Inspite of the FIFA fever, this post is not about the winners in football...it is about another kind of victory. Victory in the court of the Indian consumer!
And the winner is...Vanita Singh! :)
My friend, Vanita, set out against her car insurance providers (Royal Sundaram) in July 2005. When she sent a check last year to renew her insurance, the money was promptly debited from her account. Sometime later, they sent her a notification saying that she needed to pay some additional amount. She was out of country and did not read the notification for a month or so. Royal sundaram's way of dealing with the problem was slapping a 'compulsory excess' amount of about 5 times the additional amount she was to pay! All this amount was adding up to quite a lot more than what competition was offering insurance at. She decided it wasn't worth renewing her insurance with royal sundaram and asked them to cancel the insurance and refund her money. After a couple of months of follow up and long distance calls (the local office refused to entertain her calls or give her any information) they sent her a check for about 3/4 the money she had paid. When she asked for clarification all she was told was 'this is the amount the underwriters decided. We don't have any more information'.
How unnerving is that! That is when she decided to go to consumer court.
It did take a lot of time and appearance at the court over the last year. It also meant taking time off from work for this! But she persisted and finally won the case. She will be getting back her money with interest!
I am just happy to note that some systems are still working around here! :)
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