[Mubeen]

Originally Posted by Samurai

Hopefully, this will be the end of the drama. Meanwhile, my accountant thinks Airtel reversed somewhat less than they should have and he is going to take it up with local Airtel office himself.

for the love of God hold your accountant back!! If the amount is immaterial, please don't bother. There's no saying what the nerds at airtel office are going to understand & how they're going to action that understanding.

[BoneCollector]

Never thought Airtel could be so pathetic.I've had serious problems with my Tata Photon+ connection on 3 occasions wherein i was on a minute based plan with a credit limit of 3500.I dont understand what unit they follow for it coz anytime my usage used to cross 2400mins,they used to barr my connection inspite of having a 3600+5400 minute plan per month!Worst of all was that net used to stop working in evening of a saturday and then they used to ask me to pay my bill which i always paid online.I had to raise this matter till regional officer(over Nodal officer) and things were sorted out.Now for any problem,i mail them and then call him directly at Hyderabad.

CUSTOMER CARE= CUST=PAIN/GRIEF/PROBLEM, MER=DIE,for those not well versed with Hindi,Die due to problems is akin to customer care.

[Samurai]

Originally Posted by Mubeen

for the love of God hold your accountant back!! If the amount is immaterial, please don't bother.

You are probably right, I'll ask him to stop confusing them more. The trouble is he shot off the email before telling me.

[noopster]

Hehe, Samurai this is more fun to read than PG Wodehouse.

Scaretel's customer service has always been pathetic. I had written a rant on why they call centres are India's shame inspired by one such frustrating experience many years ago! It's still online somewhere.

Anyway, glad to know you got 3500 back. Enjoy!

[sgiitk]

@noopster; I like the new acronym Scaretel! Will sure spread it on mobile forums.

[Samurai]

I did the calculations myself. Assuming all the wrongs are corrected, but bill should be -353 rupees, that is I have credit. But they say Rs.417/-, that means they are charging me Rs.770 in excess.

But I feel my peace of mind is worth more than Rs.770. So I not going to going follow it anymore.

[crkishore]

Good to see some kind of resolution coming through.

I too had similar experience with Airtel when they refused to give me a new connection without an active job! That sounded really funny to me, as they give me a 10k credit limit one of my other connection -

At the end of a 2 week battle with them, the nodal officer silver the issue. Call centre and especially the Airtel presence team were very pathetic.

Sometimes I just feel so bad that they don't learn anything with 200 million customers. We too are blocked by availability of choices :(-

[Samurai]

Americans have a saying. It ain't over until the fat lady sings. The reference goes back to the early days when all major events had a fat lady singing opera at the end of the event.

In case of my Airtel 3G saga, the fat lady simply refuses to sing.

Yesterday night I received another SMS for Airtel.



I said to myself, it is a rogue message, let me ignore it. And I did.

But today afternoon, I get a call from Airtel Customer Scare.

CC: Sir, I am calling you inform you that your zero rental plan is active.
Me: Ah! Nice to know, since when is it active?
CC: It is active from March 10th.
Me: Hmm, and is there a reason why you are informing me about it on June 25th?
CC: <confused> Err... we will check your account and call you back in 5 minutes.

That was 30 minutes ago, there has been no call.

Now, my programmer brain is thinking. Does this mean when they called me all these times with zero rental plan notification, they were only referring to the same March 10th change? May be their notification process is screwed and it keeps sending notice to call center to notify me about an old change?

[amit_2025]

Airtel has been sending Misleading Messages around 3G Usage to Customers.

The alerts similar to the ones mentioned in the post are sent considering usage in a calendar month, whereas according to Customer Service, usage quota is reset according to the billing cycle.

Have had numerous instances where services, packages have been activated without an approval and have discovered only months later. This is mainly done by DSA's trying to meet their targets.

Escalations to the Nodal Officer help more often than not.

[libranof1987]

Originally Posted by Samurai

Now, my programmer brain is thinking. Does this mean when they called me all these times with zero rental plan notification, they were only referring to the same March 10th change? May be their notification process is screwed and it keeps sending notice to call center to notify me about an old change?

Don't you really wish there was a reboot button you could just press and all this 3G billing mess with Airtel wouldn't have started in the first place?!

[Samurai]

Anyway, I finally got a call saying they were wrong. I am indeed on 450/- or 600MB plan. Then she started pushing me towards the 675/- (1.25GB) plan. I said why not, put me down for it.

The main difference is, the 450/- plan costs Rs.15/MB after crossing the limits, while Rs.675/- plan costs 10p/MB after crossing the limits.

Let us see whether they can really change it from 450/- plan to 675/- plan.

[vineetmanghani]

My Airtel bill came in today, and funnily enough, everything seems ok!

No overbilling on data, and my plan reflects as being changed back the Rs. 98 GPRS plan!

I guess this once I've been lucky with Airtel (hope I don't jinx it by saying it out loud!)

Phew...all the best Samurai!

[download2live]

Here is my story:
I wanted airtel broadband.
One guy comes and says that connection port is available. Collects a cheque of I think Rs 999. Then after few days comes and tells me that the port is not vacant and I can stop my cheque. I had learnt that one of my friends had a tough time getting money back. They spelled his name wrong in the cheque they gave him.

So i stopped the cheque. It cost me Rs 300 to do that.

Then I started getting bills for my broadband connection.

I called them and told them that not a single wire has been laid in my house. And then this bill?

I asked them to do the needful. I do not know what happened after that. The SMS came for one or two more month, then it stopped.

I was scared that they might put my name up in CIBIL. But later on after my loan got cleared I rested easy.

[Xryder]

On May 19th 2011, I called the Airtel Customer Care for activation of the 98.rs GPRS pack for my new android handset. Since the settings was not sent to my phone, I had received a message asking me to call the Customer care and enter the settings manually. I called and informed them the same. The person handling my call told me that a request has been taken to activate the GPRS pack. He then proceeded to give me the settings. Then told me once the call is cut, please restart the phone. I had done so and all was fine till a few days later, I noticed that at some point in the day i was getting the 3G sign on my handset instead of the regular E sign for GPRS which I normally get. I called the customer care and enquired about this. I was told that I was using the 3G 100.rs plan. I told them that I had asked for the regular GPRS 98.rs plan. The customer care executive said he will place another request for the same. So for about 5-6 days I was using 3G instead of what I had initially asked for. So by 22nd or 23rd May 2011, the 98.rs plan was activated.

Come June 2011, I recieve a bill for 42696.17rs, out of which 39228.70rs is for Value Added Services(VAS) for the 5-6 days. I have been an Airtel Customer since 2006. I have 2 postpaid connections, one primary number and one secondary number. The issue I am describing here happened on my secondary number. On seeing the bill I was shocked as I have a credit limit of only 13,000rs on my account for both numbers combined together.

Three points to note here :

01. Airtel activated 3G on a 20kb/30paise plan on my secondary number without my consent or request or knowledge. - This amounts to a fraud.

02. Airtel did not call and inform me that my usage exceeded way beyond the credit limit. - This makes sense since they have activated a service on my connection without my knowledge and would eventually get away with it by slapping me with a bill for 42696.17rs.

03. If my memory serves me right, never in the past 5 years has my bill gone above the credit limit. Moreover, my bills are mainly on the call charges and very little for the VAS. The only VAS I have used is a Hello Tune for 3 months and ofcourse the 98.rs GPRS pack which I have been using since the time it was offered.

I tried to get through to Airtel Customer Care and explain the situation to the customer care executive. First 12 attempts failed as each time he/she would put me on hold and then the call would get cut. Later, I would call up 121 again and explain the same story to somebody else.

Frustrated, I decide that the only way to get Airtel's attention is to initiate MNP. I send the message for MNP. And viola finally, on 23 June 2011, I got a call from Airtel representative asking why I initiated a MNP on this secondary number. Then I explained my problem and he made sure I received a service number for this particular complaint. I was told that by 29th June 2011, this issue would be resolved.

On 28th June 2011, I received a call from an Airtel Representative and she confirms that the VAS charges was indeed an error from their side and the appropriate action would be that they would revoke these charges and inform me the same by way of SMS.

On 30th June 2011, I receive a call from Airtel Customer care stating that my bill is due on 01st July 2011 and that I have not made the payments. I explain that I have a complain against the billing and that I was informed that I would not have to make the payments. Now, the story changes and I am informed that I have asked Airtel to activate 3G services on my secondary number. Then when i confronted them with the call details on 28th June 2011, the executive puts me on hold, then transfers the call to the floor manager. I explain the whole story to him again and finally he says that I have to make the payment as I have asked for this service on my secondary number.

I have the service request number which is 38125051. I have had enough of Airtel CC responses. Each time they change their stand and I, the loyal customer is left in the lurch to be cheated in broad daylight fraud.

Can somebody please shed some light on what to do next ?

[libranof1987]

Originally Posted by Xryder

Can somebody please shed some light on what to do next ?

Forget the CC. Email the Nodal Officer and Appellate Officer directly.

1) appellate.kk@airtel.in
+ 91 9972544865
+91 9945500121

2) nodalofficer.kk@airtel.in
+91 9972534865
+080 41218070

Go, get 'em tiger!

Sweet mails don't work btw; make your point loud and clear.