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Do you hate the calls from your mobile operators asking you to activate caller tunes, missed call alerts, subscribe to different services – which comes any time of the day making you irritated a lot?
It is a fact such unnecessary value added services or VAS cause more or less problem in our life. When we are on multiSIM environment need of VAS is very less.
But still often operators activates such services without our acknowledgment making loopholes in our hard earned money and giving bill shock at the end of month!
I hate such things too much, at a point I think telemarketing calls are better than these automated calls which have no human touch. If you think such things are limited to call or SMS at inconvenient time, beware these things can come via USSD, and this becomes a better or potent trap as now these things will appear on your mobile screen – click or touch on OK and you will be charged any amount from Rs 5 – Rs 50!
When already subscribers are suffering from VAS activation, this step will create more mishap, while customer care executives will be busy saying: Sir you activated this service at this time. We can not do anything.
Watch out the following figures taken on two Tata Docomo no. (with Nokia 1200 and with Samsung touchscreen phone):
Comments are appreciated.
Saurabh gupta December 3, 2011 at 9:58 am
Reliance is good if you keep your balance below Rs50 otherwise you all know
Raghu December 22, 2010 at 3:48 pm
@dskushwaha
yes u are right. Reliance is good in bringing down tariffs and then hike it later.this is the bad thing. and also they cheat the customers by activating VAS without activation by customer.
dskushwaha December 22, 2010 at 3:33 pm
Yeah! Reliance is a cheater. I didn’t find anyone in TT who says Reliance is a good operator.
karthi December 22, 2010 at 12:40 pm
the same happened to me this month with reliace……..cheaters
PD December 21, 2010 at 8:51 pm
Mamaji – A pertinent point that could exposes many ills that are prevalent in our society
mama December 21, 2010 at 2:58 pm
but what about those crores of customers who are not educated enough/ or those having no access to computers. who will fight for them?
it’s time TRAI should take some drastic step to control all these looters.
Ankit December 21, 2010 at 1:52 pm
Yes the same situation is with IDEA DELHI,i hav sent a mail to nodal officer and made 10 calls to cc but no effect,my vas wud not b deactivated.
PD December 21, 2010 at 12:01 pm
Kushwahaji, Call the CC and tell them to deactivate all the VAS and also make a request NOT TO ACTIVATE ANY VAS and ask for Request registration no. Also write mail to
(1)customercare@relianceada.com and
(2)corporatecentre.customercare@relianceada.com
It should work.
dskushwaha December 21, 2010 at 9:22 am
Can we give standing instruction to our service provider for not activating any VAS or deducting any amount from our balance
dskushwaha December 21, 2010 at 9:03 am
Sending Emails to Customer Care/Nodal Officer regarding VAS activation is NOT working with Reliance GSM. They have not refunded the amount for activating cricket updates without my knowledge (when I was not even in their service area). I made 3 calls and sent 11 emails, their way of talking itself was not good.
rajesh December 20, 2010 at 9:44 pm
Yeah Tata Docomo using thing cheap practice to steal money from their customers.just by getting msg,if a customers accidentally press ok means thats all…TRAI or somebody should take necessary steps…
sumit December 20, 2010 at 6:25 pm
@Ankit
national consumer forum helpline- 1800114000 (tollfree only from mtnl/bsnl & tata indicom)
You should send a mail to nodal officer atleast once. Further you should send a mail to their appelate authority and, if the problem is still unresolved, you must compain in consumer forum. In ur compain you can demand for compensation ( if any) occured due to that problem.
PD December 20, 2010 at 5:53 pm
Ankitji, I think the service providers have started reading “writings on the wall” and also started reading “between lines” too – Got it ? Road to our option – MNP will soon arrive !!! Hope good days are ahead for all including the service providers !
Mali C December 20, 2010 at 5:46 pm
@Ruchit Shah
yup you are correct… i took a tata docomo sim for my mother … whenever she will try to make a call, there will be no range and cannot make a call… my mother got frustrated by this … my father destroyed the tata docomo sim and took a bsnl sim for her.. now she is happy… bsnl is having range (even Edge) in the ultra remote area of kerala … bsnl used to give free sim every year and now all of our family is using bsnl…. thank you bsnl….
Ankit December 20, 2010 at 5:26 pm
@Ankit
hi sumit,hw can i connect to consumer forum helpline.I am also the victim of self activation of VAS.on 16 th dec 50 rs from my bal deducted.when i contacted cc they told me that Dialer Tone and one other service will get activated.and for the other service rs5 daily dedcuted from my balance from that date.plz suggest what can i do.contacting nodal officer is worthless,coz i contacted them many times before this for other reasons,but there were no response.
Ankit December 20, 2010 at 5:22 pm
@sumit
PD December 20, 2010 at 3:24 pm
Right – Good experience for me too ! ? Yesterday (19/12/10) Airtel activated -Friendship & Radio Mirchi (VAS), of course, unilaterally and deducted Rs.50/- (This is in spite of my standing instruction) I made strong worded complaints to CC and Nodal Officer of Airtel. To my utter surprise, within 2 hours, came the (apology) reply and and REFUND !!!!!!!!
Airtel- carry on – Be fairtel !!!! Think of Bangladesh later -Be Indian First !!!
Sittrarasu December 20, 2010 at 2:23 pm
Sending Emails to Customer Care/Nodal Officer regarding VAS activation is really working…….
I contacted the AIRCEL customer care executive after they activated a VAS without my knowledge. They registered a complaint and remained cool without any action. I registered as many as five complaints, all went in vain. Then, I wrote a mail to nodal officer and customer care of Aircel regarding that.
Within 24 hours, the nodal officer contacted me, deactivated my VAS and refund the waived amount from my account.
Vasu December 20, 2010 at 12:01 pm
I wrote a dhamki mail to airtel customer care when they started cricket alerts and samachar service without my approver. They then refunded rs. 12 which was deducted for this VAS. Since then i have not recieved any issue.
So moral of the story if we don’t speak up they will not behave.
Vikas December 20, 2010 at 11:23 am
@sumit I think Idea has limit of 70 MB of data limit per day.
Ruchit Shah December 20, 2010 at 11:16 am
All this companies are helping BSNL to get more subscribers.
Dilip Virani December 20, 2010 at 10:48 am
Best example is reliance. very low rate but highest complain against him.
Just try to search on google with key world “Reliance money deduction”. You will got thousands of complain. even i also passed out from this situation.
if this kind of law appear then it will be service.
sumit December 20, 2010 at 10:24 am
@swana
Bhai trai itself is on trial. when I was the victim of idea sent mail to trai thrice but didn’nt get any response. Finally, when I reported to consumer forum it helped. I filled a complain with 50,000 compensation. I provided all evidents and it worked.
Gaurav Grover December 20, 2010 at 9:05 am
HI
I belive these Tele marketing Calls & Bulk SMS and other promotional activties are the prerequisite for the VAS promotion, the way Govt are charging from the Telecom operatros its not hidden with other, They also needs some spcae to survive in highly touch & competitive market.
from customers Point of view govt has already taken lots of inititave like DND & recently they make modifications as well in currrent curricular. Customers have the cushion to avoid such type of things
swana December 20, 2010 at 8:55 am
One could write to TRAI with a copy to the service provider giving the details, this would defnitely put a pressure on the service provider. As the amount is small here people tend to let it pass. Rcomm had done this on a number of times to me and after writing to TRAI around 6 times it has since stopped.
Emad December 20, 2010 at 8:02 am
how do i get rid from flash danger?
alamgir December 20, 2010 at 7:39 am
Shouldnt there be some kind of compensation to the customers or punishment to the companies involved with such instances ? Such things are very common with almost all private Cos. My entire family was victimized by Airtel in the past three months, on calling customer care, firstly they start charging money to talk to customer care executive(another trouble to already troubled subscriber). When the person comes(After some torturous noise) he/she just says you have activated so and so services for which you have been charged. WTF
Gourav December 20, 2010 at 5:57 am
Reliance is great in automatic vas activations..
sumit December 20, 2010 at 1:31 am
@Anil
I recharged my Idea no with internet pack 98. 5 days later, when I was surfing and downloading, they deducted Rs 155 from my main balance. I complained cust. cr and later they refunded the amount. On day 7 after getting the balance,I used intenet and again I was charged Rs 154. This time I complained several times and sent email to their nodal officer too, but didn’t get any response. Later,I visited their Head Office in Cannaught place. They assured me to refund the amount in 48 hrs but failed to do so. I was very much dissapointed. Finally, I called consumer forum helpline and reported the same. They gave an email id of an authority of Idea cellular and told me to send a mail and if the matter still unresolved they will take a legal action.
And this time I was really surprised. I got a call from a senior executive and got the balance refunded.
Anil December 20, 2010 at 12:00 am
Idea is best for gprs download speed upto 30kbps average
firstonnet December 19, 2010 at 11:39 pm
Thanks to MTNL who never send us any USSD messages. MTNL is great.
Rudradeep Biswas December 19, 2010 at 11:38 pm
@Ruchit
right, DND will stop these calls, not this USSD!
firstonnet December 19, 2010 at 11:37 pm
Thanks to MTNL Mumbai who never send USSD messages to his subscribers.
Rudradeep Biswas December 19, 2010 at 11:36 pm
Thankfully CDMA does not support USSD !
rohan December 19, 2010 at 11:23 pm
Docomo did this while i was surfing and deducted 50 rs. This was common with airtel, vodafone and now Docomo. Bsnl is still safe and clean using it for more than 5yr.
Ruchit December 19, 2010 at 10:38 pm
@Chaand DND wont matter. This messages will just flash on your screen whether you have activated dnd or not.
Chaand December 19, 2010 at 10:35 pm
Activate DND. These messages wont bother you then. Ideally DND should be activated by default on all new connections. TRAI needs to look into this.
Ruchit December 19, 2010 at 10:32 pm
Well i too used to get this messages in Vodafone. In Vodafone there is a way to stop this messages. Vodafone Service -> Flash -> Activation -> Deactivate. you wont get flash messages back.
Anbu John Boban December 19, 2010 at 10:30 pm
Per user monthly revenue will be high ! Even if DND is active i get messages from Airtel and also !@#$%^&* caller tunes calls!
Benny December 19, 2010 at 10:23 pm
OMG i dint know tata docomo was into these cheap tactics. good i came to know… i was planning to move to docomo when mnp kicks in
dinesh December 19, 2010 at 9:45 pm
to deactivate a vas service they ask for a second confirmation sms.but to activate a new one they dont need our consent.
The sim tool kit or stk is another secret looting tool used by the operators.there are sub menus like cricket jokes astro etc.many game loving kids press ok on these options without knowing the trap.
What trai shoud do is to make it compulsory to send a message from the operator to the subscriber informing him of the charges involved and he really wish to subscribe then reply with yes or no before deducting the amount.another way to prevent this vas meanace is by ordering not to deduct talk time amount for vas.if a customer wants caller tune he shoud be made to recharge seperate vas recharge.
Amit.g December 19, 2010 at 9:29 pm
In karnataka Airtel, vodafone reliance and docomo send ussd messages to take away money from customers. Today i saw one person buyin Bsnl sim and was tellin tat he got bugged up wit idea services as everyday 3rs will be deducted from his balance n he informed many times to cc but nothin worked.
Animesh.Sengupta December 19, 2010 at 9:28 pm
I was recently charged Rs. 25.00 for International Roaming SMS, While I was very much in India. This is total cheating.
BK December 19, 2010 at 8:55 pm
tata docomo sends me these atleast 5 times a day
saisundhar vaidyanathan December 19, 2010 at 8:45 pm
ok what abt the charges deducted daily by some famous operators for which we did not subscribe…who will take action against them…here in tamilnadu its done regularly by aircel and airtel…daily 1/-from a single user……if its happening to at least 10000 customers daily they are gaining 10000/- for a month for so many customers pls calculate the amount earned by the cos…from innocent customers even village people…..who will tie the bell for it…
Amit.g December 19, 2010 at 8:34 pm
Yes this s really irritating. Now even tata docomo s playin this cheap trick to lure money. In my point uninor s the best because they pay u back even when u call a Ivr chargin some 2rs per min and if it disconnects in between then they ll refund it. I was refunded 6rs
mama December 19, 2010 at 8:13 pm
Aircel activated caller tune without my knowledge. Even after repeated complaints they are not deactivating/ refunding my balance so i have stopped using that number. same is the case with tata docomo. (imp.: They are very punctual at deducting the fees as soon as the due date arrives even if you had complained them 100000000…. time for deactivating the same.)
CDH December 19, 2010 at 7:47 pm
If TRAI keeps sitting like it is now then in the next 2-3 years these pvt. operators will start threatening the customers to recharge forcefully so that they could deduct the balance from their account.
Almost 10-20 % of the annual income of these companies might have been coming from these cheap tricks if someone starts preparing an account that counts the all complaints regarding the automatic balance deduction. Earlier they were chors now they have become looters who are not even appolagatic after commiting mistake !
PD December 19, 2010 at 6:39 pm
ADDENDUM to my earlier comments -
Also ensure that you don’t get carried away by the Uninor’s ploy !! – And Do not give your cell to opposite sex, however close such person may be – without unlocking and reading what transpired while the was in dormant status ! Else u may be lose Rs.5-30 !
Mane December 19, 2010 at 6:14 pm
As my opinion customers want to use their number mainly for calls, sms and gprs and some for miss call alert.
All other services like love pack, shayri pack, health pack etc. are the worst and no one cust want to use.
Reliance is a bad provides because reliance acts these service without any notice of cust.
Gaurav December 19, 2010 at 6:09 pm
Yes this is absolutely irritating.earlier reliance used to do it.now tata i got same message as appeared above while i was chatting.fortunately i didnt clicked yes.hey guys now a days there is one more horror on wap world.few links come on almost all wap sites a single click on which costs you rs.99.i got to lost 99 rs two times.one time while i was using ebuddy chat application.it came in ad slot.and another time on wap site.where it is extremely closer to the download link.so people usually commit mistakes like i did.beware
PD December 19, 2010 at 6:07 pm
A very useful and information posting by R. Biswas.The GSM players are using USSD gateway to trap the unwarranted subscribers for VAS activation ! No service providers take TRAI seriously! Protect yourself – Beware when u press OK on hearing an alert from ur cell especially when cell is kept idle in pocket or kept at some distant location. Better always keep the Automatic Key guard ON so that even if you, by mistake, press the OK-CALL button keypress will not be activated registered your selection and by the time the LCD back-light will ON and u can see what is on the screen take a decision!
As I said earlier best thing is to visit the gallery of your service provider and give a written STANDING INSTRUCTION asking them NOT TO ACTIVATE ANY VAS unless and until specific request is given from your cell (read – NOT A RESPONSIVE ACTIVATION)thru SMS or written request. And do not forget to get a signed ACKNOWLEDGEMENT ! Also specifically mention that “I am not interested in any of your unilateral VAS offerings either from you or anybody else. Also please ensure that no third party uses your gateway/services to offer any VAS unilaterally”.
Aashwinikumar December 19, 2010 at 6:00 pm
Yes i have seen this thing on my Docomo… also on my uncles Vodafone who keeps complaining it comes repeatedly… This is serious issue!! Operators should be banned/fined from doing soo!!!
Nikhil December 19, 2010 at 5:51 pm
Just today I received the same message on my docomo sim for first time and I was thinking person who is in hurry can press OK button falling prey to such VAS activation.
som December 19, 2010 at 5:49 pm
i faced this problem 5 years back with hutch.throw away the connection and took an airtel.no such problem till date;hopefully this will continue.
the problem is cc refused to accept this.they always try to blame us.this should be punished.
Varun December 19, 2010 at 5:37 pm
Services like Reliance GSM and Virgin Mobile GSM activates caller tunes without your awareness and put songs like bhopuri which becomes a topic of teasing among friends…..
MeKyle Syed December 19, 2010 at 5:18 pm
DOT should take action against this & charge penalty to the operator who try too loot the subscriber
deep December 19, 2010 at 4:53 pm
This is a utter nuisance for a customer.. Here in NESA circle i’ve been using airtel and got my hellotunes activated without my consent .
Sahil December 19, 2010 at 3:44 pm
@Amit Karmakar
This kind of service has started by Airtel, first in telecom industry.
Sahil December 19, 2010 at 3:40 pm
Hmmmm…….. I have also lost around 45 rupees when I was using Idea 2 month ago. I think this tactic is not created by DOCOMO as my brother receives such USSD msg from more than a year on his VODAFONE.
sujai December 19, 2010 at 3:38 pm
im using docomo and accidently i pressed ok for the ussd message and they charged rs.30
but when i called customercare they deactivated the service and refund my rs.30
friends beware of this scientific robbers
ABDUL WADOOD December 19, 2010 at 3:34 pm
Government is sleeping they have no control on any company as we can see our internet services you can imagine how far we are from others… we still surviving for average internet connection.. the world is moving toward 4g and we are still waiting for 3g network…
Webly December 19, 2010 at 3:31 pm
TRAI is a sleeping giant. This issue should be taken seriously and the guiltry operator must be punished with hefty fines.
The most common VAS activated at the time of new Sim activation without subscribers concern is Cricket pack, i have come across many cases wherein the VAS gets auto activated on new subscribers mobile no.
TRAI should consider this issue on par with anti-pesky calls rule.
Ankit December 19, 2010 at 3:23 pm
i m using vodafone with android handset and tell keep sending me lot’s of USSD msg + call fro activate caller tunes can we do something about this ?
Amit Karmakar December 19, 2010 at 3:13 pm
True! I also saw this on my friend’s mobile when I was just listening a song and that too on Docomo sim. It is my luck that I instantly cancel the request and save my friend’s money. Now Docomo when fails to attract customers with 3G, they discover a very clever way to trap the customers. But Docomo should know that this will not only blacken their image but also make people angry. And one thing is that it will probably be taken by others operator too.
Keshav Jha December 19, 2010 at 2:55 pm
It looks like TRAI is not alive. No control of Govt. on telecom operators.