Airtel
Incorrectly high billing owing to GPRS usage under Rs.98 1GB plan without intimation of data usage or exhaustion of data

I have used mobile internet packs of Rs.98 on prepaid numbers but this is the first time I used it on a postpaid number. I activated mobile internet pack of Rs.98 (1 GB plan valid for 1 month) on my post-paid airtel number 9911002349 on 16th December. My usual usage for a month comes to around Rs.300. I received message a couple of days later that my bill excluding discount is Rs.1200. Shocked and unaware of such billing practice in postpaid connection, I checked with customer care who replied that at the month end the entire data pack offer of Rs.98 would get adjusted against the huge amount and I would get the usual billed amount similar to previous months. I enquired how would the customer get to know his data usage to which the customer service exec confirmed that there is no way to check data usage. However, after 80% usage customer gets a message that 80% of the data under the plan has been used. Data is billed at 10P/10Kb and discount/plans are adjusted at end of monthly billing cycle. Thus, at the rate of 10P/10Kb I had already used 100MB.

For my own precaution, I downloaded and used a data usage monitor app. Subsequently, I have been getting message of my daily bill (excl. discount) reaching Rs.3000, Rs.4000 and as of today its Rs.5466 (dt.25/12) which equates to approx.500-550MB of data. Suddenly, yesterday my internet stopped working. I checked with Customer Care and they informed that my bill is currently Rs.2000 including discount, as I have exceeded my data usage. Due to high bill, my internet service has been suspended. My data usage app shows data usage no more than 400-500 MB (since I downloaded the app a couple of days after I activated the data pack, exact figure is not ascertainable). My problems are:

1) The unusually high billing of Rs.2000 without intimation that I am exceeding my 1 GB plan.

2) Under no circumstances I could have exhausted 1 GB. The bill of Rs.5466 with data usage billed at 10P/10Kb itself shows the data usage in the range of 0.5 GB only.

3) I was told by customer care that unless I pay Rs. my GPRS service would remain suspended. Neither have I received intimation of 80% usage nor that I have exhausted the entire 1 GB under the plan. How am I supposed to know that my current plan is expired and that its time to buy a new one?

4) It is unusual that there is no way customer can check his data usage. I have experienced Vodafone GPRS service a year back and even back then, customer was able to know his exact data usage and balance data left under the plan.

Company: Airtel
Country: India
State: Delhi

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