[Resolved]  Vodafone — Dishonouring bonus recharge

Dear Sir/Madam,

I am the owner of a pre-paid account of Vodafone and my cell number is [protected]. I reside in Kolkata, West Bengal. I am using this number for the last one year.

On Nov 26, 2009 I had recharged my account with Rs.63 in order to avail the 1 paisa per second call charges (Transaction Id: KO[protected]). On Dec 02, 2009 I had received an SMS informing: "Your validity expires in 3days. Recharge with Rs.47 get LIFELONG VALIDITY. Use any Vodafone Bonus Card to reduce call rates. Recharge Now!" I had finally recharged my account on Dec 05, 2009 by paying Rs.47. However, to my utter surprise I found that calls made thereafter from my mobile number to another Vodafone number charged me at Rs.0.49 paise/min. Which indicated that my earlier Vodafone Bonus Card recharge of Rs.63 became inactive.

Immediately, I had called the Vodafone help desk and reported the incident. The initial representitive tried to convince me by saying that in order to avail the 1paise/sec call charges, I have to recharge again by paying Rs.63. On my insistance to speak to the higher authority of Vodafone, he had transferred the call to one Mr. Soumya who again did the same thing. However, he had added a new idea which was to credit my account balance with Rs.63 talk value and asked me to recharge with Rs.63 on top of that in order to enjoy the 1paisa/sec facility. All I wanted was an explanation from him regarding deactivation of my earlier recharge of Rs. 63 within a span of 9 days without any prior intimation. To my utter dismay, Mr. Soumya said: "it is not possible" and it was also suggested by the Vodafone agent that I should have checked this with the Vodafone people before validating my account.

I am an employee of Wipro Ltd and I own another Vodafone post paid corporate account for about 5 years. The experience that I had today (Dec 05, 2009) with the pre-paid account clearly implies that Vodafone is "robbing" it's customers with their attractive and confusing plans. It is not a question of spending Rs.63 but it is a great concern for all such pre-paid cosumers of Vodafone like me to unnecessarily spend Rs.63 within a short span of time just because they had renewed their account with a lifetime validity of Rs.47.

I am highly dissatisfied with the service and policy of Vodafone and would sincerely lookforward to a favourable, remarkable and immediate action from your end which also needs to be highlighted before the public for their benefit so that these cellular operators think twice in future before playing with their policies.

You may contact me at: rajkumar.[protected]@gmail.com

With best regards,
Raj Kumar Mukherji.