Vodafone India — unethical practices pertaining to international roaming package

Address:400095

I am writing to you to resolve my compliant request #[protected] which is open since Aug 2018. I have tried to resolve this issue through multiple modes of communication with numerous Vodafone representatives (Web Chat, In-Store managers, and Phone customer service), however it continues to be unresolved.

Each one of the Vodafone reps acknowledges that there is an issue, and will document the account to help back-office resolve my case. However each representative have stated that they don’t have much control in their hands to resolve my case. Till date I have not heard back from anyone from the Vodafone Back-office who is assigned to resolve my case. But I continue to get calls from the billing dept asking me to pay the unresolved amount. The billing department has no notes regarding my open compliant and I have to explain the entire case over and over to each person who calls me from Vodafone, only to hear in the end that they can’t do much as the case is with someone in Back-office.

When I visited the branch, the in-store supervisor mentioned that there were no notes on the account and had to pretty much document my case from the start. Even Surendra – Supervisor from Malad Link Road Vodafone Store said he will do his best to document the account, however he does not have control over the case as it goes to Back-Office. He too acknowledged that there is an error and assured me this issue will get resolved if we give all details in the account notes to back-office.

Till date there is no resolution and I am afraid Vodafone has become so big, that customer complaints go unattended in a black hole; genuine issues and concerns are ignored and unethical practices continue without one department knowing what the other does. I am also afraid that this carelessness on part of Vodafone will play absolutely no impact on the giant organization, but adversely impact my credit which will have a greater impact on my livelihood – without no fault of mine.

This is my last attempt trying to resolve my case. If post this email my case is unresolved, I have exhausted all possible methods and will report the unethical practices to the Consumer Court.

Below you will find key point pertaining to my complaint #[protected]:
- Phone # [protected], registered email address: Doreena.[protected]@gmail.com
- Compliant Request #[protected] opened on Aug, 12th 2018.
- Compliant regarding International Roaming package continued beyond the dates requested by me, without my authorization, approval, consent or knowledge.
- I requested International Roaming using Vodafone Mobile App on July 30th, for effective dates August 1st 2018 to August 10th 2018, from the airport. Countries selected is United States. I was to land back in the India on Aug 11th. International Roaming (IR) Package selected was for Rs.3500, details mentioned this included unlimited calling, data and all fees for 10 days. I read all fine print from the IR3500 package, and no-where it stated Auto-Renewal, Additional fees for international roaming and data.
- When I check my bill online, I see an amount of Rs.4895.85 which included additional fees for this package and GST. Confused with the amount, I did a web-chat with a Vodafone Rep on Aug 12th, asking to explain the charges. Normally my bill does not exceed Rs800, with Rs.3500 additional for IR package, I expected my bill to not exceed Rs.4300. When the web-chat lady explained the additional amount was GST and Rs.149 International Roaming fee, I didn’t want the hassle of arguing, and agreed to pay Rs.4895.82 on 13/08/2018 as per the Aug bill. This lady whom I chatted with on Aug 12th, did not mention even once that this package is auto-renewed and my IR package is still active.
- After I paid my bill on Aug 13th, I noticed my bill was now Rs.10, 000 on Vodafone online. Surprised with the amount, I chatted with another Vodafone rep on Aug 21st. When she explained the IR charges, I told her that I had already paid for the International Roaming on Aug 13th and my bill is not reflecting my recent payment made. She still did not mention this was an additional amount as my IR was still active, and I was getting charged being in India. She assured me that the bill is incorrect and will take my complaint service Request #[protected]. However when I go back online to check the status of my complaint, she documented my request as “Complaint on Self Service Application” and closed it. This is outright unethical as my compliant was pertaining Billing and charging me for something I had already paid. I request you to retrieve the web-chat records to validate what I had requested a compliant for. I will also subpoena these records in court as this is a second evidence o[censored]nethical practices.
- Frustrated with phone and web representatives, I decided to go to an in-store Vodafone branch on Sep 12th and met Supervisor Surendra in person at the Malad west - Link road Vodafone Store. He too agreed that my plan was auto-renewed, and the dates were not accurately accepted by the back-end. He said he will add additional notes in the system to help the Back-office person resolve my case. However this case was also closed without any communications, or reason, or understanding of the case.
- Another case #[protected] was opened with an attempt to provide details notes, as the previous reps did not provide accurate data, and help me. The In-Store reps and managers were also getting helpless as there is no means to speak with someone in the back-office to help them understand the issue and help resolve this case.
- My account has IR auto renewed, however somehow the Rs.3500 package was deactivated and I was charged Standard roaming charges for data, when I am back in India.
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Vodafone India customer support has been notified about the posted complaint.
Oct 17, 2018
Updated by Doreena Mascarenhas
I got a reply from Vodafone acknowledging that my International Roaming was deactivated on Aug 10th, however the Standard roaming was kept active on my account. While I was in transit from one country (USA) to another (China), I used the internet for 3 minutes (Airport Provided internet), for which they say - they were the service providers and are justified to charge me Rs. 10, 292.78 for internet data used for 3 minutes in China.

This statement further validates the unethical business practices embarked by Vodafone.
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