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Is your bill right?

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CIOL Bureau
New Update

Binu Alex



AHMEDABAD: Many wonder why BSNL continues to register upward growth in its segment even with the advent of private players like Reliance Infocomm and Tata Indicom. The answer that many users of these services give is ‘trust.’



"We are used to the babudom of BSNL and though we don’t get sweet voices and sugar coated replies from BSNL, our work is done," asserted a former Tata Indicom subscriber Rajesh Shah.



Shah cancelled his Tata Indicom fixed wireless long back after the Tata’s failed to keep its promise of providing Internet through its fixed wireless. Though it has now started the service, the answer that he got from a customer service executive was a flat no when he enquired to confirm the commitment that the franchisee has given him. But Shah continues to get zero payment bills of his cancelled service even today.



"I took Reliance instead and to my surprise, I found that their call center services and their web world stores are nothing more than a glorified fish market," he said. Agreed CMD of Growth Compusoft Exports Ltd SN Khemka. He had subscribed to eight Reliance mobile connections in November 2003 and in the first month he got a bill from December 2002 to December 2003.



"Instead of one month bill, I got one year’s bill for all eight connections. I don’t know what system they use. Worse part is that they just don’t reply to my complaints and now I have stopped complaining since I know it is of no use," he added.



Still worse, almost all the bills generated have at least Rs two to Rs three additions in the total. With very few who tally their bill totals, this ‘deliberate mistake’ will fetch Reliance, with a customer of base of 50 lakh, a cool one crore per month. "Isn’t that an innovative way to earn profit?" Khemka opined.



But the GSM operators are more or less spared from these allegations as no such irregularities have come to light. Some of the RIM prepaid customers are thronging the Reliance Web World enquiring whether their billing starts the moment ring starts on the instrument.



Though the Reliance executives have discounted the fears but the subscribers are yet to put their faith in these companies. But sources in the CDMA segments attribute this to attitude and illegal profiteering than billing systems of these companies.



"The fact that these companies don’t even respond to the queries show where we stand as far as services are concerned," he said. He said there is no surprise element if the masses still trust state owned corporations like BSNL for their integrity.



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