[Resolved]  Zoom Car — serious accident due to negligence by zoomcar

Address:

Zoomcar, 7th Floor, Tower-B, Diamond District, 150, HAL Airport Road, Kodihalli, Bangalore-560008, Bangalore, Karnataka

My name is manu paruthi. I want to narrate to you a series of incidents and then seek advice/ redressal to my grievances.

I booked a self-drive car for self and family through zoomcar at hyderabad. One of the reasons for taking this option was that my wife had a mild sprain in the lower back and we didn’t want to get into the hassle of booking cabs and the waiting involved while we were at hyderabad. The details of the booking are as under:

Vehicle: i20
Pick-up location: terminal-1, rgi airport arrivals ramp, hyderabad airport
Begins at: 25/10/19 03:30 pm
Ends at: 26/10/19 06:00 pm
Reservation id: jps6xnqff

Estimated cost: rs. 2804
Refundable deposit: rs. 3000
Deposit is fully paid.

The problems began right from the time our aircraft landed at shamshabad airport, hyderabad. I enumerate the sequence of events as under:-

1. As soon as we landed at hyderabad, i tried calling the given cell number. After a series of no replies, someone (Your fleet executive) finally picked up the phone. I was expecting that they’d bring the car at the ‘arrivals ramp’ as promised. However, i was surprised when i was told that we would now find the car parked in parking c-10.

2. As i’ve shared, my wife had a mild pain in the back and instead of finding the car at the arrivals ramp, we had to walk a rather long distance to where the car was parked, which was inconvenient and unexpected.

3. On reaching the car, we were again surprised to see no one to hand over the car. The use of face-less technology is good... But when you are being handed over an asset such as a car, one appreciates human interaction. Especially when one sees the pathetic condition of the car and realises that:
(A) the car is extremely unkempt, dirty and dusty both from outside and within.

(B) the hatch of the boot could not be opened with the remote provided in the car key. Finally, we figured that there was a loosely hanging electronic switch on the hatch, which after a number of attempts finally opened the hatch manually, so we could place our luggage in the boot.
(C) moreover, there was a rumbling noise from the front of the car as soon as i tried to reverse it out of the parking lot.

4. Anyway, after a series of missed calls later the fleet executive again picked up the call. On being explained to him the condition of the car, he finally declared that, it was the only car available at the moment and nothing much could be done about it. We had very little time in hyderabad and a lot of things to do; we had already made the payment to zoomcar for the entire trip; we were far away to consider any other option; my wife was in pain. Considering all this we decided to take the unexpected imperfections in our stride and we decided to let it all go and we just wanted to begin our journey at the earliest.

5. A very bumpy journey. Literally. So, what sounded as a mild noise and rumble from the front of the car as i initially reversed it out of the parking lot, turned out to be a constant.in addition, it gave a constant jerky motion. My diagnosis was that possibly the rim of the front tyres was bent that was causing the noise and bumpy ride. It was surprising that a car from a company as big as zoomcar had issues with road-worthiness right at the start of a ride.

6. Fast forwarding our uncomfortable, bumpy ride (Which had by now already aggravated my wife’s back-pain) to about 7:45 pm. We were at the nehru outer ring road (An express way where the speed limit is 100 kmph). Travelling at about 85-90 kmph the noise and the jerkiness suddenly increased. Suddenly, there was a very strong jerk... Almost simultaneously, my elder son (Sitting right behind me) and i saw a very strange sight. We saw a wheel speeding ahead to our right and bouncing off across the median to the other side of the expressway and vanishing into darkness. It took me no time to realise that this was a wheel from our car.

7. The car was suddenly out of control. It began to swerve wildly... To the extent that there was a risk of it being banged from behind by oncoming fast vehicles. With the grace of god, i could keep my presence of mind. I gradually got the control back and brought the car to a complete halt almost 300-350 metres later. As expected, my first impulse was to check with my family if they were fine and unhurt. Unfortunately, the impact of the sudden jerk had a very bad effect on my wife’s back. And she was in severe pain. We got down and saw the wheel missing on the front right side. I realised how serious an accident could have taken place and how lucky we were to be alive to tell the tale.

8. And now began the ordeal of getting through to zoomcar’s “helpline”. (Which was also the reason; my family and i now refer to the company, ‘doom car’). Firstly, their ivr needs a serious re-look. Not only is it unnecessarily complicated, it also doesn’t function correctly. For instance, you are expected to ‘press 2’ for accidents/ breakdowns.in this option, when you finally try to key in the ‘last 4’ digits of the registered number of the car (In this case 4908 from the registered number ts07 uf 4908), the ivr says, ‘sorry, please enter the correct number’.

9. So after a number of failed trials and errors, i was finally able to get through a human voice (After i erroneously pressed 6, for something else). That human voice and subsequently many others at zoom car later that night, did not help and in fact caused further misery and confusion. The details of the individuals i spoke to are as under:-

(A) zoomcar’s fleet executive at hyderabad.
(B) junaid ahmed through the ivr.
(C) naveen raj through the ivr.
(D) indranil through the ivr.

10. The gist of the conversation with these people was as under:-

(A) they termed it as an accident for which i was responsible.

(B) i was asked to first upload images of the damage caused before they would even consider my urgent request for clearing the vehicle off a very fast expressway, (Please appreciate that it was dark with no overhead lighting and an in spite of the fact that i had switched on the hazard lights on the car, there were many instances when speeding vehicles saw the car at the last moment, screeched and barely averted another serious accident).

(C) i was advised that since it was an ‘accident’, some ‘formalities’ will need to be taken care of first, which included a kind of a clearance from the civil police. I was also cautioned that the responsibility of getting the car towed to the nearest police station would be mine.

(D) i was informed there would be no replacement vehicle.

(E) i was also advised to keep calm. This, when i had informed them a number of times that my wife was in severe pain; that we were stranded in the middle of nowhere on an expressway, where the risk of speeding vehicles ramming into a static vehicle was extremely high; that the car’s road-worthiness was circumspect right from the beginning; and that this was a serious and obvious case of negligence which could have cost my family and me our lives.

(F) after i uploaded the pictures of the wheel-less front right axle, the people at zoomcar seemed convinced that this seemed a case where no police involvement was warranted. And finally, at about 10:30 pm they initiated the process of getting the car cleared by something called the rsa (Road side assistance, i later learnt). This turned out to be another series o[censored]npleasant calls and false promises, where i was constantly assured that someone would get back to me about getting the car towed to the nearest convenient spot within the ‘next 15 minutes’. These minutes didn’t happen till about 11:50 pm.

(G) i was also instructed by the zoom car people, that as soon as the rsa people arrived and did their job, i could hand over the car key to them and that would be taken as the end of my trip. (Just to let you know, no one arrived from the rsa that night. They finally turned up only at about 9:00 am the next morning).

11. Meanwhile, apart from the fact that my family and myself were still alive, there was another good thing that happened. The highway patrol and their road-clearance team did an amazing job. Finally it was them, who towed the car to the next nearest exit (Exit no) 6 on the nehru outer ring road. They charged us a minimal rs 1500/- for the job, but their presence was re-assuring and in stark contrast to the apathy and ineffectiveness of team zoom car.

12. It was almost midnight by now. My wife was in severe pain; all o[censored]s were tired and sick of the way we had been and continued to be treated by team zoom car. It was then, that i finally asked your the people at zoomcar that i was leaving the car key inside the car, just as the car had been handed over to me and they could lock it remotely. Thankfully, i did not pay heed to the instructions from their team where they wanted me to wait for the arrival of the rsa team to hand over the keys (In which case, i would have been waiting at exit no 6 till 9 am the next morning).

13. And now, comes the strangest and sickest grand finale from team zoomcar. As soon as i reached back from hyderabad, i received a text message informing me that there were balance dues of rs 7000/- that i should pay at earliest. These were on account of ‘damages’ that have not been listed.

14. Ma’m/ sir, i want to put the following for your consideration:

(A) the car was not available at the designated place. This cause inconvenience to us as a family and aggravated my wife’s back pain.

(B) the aesthetic and mechanical condition of the car was not at all up to the mark.in fact its non-existent road-worthiness resulted in a serious accident just after 4 hours of driving.

(C) the accident resulted due to a clear case of negligence on zoom car’s part, where in the mechanical robustness and road-worthiness of the car was circumspect right from the time our trip commenced.

(D) my family and me could have died or got seriously injured in the accident.

(E) my wife’s back pain got severely aggravated because of the accident.

(F) no assistance was given to me by zoom car in moving the car away from a very speedy and active expressway (With a definite potential of causing another serious accident), to the next nearest exit (Exit no 6).in fact i personally had to pay rs 1500/- to the highway patrol road clearance team, for getting the car towed till the said exit.

(G) the mental harassment and agony caused by team zoom car to my family and me for the entire duration of almost 5 hours just after we had miraculously survived a very serious accident, can only be felt and is beyond any form of compensation.

(H) i feel that the following is the least zoom car can now do, instead of asking me to pay rs 7000/- :-

(I) the trip did not go as per plan, for no fault of my family or me. Consequently, the entire, money (Rs 5, 804/-) charged to me thus far be refunded.

(Ii) zoom car needs to pay me rs 1500/- for getting its car cleared from the expressway on their behalf to the nearest safe spot (Exit no 6).

(Iii) zoom car should seriously consider compensating me for all the cabs/ personal arrangements i had to make for commuting within hyderabad right from the time i released their car on 25 oct 19, till i reached hyderabad airport at 6:00pm on 26 oct 19.

(Iv) zoom car needs to carry out a thorough investigation of how a car that was not road-worthy was allowed to be offered to me for the pre-booked trip. Further, the action taken against the people responsible for the negligence be shared with me for my knowledge.

(V) zoom car needs to take an immediate re-look at their customer care mechanism...in that instead of prioritising to find faults with the customer, they should try to solve issues swiftly and effectively.

(V) zoom car should acknowledge the hard fact, that their negligence could have caused my family and me our lives. Also, that their acts of omissions/ commissions in this case have been the cause of serious aggravation in my wife’s back-pain.

15. I uploaded my complaint on the feedback option on zoomcar's website on 28 oct 19. On getting no response, i visited their corporate office at bangalore and handed over a hard copy of my complaint on 31 oct 19. I still haven't heard from zoomcar so far.

16. I am looking forward to a positive and prompt response from your end.

Warm regards,
Manu paruthi.