Special: How to take legal action against mobile operator

According to the Consumer Protection Act, anyone making a call, texting or browsing the internet using a cell-phone is a “consumer”. And every consumer is entitled to legal remedy in case he is dissatisfied with the service.

Since it has become routine to suffer faulty service from mobile operators, we thought we could pitch in by listing the various situations in which you, as the consumer, are entitled to take legal action against a Company.


Are you being wrongly charged?
If you are a mobile phone user in India, you have almost certainly been overcharged on many occasions, or charged for services you did not even ask for.

The body governing the activities of telecom companies is the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India, shortened as the TRAI.

As per TRAI Regulations, the telecom operator is bound to continue any Tariff that it has offered to you for a minimum period of 6 months. Additionally, the Telecom operator is bound by law to tell you about the ‘talktime’ available every time you get a new service. The tariff plans should not have misleading names: for example your SMS service pack should not be called ‘unlimited’ pack because TRAI has limited the number of texts that can be sent.

Unlike prepaid services, it is difficult to keep track of the talk time spent in case of postpaid users and customers have reported being sent exorbitant bills. Remember to insist on exhaustive details in your post-paid bill including (a) the telephone calls made (b) details of pulse rates and charges (c) detail of STD calls and VAS services used.

‘Value Added Services’ activated without your consent?
How many of you have been charged for ‘Caller Tunes’ even if you never activated the service? Or the ‘Astrology’ service? TRAI has specifically declared that no VAS (Value Added Service) can be activated without your explicit consent. “Explicit Consent” can be either through a phone call made by you or a message sent by you. The operator cannot activate a VAS and charge you for it just because you accidentally pressed some buttons on your phone. If there is any accidental charge, TRAI mandates that you should be reimbursed by the operator if you inform it that the activation of a service was unintentional within 24 hours of such activation.

Miscellaneous issues
The TRAI has specified that operators need to provide customer care in local languages, in addition to English. Further, on days like New Year’s Day and Diwali, operators announce ‘black outs’ and declare that your SMS pack could not be valid for the day. TRAI states that only 5 such black out days are permitted for each service provider per year.

Additionally, TRAI has forbidden any telemarketing to any number that has been registered for DND / Do Not Disturb registration. All you need to do is register your number through your mobile operator for this service.