Present:       Sh. Kuldeep Singh Thakan,  Advocate for the complainant.

ORDER

                   Heard on the point of maintainability of the complaint.

                     The case of complainant, in brief, is that he had ordered a Lipstic on website of Myntra on 03.06.2019 vide order No.1111458-3271177-8302001 and the said product was delivered on 05.06.2019. As per price tag the cost of the product was Rs.135/- inclusive of all taxes but the OP had wrongly charged Rs.14.64 as CGST and SGST. The Op had offered a discount of 40% on the product in question but the effective discount is much lesser than the advertised 40 % discount. Even, if the retailer sells goods at discounted price, he is not entitled to charge any other tax from the customer on a product which mentions the price of the product in MRP (inclusive of all taxes). The act and conduct of the Op clearly amounts to deficiency in service and unfair trade practice.

2.                          Heard on the point of maintainability of the present complaint in preliminary hearing.

3.                          Undisputedly, the complainant had purchased the said product from the OP but before proceeding further it is desirable to reproduce the MRP Calculation Formula:

Maximum Retail Price = Manufacturing cost + Packaging/ Presentation cost = CNF Margin +  Profit Margin + Stockiest Margin + GST + Stockiest Margin + Retailer Margin+ Transportation+ Marketing/Advertisement Expenses+ other expense.

Section 15 of the GST Act, 2017 deals with the provisions of discounts under GST. The definition of GST on discounts is as under:

Offering various discounts like cash discount, trade discount, volume discount, percentage discount etc. is the part and parcel of the sale promotion activities now a days, under GST law cash discount, trade discount, volume discount, percentage discount etc. are not bifurcated. However, under GST, discount provisions are bifurcated under following two criteria 1. Discount offered before or at the time of supply and 2. Discount offered after the supply7 has been effected.

4.                It is worthwhile to mention here that the complainant was very well aware of the cost of the product after availing the discount at the time of placing the order and was very much satisfied with the value of the product even after delivery of the product. If the complainant was not satisfied with the value of the product, there was opportunity with him to return the product or to get the order cancelled but he has not done so, which clearly shows that the present complaint has been filed for undue advantage by misusing the benevolent provisions of the Consumer Protection Act. It is pertinent to mention here that the complainant has filed a set of 29 complaints (14 against Shreyansh, 2 against Jobang and 13 against Myntra) including the present compliant.  When a product was sold by the company on discount to the consumer directly, in that situation, the tax cannot be charged on discounted amount. In the present complaint also, the tax has not been charged on discounted amount and the product was not sold more than the MRP amount whereas the sale price was much less than the MRP price. The sale price included all the taxes if the product has been sold on MRP (inclusive of all type of taxes) but when the product has been sold on discount then  a bifurcation was made in the tax invoice and it has been specifically mentioned the all heads of grose price and sale price and taxes etc. In the present case the MRP of the product is Rs.135/- and the sale price after discount and including of taxes was Rs.96/-. It is clear that the Op has issued the invoice as per the MRP calculation formula and it has not violated any GST Rules and even misled any consumer such like complainant. Moreover we cannot force Myntra by law to change its policy which specifies how discounts will be applied. Another strange fact which came to the notice of this Forum that the complainant has filed the said complaints in a cycle-style manner.  The case law titled as  M/s Aero Club Vs. Rakesh Sharma decided on 04.01.2017 by Hon’ble National Commission in RP No.3477 of 2016 relied upon by learned counsel for the complainant is not applicable to the case in hand as in that complaint the matter was related to VAT and the present complaint is related to GST, which has been introduced by the government after revoking  the VAT.

5.                          In view of the above discussion, the present complaint is hereby dismissed in limine, but however, liberty is given to the complainant to file fresh complaint before the appropriate court of law as per rules. A copy of this order be sent to the complainants free of costs.  File be consigned to the record room.

Announced in open Forum.                                           President,

Dated:09.09.2019.                                                  District Consumer Disputes

                                                                     Redressal Forum, Bhiwani

                                                Member                                                                                   DCDRF, Bhiwani