

If I understand your situation correctly, you may not need to worry.

Here is my story and you will know why I am saying this.

I activated Rs.750 monthly rental plan with 2GB free limit on my Airtel connection 2 months back.
The first month I too had a shock. My account information shown me that the usage is around 1400MB and the unbilled amount was over Rs.20,000. I made many calls to Airtel and finally got a sensible lady to talk to me. I guess she was the team lead in 3G Dept.

Here is the deal. Until your bill is prepared, they go with the standard rate of per kb usage. In your case, your plan has 30p/20kb. This mean Rs.15 for 1MB and Rs.9000 for 600MB.

At this rate your unbilled amount can reach Rs.9000. At the billing cycle they will apply your plan to this usage and your actual bill will end up at Rs.450 for 600MB

My billing is on 20th of every month. On 19th of this month my unbilled amount was Rs.28599 and when the bill was prepared the 3G bill came to Rs.750, which is my actual plan. (With my plan, I can go up to Rs.30,000)

All you need to pay attention is Rs.9000 cap for 600MB plan. Beyond that you will be charged 30p/20KB

Please confirm this with Airtel though.

[Mubeen]

Originally Posted by Mubeen

I've subscribed to airtel's 3G service in Chennai since February 2011. I've been on the 750 rupees 2 gb free usage plan since day 1. In the last week of May I received an SMS from airtel informing me that based on my usage my plan has been changed to the Rs. 675 plan.

I immediately shot off an e-mail to customer care informing them that although the change of plan is well meaning, I don't appreciate the unauthorised & unilateral change without my explicit approval. I got a mail back from customer care apologising for the change & promising to not make any more changes unless explicitly requested. Furthermore the plan was changed back to the Rs. 750 plan.

Within a week of the exchange of mails, I again got an SMS informing me that my 3G plan has been changed to the Rs. 675 plan. I immediately forwarded my correspondence with the customer care representative to the nodal officer & demand an explanation as to why the same action is repeated in-spite of receiving an assurance to the contrary.

The nodal officer replies assuring that plan will be changed back to the Rs. 750 data plan & no plan change will take place without my request.

Therefore in my last billing cycle the 3G data plan has been changed 4 times within a period of 7 days. In between all these plan changes my amount due to airtel in the current billing cycle is Rs. 5490 as against my average bill of 1200 - 1300 rupees. My bill has still not been generated & is due to be generated tomorrow.

I can think of no other reason for this inflated bill apart from airtel's mindless plan changes somehow affecting the billing on the 3G data usage.

I'm really going to have a fight on my hands to get this issue sorted out. Based on the experiences mentioned in the previous posts it looks like airtel certainly doesn't seem too keen on rectifying their errors!

Hey guys get a load of this. I got my itemized bill today & I guessed right. The airtel guys have charged me extra on the 3G data usage.

Sent a mail to the nodal officer this morning. A lady calls me this afternoon and tells me that they have charged pro-rata because plan was changed inbetween the billing cycle.

I tell her the plan was changed without my asking and that too twice within a span of 3 days that too in-spite of my informing customer care the first time round. I also forwarded all e-mails sent to customer care regarding the same.

Guess what she tells me - Plan was changed by airtel customer care. She is calling from airtel nodal office. She has not changed my plan & hence I have to pay an extra 3500 rupees plus taxes!!!!

Damn how I wish we were allowed to curse in these forums!!

I've escalated the matter to the appellate and the government website that was mentioned in an earlier post here.

What are my other options???

[sj_koova]

This Plan changing drama is news to me now. I used to watch my usage almost everyday basis. So far things are straight.

At least in my case, when the bill comes the amount was proper against all items.

[silversteed]

Originally Posted by sj_koova

If I understand your situation correctly...

Sorry, you seem to have got it all wrong. Unbilled amount is not the concern here, but the actual bill that gets generated every month.

Unless we reach the data transfer cap, there's no need to worry about the unbilled amount. Period.

[sj_koova]

Originally Posted by silversteed

Sorry, you seem to have got it all wrong. Unbilled amount is not the concern here, but the actual bill that gets generated every month.

You are spot on. I got it wrong.

[Mubeen]

Look at the data usage percentage in both the messages. In the first message the usage is 72%. In the second message the data usage is 60%. The data usage in MB though is constant!

How cool is airtel's data tracking system!! 