Mood:  vegas lucky

One day I bought two Airtel refil cards for Rs 455 each. This is just about a year ago. In those days I had a prepaid number which was so easy to recharge and was hassale-free as their ad says. About four years ago I had an Orange post-paid number. There was nothing called customer service with Orange in those days. I wonder how much has it changed since it got converted to Hutch. I was rudely stopped from using Orange services one day because they would not recognise the fact that I had paid my bills to their designated bank -- Punjab National Bank near my house. Though, I had been paying my bills at that bank branch for years. Even when I had faxed them the bill copy I had paid, and even agreed to send them photo copies of the bills Orange service center man rudely told me that the connection will be cut within 24 hours if the Rs 2,600 bill was not paid again.

I didn't wait. I immediately got a prepaid Airtel card because I heard from many of my friends that the service provider gets less opportunity to fleece you than with a postpaid card where you are beholden to the service provider. I also somehow suspect that because I had a very sought-after, easy to memorise phone number Orange was keen to sell that number to someone who would pay them well for it.

Well, with the pre-paid Airtel number things did work out as easy as their ads claim. It was hassle-free inasmuch as using the phone. And I really didn't care if I was being overbilled because the monthly outgo was affordable to me. It never was Rs 2,600. When you don't have any human contact,  services in India always look good. Only when you have to deal with the service provider officials things go sour. And I realised that when I bought the two Rs 455 refil cards.

I had bought the cards from a small four square feet shop which sells CDs and wrist watches near Mulund station. I took the two cards home and tried to refil my phone charge. A 'network problem' message flashed persistently. Then I waited till the next day to check if the network had eased to help me recharge. But to no avail. Finally I called up the service call center for lodging a complaint. The lady at the other end without holding her breath told me there is congestion problems since last two days and it will be resolved in about 20 minutes.

I knew she was lying so I took a reference number for the complaint. Expectedly, two days later the problem had not resolved. So I called up again. This time it was a male on the other end. I narrated my saga to him. He again gave me the congestion fiddlesticks. I growled at him and I gave him my earlier complaint reference number. He put me on music for nearly 15 minutes and finally came back to tell me that there was a 'unique' problem. The two refil cards of Rs 455 are not valid on my phone as I was their most favoured lifetime customer! Strange but it is true, as Freddie Mercury said.

So what do I do now, I asked him. He politely told me to go the nearest Airtel service center and give back the cards for reimbursement. I loved that attitude. So I trooped to the service center near Mulund station next morning. The lady (I guess companies employ girls for their glorified indifference to customers) as usual gave me the you-stupid-jerk look while she explained that they are not mandated to make any reimbursements to customers and that the call center guy is unlikely to have said so. Which essentially meant that I was lying.

She suggested that I go back to the dealer from whom I bought the card for reimbursement. I thought that was a stupid idea. It was already three days since I bought the refil cards, so the dealer would have forgotten any such customer. I did not have any bill to prove that I bought the two cards from him. And I suspected even he does not know about Rs 455 refills not working in lifetime numbers. Well, in any event I thought I will give it a try.

The dealer was non-comittal and made all the appropriate sympathetic noises for me. His logic was that once the cards are scratched it is impossible to sell them to another customer. I thought selling the same cards to another customer, that too with numbers exposed, is sacrilege. I presumed the dealer could give the two cards back to the company as they we're still unused and Airtel could check their veracity. The exchanges between us after that point are unprintable.

So I went back to Airtel service center for an explanation. What really riled me up was the fact that the refil cards never mentioned that it was not valid for lifetime customers. I asked the girl at the service centre the same question. She only had a disdainful shrug. To prove her point she called up the call centre 9892098920. After she ascertained if it was the policy to reimburse the money from exposed  cards mistakenly sold to lifetime customers she gave me the phone. The girl at the other end exasperatedly told me: "how can you even think of reimbursement from an exposed card?!" Hmmm... I didn't have the heart to tell her I am the courtesan not the customer. 

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Posted by Anil Nair at 6:05 PM

Updated: Sunday, 22 July 2007 6:38 PM

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