Before the District Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission, Rohtak.
Complaint No. : 601
Instituted on : 08.10.2021
Decided on : 10.11.2022
Shubham Gill age 25 years, s/o Sh. Sheel Kumar Gill, Resident of H.No.1670, Urban Estate Jind-126102.
.......................Complainant.
Vs.
- Apple India Pvt. Ltd., No.24, 19th Floor, Concord Tower, UB City, Vittal Malya Road, Bengaluru, Karnataka-560001(Manufactrer)
- DIGICARE Services Apple Rohtak at Shop no. 106 First Floor, Sheetal Life Style Mall D-Park Rohtak-124001, Haryana(Authorised service center of Apple India).
……….Opposite parties.
COMPLAINT U/S 12 OF CONSUMER PROTECTION ACT,1986.
BEFORE: SH.NAGENDER SINGH KADIAN, PRESIDENT.
DR. TRIPTI PANNU, MEMBER.
DR. VIJENDER SINGH, MEMBER
Present: Sh.Anikit Hooda, Advocate for the complainant.
Sh. Kunal Juneja, Advocate for opposite party No. 1.
Opposite party No. 2 given up.
ORDER
NAGENDER SINGH KADIAN, PRESIDENT:
1. Brief facts of the case, as per the complainant are that complainant purchased a mobile APPLE Phone 11 64G8 color White vide IMEI No. 356810118237546 on 16-10-2019(whereas the bill is dated 16.102020) for a consideration of Rs. 47,999 from Online site of Amazon.com which is the official sales partner of Apple company and opposite party No.2 is the authorized service provider of Apple India. Complainant used the said phone as per guidelines and instructions for use by manufacturer. i.e. opposite party No.1 and the same worked only for some days, but after 2 months of purchase, the complainant faced some problems in the mobile. The alleged mobile started hanging problems like: ‘the screen used to freeze and applications began to close down on their own, rebooting on its own, stopped responding’ and due to the said defect, the complainant was unable to do any function of the mobile. The mobile phone also created a lot of error cache files on its own which further slowed down the device a lot. The complainant immediately contacted opposite party no.2 for the said defect and requested to get the same repaired. Opposite party no.2 returned the set to the complainant on 28.7.2021 after resetting the software. After some days the issue began repeating itself. The complainant again contacted the service center on 08.09.2021 and requested the opposite party to resolve the issues, they merely took the said mobile for half a day and returned it in the same condition without doing anything to resolve the issue. The complainant requested them either to resolve these issues or to replace the mobile with new one. Complainant also wrote several mails to the opposite party No.1 as well as online complaint dialogue box and portals. But there was no solution to his problems and any heed was not paid to his request. As such there is a clear deficiency in service on the part of opposite parties and the complainant is entitled for compensation for not using the mobile since long. Hence this complaint and it is prayed that opposite parties may kindly be directed to pay the invoice amount of unit i.e Rs.47,999/- along with interest @24% p.m. from the date of purchase and also to pay an amount of Rs.50,000/- as compensation on account of mental agony & harassment and Rs.51000/- as litigation expenses to the complainant.
2. After registration of complaint, notices were issued to the opposite parties. Opposite party No. 1 in its reply has submitted that the Complainant had purchased an iPhone 11 64 GB on 17-10-2020. The complainant has alleged that he had some hanging issues with his device. He approached the Apple Authorised Service Provider (AASP) i.e. Opposite Party No.2 on 28-07-2021. The said O.P.No.2 checked his device for the said issue, confirmed the issue and restored and updated its software. After the said restoration, the iPhone was working fine and the complainant collected the said iPhone back on the same day. The complainant had verified and acknowledged that the said device was working fine, on the delivery report while receiving the iPhone back from the OP2. Subsequently, he approached the OP2 on 08-09-2021. There have been no other issues detected on the said device by the OP2 or any AASP on the said device. The complainant is aware that as per the terms and conditions of the warranty, the device will be serviced/repaired or replaced, depending on the condition of the device. Besides the issues mentioned above, there have been no other issues detected which warrant the replacement of the device. Despite being aware of the same, the complainant filed this complaint. There is no evidence of any sort of issue on the device after the restoration was done by the opposite party No.2. If the complainant had issues, he should have submitted his device again for the alleged issue. However, he has not submitted his mobile as there were no issues on it, this itself proves that the complainant is making false statements to support his case. It is a settled position of law that manufacturer cannot be made liable until it is proved by adducing expert evidence that there was any manufacturing defect and the present case is not related to any manufacturing defect. All the other contents of the complaint were stated to be wrong and denied and opposite party prayed for dismissal of complaint with costs. However, opposite party no. 2 was been given up by complainant vide his separate statement dated 04.01.2022.
3. Complainant in his evidence has tendered affidavit Ex.CW1/A, documents Ex.C1 to Ex.C11 and has closed his evidence on dated 10.05.2022. Ld. counsel for the opposite party No. 1 has tendered document Ex. RW1/A, documents Ex.R1 to Ex.R2 and closed his evidence on dated 19.09.2022.
4. We have heard learned counsel for the parties and have gone through material aspects of the case very carefully.
5. In the present case it is not disputed that complainant purchased a mobile phone for a sum of Rs.47999/- as is proved from the bill Ex.C3 dated 16.10.2020. As per job sheet Ex.C4 dated 28.07.2021 there was ‘hanging issue’ in the alleged mobile and the device was restored and updated by the opposite party. As per job sheet Ex.C5 dated 08.09.2021 there was again hanging issue in the alleged mobile and again the same procedure was done by the opposite party. As per copies of emails & their reply Ex.C6 to Ex.C11, complainant made complaints regarding crashing of applications and hanging issues but every time the opposite party gave the same answer that they will contact the complainant. But despite repeated requests and emails made by the complainant, his phone has not been repaired by the opposite parties within warranty period. On the other hand, opposite parties failed to prove the fact that the complainant had verified and acknowledged that the said device was working fine, on the delivery report while receiving the iPhone back from the opposite party No.2 as no such document has been placed on record by the opposite parties nor such endorsement has been made by the complainant on the job sheets placed on record by the complainant Ex.C4 & Ex.C5 and the complainant has merely signed the same. It is also observed that the Apple is a renowned company of such worldwide stature and the consumer purchases its costly mobiles after impressing by its name and fame and for long time utilization of the same under the impression that the such costly mobile would be free from every defect and will give longtime results. But when such like companies do not redress the grievances/do not remove the defects of their product, the customers lose their faith in the company. Hence the act of opposite parties of not removing the defects of the mobile set within warranty period amounts to deficiency in service and opposite party no.1 being the manufacturer is liable to refund the price of mobile set after deducting the 15% depreciation on it i.e. to pay Rs.40800/-(Rs.47999/- less Rs.7199/-).
6. In view of the facts and circumstances of the case, we hereby allow the complaint and direct the opposite party No.1 to refund the amount of Rs.40800/-(Rupees forty thousand and eight hundred only) alongwith interest @ 9% p.a. from the date of filing the present complaint i.e.08.10.2021 till its realization and shall also pay Rs.6000/-(Rupees six thousand only) as compensation on account of deficiency in service as well as litigation expenses to the complainant within one month from the date of decision. However complainant is directed to hand over the mobile in question to the opposite parties at the time of making payment by the opposite party No.1
7. Copy of this order be supplied to both the parties free of costs. File be consigned to the record room after due compliance.
Announced in open court:
10.11.2022.
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Nagender Singh Kadian, President
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Tripti Pannu, Member
……………………………….
Vijender Singh, Member
