Hyderabad: The Chittoor consumer forum has asked e-tailing giant Flipkart to compensate a smartphone buyer for causing him mental agony. On June 16, 2016, the forum issued orders based on a complaint lodged by Mr G. Jyotheeswar against Bengaluru-based Flipkart.
The complainant had alleged that he had placed an order for an MI 4I smartphone on Flipkart in November 2014. The order was cancelled by Flipkart as the product could not be delivered due to insufficient address, and refund was initiated.
The complainant then informed Flipkart that though he had furnished the correct pin code of Chittoor, the product was sent to Tirupati, which was not his mistake. He demanded that the company resend the product on the previous offer of Rs 7,694 but the company refused. Flipkart remained absent for the consumer forum proceedings.
In its judgement, the forum stated: “The purpose of the Consumer Protection Act is to help consumers when they suffer from deficiency in service, which was caused by the service providers. The service provider should not escape from its liability by blaming the complainant on flimsy grounds. Such practices should be deprecated.”
The forum noted, “The opposite party had blamed the complainant on grounds that the article could not be delivered due to insufficient address provided by the complainant, though the address was correct… On account of the opposite party’s negligence, the complainant suffered mental agony.”
The forum said that “mere apologies expres-sed by the opposite party due to the inconvenience caused to the complainant will not in any way console the complainant’s mental agony. Therefore we are of the opinion that there is clear-cut plausible evidence placed by the complainant and as such deficiency of service on the part of the opposite party is proved.”
The forum ordered Flipkart to supply the smartphone on exchange offer as had been originally agreed, along with compensation for Rs 1,000 towards mental agony and also costs of Rs 2,000.
