[Resolved]  Airtel — PREPAID CONNECTION HARASSMENT

Hi...

This is Raja Mukherjee working with Murugappa Group, Chennai.

I was earlier working in Mumbai and have shifted to Chennai some months’ back. As I had already been provided a corporate Airtel connection from my employer, I decided to go in for a pre paid Airtel connection for my wife. It turned out that journey of achieving stability with prepaid number was a dream which would never see its day.

Here is how the entire fiasco unraveled...

Prepaid number: [protected] was obtained on Nov 07 from a mobile agency shop after providing passport (for id proof and permanent residence proof) and rental agreement (for present residence proof). The connection was on full swing until one day the mobile showed "SIM CARD REGISTRATION FAILED". Calling the customer care was of no help because they said that nearest Airtel outlet would do the needful. I visited the nearest Airtel outlet “X SQUARE COMMUNICATION” in Parrys’, Chennai only to find out that connection could not be reinstated because the lines were permanently disabled due to failure of address verification process. I thus lost my entire balance amount and the booster pack amount from my earlier connection.

Nevertheless I went for another prepaid connection bearing number: [protected] from the Airtel outlet, after paying all the charges for the new prepaid number. I submitted the same documents – Passport and Rental Agreement and repeatedly verified from Airtel executives in the Airtel outlet whether the documents would be sufficient for the connection. The Airtel executives (especially one person by the name of Mr. Muthu from X SQUARE COMMUNICATION) assured me that this time round, since I have taken the connection from Airtel outlet, there would be no problems. But again in Mar 08 the line was disconnected and the same message was displayed on the screen “SIM CARD REGISTRATION FAILED”. Again I lost my entire balance amount, booster pack amount and also the initial charges for the new connection. Under these circumstances, I would like to know:

- Why the line is disconnected without prior warning?
- When I am receiving all the correspondence in the present address including the bank statements what really goes wrong in the address verification process?
- While address verification process turns out to be positive for all other cases what goes wrong with Airtel? Is address verification ever done at all?
- Why don’t Airtel people call the person and verify over the phone?
- Is there some kind of strict regulation enforced by TRAI? If yes, why is it not shared with end users? Are the Airtel employees manning the outlet ignorant about new TRAI rules or are they feigning ignorance and busy ticking cash registers and in the process taking end users for a ride?

At the end it is the customer who is harassed like anything and nobody is held responsible.


Please enlighten as to what is really the cause of all this? Who is really responsible?

Regards
Raja Mukherjee