Vi (formerly Vodafone Idea) has been ordered by the Gujarat State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission to pay a compensation of Rs 50,000 to a customer for disconnecting and blacklisting his number for allegedly using the number for telemarketing without registration. . According to a report in Times of India, Vi said that the user was perceived to be harassing other customers.
According to the report, a user named Nirmalkumar Mistry of Surat received a message from his telecom provider.Sixth) in October 2014, stating that the company had received complaints about a user sending unregistered telemarketing messages and calls. Because of this the telecom provider disconnected Mistry’s number. Mistry later got a new SIM card from another store, but could not get his phone number back.
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Mistry has sent a legal notice to the company. He said the user was using the number for unregistered telemarketing activities but was only able to furnish a number to establish that complaints have been submitted, the TOI report said.
After this he approached the Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission Forum of Surat against this move. Mistry said he is a software developer and does not work as a telemarketer. He said that when the number was blocked, he had lost Rs 3,50,000 in his business and it should be compensated. However, the Forum dismissed the complaint in 2016 and accepted Vi’s defense that Mistry’s number operated as an unregistered telemarketing service. The telecom provider also said that since Mistry was registered as a telemarketer, he cannot be treated as a customer under the Consumer Protection Act.
Mistry then moved the state commission, and his counsel pointed out that under TRAI’s rules, a customer’s complaint must be filed with the Provider Consumer Preference Register (PCPR), which was not done in Mistry’s case. Further, reports suggest that the customer who complained about Mistry’s number, had “Do Not Disturb” activated on his phone. Therefore, the counsel said, the company had no reason to block the number of its client. This convinced the state commission. Which ordered Vi to pay Rs 50,000 as compensation along with 7 percent interest.
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