I took the effort to register with mouthshut just to write about the harassment i faced with airtel. Clearly sunil mittal has got more cash now than he had ever imagined and left the company to be run by amateurs. The inconsistency in services just indicates that the company is not fit to manage its present scale and its only a matter of time when the next docomo like player will just sweep it off its feet.
I have attached pics of the sms that airtel sent
I am in Mumbai, my mother visiting me for a month, with an airtel connection from outside mumbai. I tried to recharge her airtel number using icici. I have done it a few times so far. This time it didn’t work. I checked my mother’s mobile. There was an sms about full talk time on rs150 for 15 days, i went to a local mobile recharge guy and got a recharge for rs 150 and found out from the confirmation sms that charge has gone to some other account and i was was unable to make any call [to elaborate - airtel has some main account and some promo account within the same mobile number that one uses - account balances in the main account are available while roaming, but balance on the promo account is valid only in the home network. Separate accounts is something that operators abroad also follow, but they do advertise clearly and there is no limitation on using account balances on roaming etc., at least not in case of singtel of Singapore that i have used.
What airtel is doing is just plain cheating] which does not work in roaming. I called 121 and they told me they cannot help in cases where the number is not from Mumbai. Wonderful. India’s supposedly largest mobile network does not have nationwide call centre integration. Amazing.This is like professional thieves. Or rather these dudes just made it by knowing some people with power and have grown when there was no competition. Just imagine you buying from a shop and you’re being told after you’ve paid the money that the goods will be delivered only if you fulfill some terms and condition. I have an idea & a docomo connection as well and have never seen something like this. (this is somewhat similar to singtel, a major investor in airtel, but even then, for singtel the other account works even in roaming)
My point is how far does airtel think it will go by deceiving people like this. I’m sure this is an ethical as well as a corporate governance issue and i wish soon airtel will become where it all started from - back to scratch, when people start to understand the dishonest practices of the thief named airtel
Just wait for the 3g revolution, already sistema (mts), telenor (uninor), vodafone are in india, etisalat and others with proper technology investments are also soon to appear. Just with a celebrity endorsement, cute kids in advertisement and rahman’s tune are not going to save airtel the rotten infrastructure, old technology, and thick bureaucracy ridden company that it has become