[Resolved]  Airtel — MNP - Another Experience of Pathetic Customer Service (even for corporate customers)

This post is on my recent experience with Airtel customer service when I requested for porting my mobile number to Airtel.

I have a postpaid CUG connection from Tata Docomo (it was originally Airtel, but was ported to Docomo 6 months back). I had requested to port my number to Airtel Postpaid CUG and I came across another poor customer service experience in the process of requesting the MNP. The customer care team of Airtel is just too lazy and careless, who do not care even if they lose customers and never try to solve the issues, rather they try to avoid issues and give stupid excuses. Here is what happened since I gave the porting request on 6th September.

1. On 6th September 2013, I submitted my porting request form with the necessary supporting documents to the Airtel agents sitting in our IBM corporate campus in EGL campus, Bangalore. After 3-4 days, I followed up with the agent asking my status. I got to know that my form was rejected because they had some issue with initiating porting of my number in their database. The issue was that my number was originally Airtel and was ported to Docomo about 6 months back, so the number was somehow blocked in Airtel database. That looked like a technical issue that the Airtel back-end team should be able to resolve. However instead of resolving the issue, they returned my application and asked me to contact a retail outlet outside the corporate office. That was first FAILURE of customer service from Airtel.

2. I agreed to the suggestion from the Airtel agent and went to an Airtel Relationship Center in Indiranagar, Bangalore. There I came to know that I can not convert my current Docomo CUG directly to Airtel CUG (don't know if that is really true, but I was told this). So I had to apply for a normal postpaid plan for porting. I submitted a new form with the required documents. I also paid my current unbilled amount in advance. After 3-4 days, upon not seeing any status in mnpindia.in website I called up the ARC agent to check the status. Then I came to know that they were having some issue with my number and they were unable to initiate my porting request. I was advised to call up 121 customer care. I called up the customer care but didn't get any help. Rather I was told to write to [protected]@in.airtel.com. SECOND FAILURE.

3. I wrote to 121 customer care on 14th September 2013 with all the issue details. I got a reply the very next day asking for some details regarding the porting request like UPC code, ARC address etc. I provided all details hoping a positive action from customer care. However to my disappointment again, no action was taken from Airtel, rather I was just asked to wait for 7 working days after the application . I replied back on that indicating I was writing to them because the ARC was unable to initiate the porting request and they need some help. However, I got the same response... wait for 7 days. THIRD FAILURE.

4. After waiting for 7 days, I wrote back on 20th September asking for any status. I got a response that they were not able to find any history for my number and I need to contact the ARC.

So at the end, I am back to square one. The same cycle repeats itself. No action from anyone, only waste of time. I don't understand that even a private organization like Airtel who is such a big brand by itself has this pathetic customer service, what should I expect from the government organizations. This is pity that Airtel is not even prompt enough to take any action even to get a new customer.

As of 22nd September 2013 - No status change, I am still with the old service provider.