New Delhi, Feb 06: A consumer court has directed Reliance Infocomm to pay Rs 20,000 for its callous attitude towards a consumer who was not provided with a connection even after months of payment. North District Consumer Forum also directed the company to return Rs 3,000 taken as advance and pay Rs 1,000 as cost of litigation to Dinesh Kumar who was not allowed to talk to higher officials despite repeated requests.
The forum asked the complainant to call the customer care centre during the hearing and noted with concern the fact that he was not connected to the CEO and his call was disconnected after he repeated his request.
''After receiving the amount they become unapproachable. They have started behaving like god and make themselves unapproachable,'' the forum said, adding there was no personal telephone number in any advertisement and at the place of address it is always ''www.dot.com.''
The complainant had paid an advance of Rs 3,000 January 30 last year and had also given 12 post dated cheques of Rs 1,800 each in favour of Reliance Industries Ltd. He alleged that he was promised a connection by February 08. After he did not get a handset despite repeated requests before dealers, he asked his bankers to stop payment of the post dated cheques.
Later when he approached the company, he was asked to approach the dealers. The company further refused to entertain any written complaint in this regard, he alleged.
The company, however, said that there was no promise to give the handset by any stipulated time. The company had made it clear that it was to be provided on first come first serve basis. Bureau Report