Airtel Fraud case report

Location/place: Bangalore

Name of company/service: Airtel

We applied for a new Airtel Broadband connection through 121 (customer care) a couple of days before May 10th.
An Airtel representative (Lakshmipathi) came to our house (on May 10th) to check the feasibility and he gave a green signal to us. Next morning, (May 11th) he came again to collect the ID proof and address proof (Voter ID, PAN Card, a passport size photo) and three month’s advance rent. We paid him Rs. 3150 and he said that the connection will be installed within a week. I asked him to do it quickly because I work from home for a US based company and without internet connectivity I have been facing a lot of difficulties. He said he will try to install the connection within 3-4 days. However he never came back. Nor he called us for any update. I did several follow ups with him and finally on May 19th, he said he cannot install the connection because of the unavailability of the network port.

Then I asked him for the refund of the amount that I paid. He said he will return the money between May 20th and 31st. I was okay with it. But, you will be shocked to know that he did not return the money till date. He said he has collected the money from Airtel office and he is currently holding that amount with him. I said “if you are busy, please let me know your office address, I will come there to collect it”, but he never told me his office address. AND HE IS NOW, NOT PICKING OUR PHONE. IF WE CALL HIM FROM A NEW NUMBER, HE DISCONNECTS THE CALL AS SOON AS HE RECOGNIZES OUR VOICE.

Then we visited nearest Airtel office (Koramangala, 5th block) on June 04th and discussed the issue with the manager on duty Mr. Dhanapati. He investigated the issue and found that the Airtel application form (TBLR 635253) that Lakshmipathi provided us was a fake form because there is a connection already activated on the same form (TBLR 635253). That means Lakshmipathi never submitted our form to the Airtel office. Mr. Dhanapati said he will call Lakshmipathi to his office, will collect the money from him and return it back to us HOWEVER they were unable to catch him. They said “we tried to follow up with him but we had no luck” and finally they suggested us to log a Police complaint and a court case against Lakshmipathi.

I was very dissapointed to see how a representative of a reputed company can do all this!

Then again I called 198 and logged a complaint. After hearing all this, the representative redirected me to his supervisor. While I was on the phone, the supervisor asked me to conference Lakshmipathi, but again he did not pick my call. The supervisor created a complaint (33894870) and asked me to log a court case and a Police complaint against Lakshmipathi.

There are few things that clearly shows that he was a cheat.

1. I said, I will pay the advance rent through cheque but he refused to accept the cheque. He said Airtel accepts only cash.

2. I asked him to give me a receipt for the amount but he said Airtel does not give any receipt. They only give application form copy.

3. There was no communication from his side even once. From the day he collected the money and documents, he never bothered to call us. The worst thing is he does not pick our calls also. But he picks the calls from unknown numbers.

4. There is already a connection activated on the same application form (TBLR 635253). Obviously Airtel will not print 2 different application forms with the same number.

5. He promised us more than 100 times to come to our place and return the money but he never did that.

6. I said I will go to the Airtel head office and will log a complaint against you. I was literally shocked when he said ‘do whatever you can’ 🙁

We are now afraid that he can misuse our ID and address proof.