Flipkart fined Rs 15,000 over failed refund of air fare

HYDERABAD: Flipkart was asked to pay Rs 4,378 over a failed refund to a Hyderabad resident, who had booked air tickets using the application. The Telangana consumer court also asked the e-commerce platform to pay an amount of Rs 15,000 for the mental agony caused to the complainant and for deficiency of services.

The complainant claimed that he had booked two airline tickets through Flipkart and received a confirmation e-mail regarding the booking. Owing to the cancellation of flights due to the prevailing pandemic, the Supreme Court, at that time, ordered the refund of ticket fairs unconditionally to the customers.

G Surarchita Reddy, the complainant, said that he had received a text message from Air Asia airlines that they had refunded the entire booking amount to the original source. As the said refund was not received, the complainant contacted Flipkart. The e-commerce platform then shared a screenshot of the scheduled refund that had failed and requested the him to share the details of another bank account. However, later the company neither responded nor refunded the amount, as claimed by the complainant.

Flipkart, in its defence, said that they had approved the refund and therefore there was no grievance unsolved of the complainant. Flipkart acts as an intermediary that allows the sellers a platform to reach across India and therefore the complainant has wrongly arrayed them, claimed the company.

The court, in its verdict, said that the amount was not refunded which has caused mental agony to the complainant. Flipkart has neither responded nor refunded the amount to the complainant and therefore is liable for compensation, ruled the court.