Airtel Mobile Service
Poor customer service

An Open letter to MR Ajay Arya.

Aashish Lohia

Block-N 580

New ALipore

Kolkata 53

Dear Mr Arya,

Greetings from my side.

This airtel no is under my proud possession since the year 2002. It was a post paid number till when sometime in september i got it converted into prepaid as i was leaving for new zealand to pursue my higher studies. Finally i got it converted to post paid again some month and a half back.

Inspite of the fact that i am now again a post paid consumer i keep on getting offers meant for pre-paid customers through sms. To odd to my woes i cant contact the customer care from my no. Everytime i try to contact them after the first 10 secs or so the line gets disconnected. Inspite of sending my office staff to new alipore relationship office, nothing has been done in this regard.

On 6th of this month i received a call from your billing officer in delhi and was requested to clear my dues before the due date to avoid barring of outgoing calls. On being questioned, he informed me that since i have already exhausted the credit limit of 1500 (which is too less anyways) i have to clear the dues of 2035 out of which Rs 1667.64 was billed amount and the remaining unbilled amount. I told him that i will be clearing only the billed amount as of now on the 7th through a current dated cheque to be deposited at the airtel relationship officr at new alipore. He requested me to kindly get the payment details updated for the record and made it clear that the outgoing services wont be barred. The following day ie on the 7th when i send my office staff to do the needful he was told by the relation officer just to drop the cheque in the drop box. When he requested him to kindly update the system with the details, he refused to budge. He was too aarogant and indifferent and told him that he wont do the same as it is not required. Furthermore the sytem will be updated automatically and the outgoing services wont be barred. Seeing his arrogane and reluctance, my office staff had no other option but to come back. The very same day in d evening the outgoing services were barred.

My misery didnt end there. I send a mail to your nodal officer on the 9th but even he didnt reply. Then on the 10th ie today i called up airtel customer care from my dad's no ie 983110770. I explained the customer care representative the entire situation. Instead of re-activating my outgoing services he was like we will get back to you in about 4 hrs time after having a word with our relationship office and then we will let you know when the outgoing services will be activated. He even added that it may take even a week or two for the services to be activated.

This is completely shocking for me. I have faced this kind of problem previously also but the kind of support i got from airtel was awesome. On just informing the customer care executive with cheque details the outgoing services used to get re-instated within 2 hrs. Probably this is what you get after 7 yrs of loyaltly in a time when people change thier no on the fly.

This is not the right way to treat a customer. Whats the point of showing that airtel cares for its customers when actually the officers function according to thier own will. All my efforts have gone in wain and i have just wasted my time. Just by advertising your company as a "people's company" doesnt make it one. I am appaled at the customer service and probably this is worse than state run BSNL. A company such as airtel which is probaly the largest and one of the respected companies in service industry should filter the quality of people they hire. Just by hiring any tom dick and harry and making him wear your blue jersey doent make him a good officer. I dont want to say much on this regard as you guys are very well aware about the quality of your staff.

Right now i feel like a fool for sticking to your company and not migrating to vodafone. At least their quality of sevice is at par with the serrvice they provide internationally. I dont have any words to describe my frustation about the whole situation. This is not expected from a company like airtel.

I hope that atleast you will look into the matter and solve this problem at the earliest.

Many Thanks,

Aashish

Company: Airtel Mobile Service
Country: India

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