[Resolved]  Airtel / Postpaid Service — Need Help on Portability Trauma

Address:

Gandhinagar, Gujarat

Hi,

My name is Saurav Dev Burman and I live in Gandhinagar Gujarat, and need help/guidance as to how I can take action against my current service provider Airtel for not letting me move to other service provider by always giving me one or the other ridiculous reasons for the rejection of porting out my number.

Since, January 2010 every month I used to call up customer care to complain for their terrible network service; however, till date there is no solution to it and every time when I call them up their CCE says, they had taken my feedback and will forward it and I will get a call after resolution and I am waiting for it since last 14 months.

After MNP was launched, on 24 or 25th Jan. 2011 I opted to port out from Airtel to TATA Docomo and all the verification process was successfully completed by TATA; however, Airtel rejected my porting request mentioning the reason as "Contractual Obligations". When, I called Customer Care they asked me, "Was there any fraud case or any legal action/case filed against you?" I was just shocked to hear this, I told that guy to think before he speaks to me. I told him that; if I am that kind of person then how come Airtel gives me credit limit of 12,500K per month? In more than two and half years, I have always paid my bill well in advance and that too more than the actual bill... I have even paid 10K to 11K in just a month and this is (tag of fraud) what I am get in return for being a good customer.

Later fighting with them for 3-4 days for hours and waisting my money for calling customer care (121) they asked me to apply for port out once again. Again I had to go through the process and this time as well all the verification process was completed successfully by TATA Docomo; however, after 4-5 days (last Friday) I received a msg from Airtel saying, my porting request has been rejected coz o[censored]npaid bill. I called up customer care and told them, that my bill was of Rs. 232/- and I have paid Rs. 400/- and other bill was Rs. 64/- and one hour back I paid Rs. 100/-. Although I want to move out of Airtel, still I am paying more than my actual bill and you are saying I have unpaid bill although everything is clear before due date?

I had to argue with them for 45 odd mins and later they asked me to go to Airtel relationship centre (at Palanpur) where I had paid the bill and the relationship centre guy told me that as Airtel server was down, so could not update your payment request, will be done in 24 hours and he again requested me to apply for port out.

For the third time, I applied for porting of my number but again it was rejected this time saying that my number is vanity number and I have to pay some charges to Airtel before I move to other service provider. I told them, that I have got this as a pre-paid number from one of the shop that too without paying anything as the shopkeeper asked me to recharge it with Rs. 100/- for some kind of scheme 4 years back... at this Customer care said that as your number is now post paid... it has become vanity number and you have to pay the charges to port out or else you cannot move out of Airtel.

They guided me to Airtel Relationship Centre at Gandhinagar and after waisting my time there for one and half hours... all the employees there said that your accounts seems to be okay and there is nothing pending from your end and we too are not aware as to what is the process for porting out Vanity number and why Airtel is rejecting your request to port out? They even called up their managers and back office team... however, no one was aware about this and no one could help me out.....

When, I called up customer care (198 for complain) and asked them why they are charging me for providing vanity number after 4 years... they said you have got discount when you got this number and we want that discount back .... however; I told them that, I have never got any kind of discount from Airtel when I got the card...

Also, if this is Vanity number then you must have charged it to the shopkeeper and now you are charging me again? And, if you had given this number for free to the shopkeeper, then you need to ask him for the payment... why you are asking me...?? As, I have not purchased this card directly from you nor you had sold me this card?

Hope for your help, support and guidance.

Thank you,
Saurav