Is this the season to piss me off?

I am so pissed off.

No, I really am.

It seems that all so called 'Services' companies have decided that first they will provide me with atrocious services, and as if that was not enough, would proceed to try to cheat me as well!

First it was Airtel DTH TV services. They provided horrible service and after multiple useless interactions with their customer service I wrote this email to them on 6th April:

Hi,



My name is Swapnil Bhatnagar (customer ID: 3000519148) and I have been a customer of Airtel TV for the last few months.



And I am extremely disappointed with the service that I have received.

i. Two weeks ago I had raised a service request to enable the Fox Crime channel. After requesting twice I was finally informed that the angle of the dish will have to be changed.

ii. After waiting for another week a couple of service engineers came to change the angle

iii. After changing the angle they asked for ‘service charge’

iv. When I had spoken to the call center they had specifically informed me that this is a regular service that is being done for all customers and there will be no charges for this

v. When I told them this, they asked me for ‘tea-coffee money’ instead. Now I’ve heard of postmen and other civil servants asking for bakshish, but has Airtel really gone so far down the drain that a private company’s employees will first try to fleece customer with an imaginary ‘service charge’ and having failed on that, beg for a tip?

vi. The worst part is that half the channels are not coming clearly on the TV since the angle was changed – I was told that this will automatically improve after 45 minutes. It’s been 2 days and nothing has happened. I think this is ‘payback’ for not having paid them ‘tea-coffee money’, and I really resent this pathetic, unprofessional behaviour



Please solve this issue by this weekend or else disconnect this ridiculous TV from my place. Frankly, I’d prefer the local cable guy rather than this kind of unprofessional, money-fleecing service. I also want an extension of the service for a week in lieu of the lack of clear channels I have been getting since those two so called service engineers came.

Fairly harsh, eh? Would a service that depends on customers take this seriously? Of course!

So I received four phone calls from different people and after a lot of hullabaloo, nothing happened.

So I wrote this on 23rd April:

Hi,
Unbelievable!

You guys are just unbelievable.

After this complaint I got 4 different calls from different people all asking me for details and promising me the world in terms of quick resolution of issues. One gentleman even convinced me to recharge my TV with 200 Rs!

And in the end your so called 'service' performed exactly as I expected. Nothing happened. No one sent engineers to solve the problem. No one took the people who asked me for a bribe to task. And I also got an sms saying that my complaint has been resolved!! It has definitely not been resolved. Absolutely useless services and grievance re-dressal wing.

I really don't want to get into an argument with you any further. It would just be a matter of banging my head against a wall. Please do the following and we will part ways without any friction:

1. Treat this email as a cancellation request. I am moving to another service and I want the useless Airtel TV box out of my house ASAP. Please do this fast and also provide me with the correct refund
2. I am cancelling the service - move me away from your sms/marketing lists. I don't want any of your smses in my phone from now on. I will never take another service from you and will actively stop other people from doing the same.
3. Refund the 200 rs recharge that I did based on discussion with your nodal officer. This was the last recharge I did based on the faith that the complaint will be addressed

Quick word of advice, this kind of service will not make you successful in this business. Treating customer complaints with such disdain is the first step in the collapse of your business.

I really don't want to interact with your useless complaint handlers, so please do the above immediately.


-Swapnil Bhatnagar

Harsher, right? Action? None. Basically, it seems to me that they're just trying to cheat me out of the refund due to me when the set top box is removed.

Anyway, I've just sent them an email telling them to remove the box and pay up by tomorrow or I'll go to the consumer court, and by God I will!

In the meantime, does anyone know Sunil Bharti Mittal's email id? I want to forward this email chain to him.

And to add to this frustration, the next company trying to fleece me is the Tata Motors services station (Prerana Motors, Hosur Road)where I get my Palio serviced.

I gave my car for service yesterday, and was given an estimate of, lets say 'X'. Now, just to put into perspective, X is quite close to the monthly rent I give.
And today, I had to call them up to follow up on my car and they casually told me that they won't be able to give my car today, and oh, by the way, the service will cost me 1.5 times X!!

Now, because I was given an estimate of X I had asked them to replace some parts in the car. If I had known about 1.5 X I may have postponed it as I do not want to invest so much money on my (now) old car!

Does anyone have the Tata Motors CEO's email id? I really want to send him an official complaint. Please help!

19178

'Light' Trouble...

When I hear stories of poor visibility conditions in foggy Delhi making traffic crawl to a stop (unless, you know, it doesn't quite stop voluntarily and this happens: http://www.ptinews.com/news/471771_Vehicles-collide-on-Noida-Expressway--20-injured ), all I do is scoff.

Bah, why blame the heavens and climate change and chilly winds and what not for conditions that I can create almost effortlessly with just just a little external help. You want poor visibility while driving? Hey, presto here you are!

OK, a little rewind is probably required now. As you know, I drive a Fiat Palio. Now, I love that car (most expensive purchase I've ever done) but it seems that age is finally catching up with it a bit. A month and a half back while returning back from a dinner at night I noticed the left side of my field of vision not quite measuring up in clarity to the right side. Now normally after an evening out I don't really think too much of these little lopsidedness because the reason for such maladies are very clear based on my consumption during the above mentioned evening out. But on that day the standard explanation was not true. It was actually just a dinner!

Puzzled, I turned my head rapidly around, cursed, and with one hand supporting my neck, figured out that one headlight of the car was on a break. Well, I got back safe enough and as I am a bit conscious about safety and my car I promptly took the car to the garage on the weekend. I also got a full service done and the garage guy started treating the headlight issue as a minor glitch.

After the servicing things were fine for 2-3 days and then again I saw the lopsidedness. And because I had sufficient reasons to explain it this time, I ignored the problem. But a few days later I had to take the car back to the garage for redoing the headlight.

Again it was okay for a few days. I travelled a bit in between and I sort of reconciled myself to driving with less illumination on one side and started driving on high beam to get a view.

BUT today it just crossed the limits. The left side low beam AND high beam have stopped functioning. And to add to it the right side low beam is also gone. So I drove back this evening guiding my car with just one high beam of light on the right side!

I sense a conspiracy here. Do I have a stalking saboteur who takes perverse pleasure in mixing up the wires in my electricals (my car's, jeez). Or is it some heavenly interference that's saying, "Say, Swapnil, you didn't quite spend enough on your car repairs for a while. I'm going to make you pay and that too with the most irritating niggles!"

One more task enters the to-do list for the weekend.


12346

Water is the Enemy...

I have realized that water is the biggest aggressive enemy I have. Some of you may remember the post when I dived headfirst into a swirling rain water drain ( http://swappinglives.blogspot.com/2007/05/bangalore-rains.html ). But what the water Gods have been doing to me over the last few days has been terrible, just absolutely terrible. And eventhough I try to maintain a cheerful view to life, sometimes its just not possible.

14th August, that wonderful day when I was supposed to land in Delhi, get picked up from the airport by PS and R, proceed to a rollicking party in Gurgaon, is when my tale begins. Its not for the fainthearted so read on at your risk. The only thing I can guarantee is that not a single eye would remain dry on reading about my plight.

I joyous Swapnil took the flight from Bangalore airport (incidently, the new airport is phenomenal and I for one think that the long drive to reach it is worth it. It brings back some stateliness to flying again. In the middle I think flying was becoming more akin to boarding a bus with no happiness and romance left with it)

I landed in Delhi in the worst jam ever caused by, what else, torrential rains. After waiting for an hour for the luggage to come out I waded into a sea of people carrying huge amounts of luggage as well as ankle deep water. The water Gods then played another cheap trick with me. Now PS and R were stuck in traffic coming from Gurgaon and somewhere near the airport they took a U-turn and I was supposed to walk out or take an auto to reach their car. The rain Gods suddenly stopped the rains and gullible that I am I walked out. Almost immediately it started pouring like crazy and I ended up soaked to the skin sitting under a small tree with a raincoated policeman of Haryana police with a wicked looking gun waiting for the rain to stop. I waited and waited but the rain did not let up.

There was no chance of reaching R's car and so reluctantly we decided to cancel the party plan as there was no way they could've rejoined the wall of traffic oozing glacially towards the airport. By the end of the night they had been in bumper to bumper traffic for 4 and a half hours that night. It should ideally have taken 20-25 minutes to reach the airport from where R stays in Gurgaon.

My tale of misery was not over though as I waded through water to reach the nearest terminal where I had to request B and his wife to come pick me up at 12 at night and had to crash at their place. In the morning B, who was already under the weather a bit, fell quite ill and I felt quite guilty about contributing to it. The entire long weekend went in bed for the poor chap.

As if that was not enough water was still running its vendetta when I came back.

I reached back to Bangalore yesterday night at 1. It was raining quite heavily and though I avoided it by taking a taxi instead of a shuttle service, I should've known that I couln't avoid its wrath so easily. But I had no premonition and no clue that it was going to launch a sneaky guerilla attack at me!

It had rained so much over the last week in Bangalore that when I walked into the basement garage this morning all excited about going to work after a long vacation (yeah, right...) I found myself wading through ankle deep water.

But that wasn't even the beginning of my troubles.

As I opened the door and sat inside I realised that there was a rather peculiar smell in the car. The smell of stale, stagnant, dirty water. Over the past week water leaked into the carand pools of it were lying casually in my beautiful beautiful hard earned car. Apart from the smell and decidedly dreadful looks of the carpeting, the central locking, air-conditioning and most dangerously the brakes were shot.

Not a great start to my new year (It was my birthday yesterday. I had great fun in Delhi. Thank you :) )

Now, someone tell me how to apprease ze water Gods!