Complaint Review: Airtel Broadband - Internet

Hi everyone

I hate to do this, but I am writing this to warn you if you are trying / wishing to become a Airtel Broadband customer now, or in near future. This guys are plain old scammers and they can do anything to take out money from you (even threaten you). It all started as following.

One of their representatives came to my office and convinced me to take a 5 gb high-speed connection @ 2mbps at a very high price (which I am not concerned about). I asked him about the full detail and he told me that I could take this connection for any number of month. How ever, if I take the connection for 4 month, they would re-pay me my initial deposit of Rs. 500 with the bill (sum may vary. I am not sure about the exact sum I paid, as I can't find the bill for that). My DSL ID/ Account ID is (7006243704) registered at Kolkata. When their Engineer came for the installation, he asked for Rs. 200 bribe, which I settled down to Rs. 100 and paid him, because I did not want any hassle.

Now their first trick comes. Though you have been registered to their system, they won't make your online account where you can pay your bill. As if, you are a unregistered customer (quite peculiar, even the worst of the worse BSNL makes the account for you, but not the almighty Airtell LOL). I tried to register and it said that I would need to confirm a verification code which would be sent to my mobile. It never came, so I could not register myself in the first go. I tried again a few days later, and I did succeed this time. I tried to pay whatever was due, but this time my debit card was declined. I am a web developer by profession and I use my debit card for purchasing everything. I have never had an issue with it till date, but here it got failed interestingly.

Anyway, I had to change my flat and thus I had to cancel the connection. I could make them transfer my connection but I did not want to because of such unprofessional system that they have. So, I mailed them for discontinuing the connection. No reply came. I then called them 6-7 days before my billing cycle was over. They kept on pushing me to tell them my new address so that they could transfer the connection to the new place. I strictly told them to not renew my connection and wanted to disconnect. After over 30 minutes of conversation, finally the representative agreed to disconnect the line and I hung up.

I, in the meanwhile changed my flat and for two months, there was no communication from them, until I finally received a call from Airtel saying that I had over 2500 Rs due for the bill. I was amazed to hear it. I told them that I had disconnected the line after the first cycle and it can't be the fact. They said they will send a representative to my office for collecting the fund.

A man (50-55 yr old) came to my office at AJ -325, Saltlake, Sector 2, Kolkata -91, to collect the bill where he started claiming for 3 months. I told him the same thing that I told customer care earlier. I told him the fact that If my connection wasn't dropped after I instructed them, I could have been in legal trouble if anyone else used that connection for doing bad things such as terrorism. I could have even received capital punishment for the same. I also told him that I would be having zero usage for these months because I have not used the connection anymore. He agreed, took 1200 Rs from me (REC. No 7917913 ) and another 50 bucks for having "sweets" (lol, I wonder how their blood sugar level stays at the normal level), called someone and told him to disconnect the line. I thought, Okay it is over now.

Now comes Airtel's master Stroke !

Today I received a called from +911244955500 (16/08/2013 - 3.45 PM, dialed to +91 9051677619) threatening me to pay the rest of the money. I even told that guy that this is a security problem. He would not listen to me. He warned me in his hard-to-understand hindi, that I would be in trouble if I do not pay all the money. I told him that I had requested them to disconnect my line, but now he took the bunny out of the hat. He said that I am supposed to take the connection for atleast 3 months! Wow! But I was never told about this? He said, it was written in the long T & C, which I signed. So there you go Airtel. This is how you treat your customers? This guy sounded like a collection agent to me, not a call center representative to say the least.

This to let you know, that I will be going to court for not disconnecting my line even after the request. I could have been in real trouble because of this and I will not leave these scammers for what they have done to me.

To all, if you have not been their customer, better not be, or you could even end up in a worse situation than myself. I hope this report serves as the review if anyone is searching for the validness. I am going to report to each and every authority possible. I will make sure that Airtel suffers for the offense that they have made. It is not about money, it is about security at the end of the day. Money cannot be more than life,even if your T & C says the opposite. Stay tuned.