The Mumbai District Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission (Central Mumbai) recently directed Vodafone Idea (Vi) to pay Rs 50,000 in compensation to an elderly citizen. The reason cited for this was mental harassment, disruption of connection of his mobile services and not letting him use an international roaming pack data service. The order was passed on Monday, in which the commission held the service provider guilty of deficiency in service, causing the elderly man inconvenience, financial loss and mental agony to the consumer. The Mumbai elderly resident had opted for Vodafone Idea’s international roaming pack (I-RoamFree) for 28 days, from May 2, 2019. The plan offered unlimited calls and 5.2 GB of data. The complainant began using the plan during his trip to Kenya and used up to 75 percent of the data. He then visited Victoria Falls in Zimbabwe, where he used his data assuming that the region was included in the pack. He claimed to have not received any notification or warning from the company regarding the same. After consuming about 124 MB of data, his mobile service was stopped without any prior intimation. The company then charged him a fee of Rs 72,419.
After returning from Kenya, he requested the company to restore his services and use the remaining data. But the company rejected his request and instead asked him to pay about Rs 60,000 to restore his services. The complainant decided to seek help from the customer relationship cell, nodal officers, and the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI), but did not get any response. His service was down for 40 days and the complainant was compelled to pay the bill of Rs 86,290, including GST.
He lodged a complaint alleging wrongful loss due to service deficiency on the part of Vodafone Idea and accused the company of illegally disconnecting the network services. The service provider countered that the customer was aware of their services being provided in just 77 countries in the discounted rate plan. Since Zimbabwe was not listed, the complainant was billed at the standard rate.
The commission found that the elderly complainant was entitled to avail the benefit of the I-RoamFree Pack after his return to Kenya, which he had availed for Rs 5,999 for 28 days and had not fully exhausted the data. It stated, “We hold that the opposite party was deficient in the service to the extent of not informing the complainant in advance about the applicable roaming charges, arbitrarily letting him use the roaming services up to Rs 72,419, forcing him to clear the same and disconnecting his services abruptly and not restoring it even at Kenya.” The service provider had to pay Rs 50,000 and additional Rs 10,000 for the cost of filing the complaint.
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