‘Lifetime’ validity valid for six months?
February 7th, 2006 Leave a comment Visited 37 times, 1 so far today
‘Lifetime’ validity valid for six months?
India has seen a tremendous telecom boom in the last couple of months. The most impressive offers to come out in this time period are the so-called ‘lifetime’ validity packages for the prepaid mobile customers. This package enables the consumer to stay connected to the network without paying anything for increasing the validity of his connection.
However, this scheme does not come with its own hidden glitches. Most companies still require the customer to recharge with a small denomination top-up card within a specific period. And the latest news in is that the companies have clarified that lifetime in general means the lifetime of their license to provide connectivity.
So, it means, if the company goes bust, you are no longer entitled to the lifetime package you have bought from the company, and they are not legally bonded to migrate you to some other company’s network. In addition, these tariff plans for “lifetime validity†can be changed by service providers.
The operators have told the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (TRAI) that the packages have been designed and structured keeping in view the present licensing, regulatory and interconnect user charge regimes. And they plan to review these plans every six months. This means that if the competition has lessened, the company might as well change the conditions making these packages useless for the subscribers.
The companies also pointed out that under the existing laws in the country, they are only required to ensure that tariffs for lifetime validity plans remain unchanged for a period of six months since the time a consumer subscribe to the lifetime validity plan from the company.
So much for the telecom revolution in the country. Consumers are also recommended to check out the other hidden conditions. Normally, these lifetime validity packages come with more expensive charges for making outgoing calls to other phones. We at TechWhack are not exactly big fans of these new offers from the companies and have decided to stay away from them.
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February 8th, 2006 at 10:46 pm
IIRC Tata Indicom started all this off with a 2 year validity deal, which I guess was a useful and valuable offer. Competition forced others to come up with the Lifetime validity offer
Fundamental logic states that if an offer is too good to be true, it probably is … In Telecom as well as any other market, I would be very cagey of offers that really sweep me of my feet
February 9th, 2006 at 10:16 am
IIRC Tata Indicom started all this off with a 2 year validity deal, which I guess was a useful and valuable offer. Competition forced others to come up with the Lifetime validity offer
Fundamental logic states that if an offer is too good to be true, it probably is … In Telecom as well as any other market, I would be very cagey of offers that really sweep me of my feet
April 4th, 2006 at 12:09 pm
How the hell can companies fool consumers by saying ‘LifeTime’ Validity??? When you have to keep recharging every 6 months, how is it lifetime? And anyway, if I use it that much that I have to keep recharging in 6 months, it will anyway last for my lifetime no? So what the fcuk is lifetime for? Someone should sue these a**holes for fooling the consumers.
April 4th, 2006 at 01:39 am
How the hell can companies fool consumers by saying 'LifeTime' Validity??? When you have to keep recharging every 6 months, how is it lifetime? And anyway, if I use it that much that I have to keep recharging in 6 months, it will anyway last for my lifetime no? So what the fcuk is lifetime for? Someone should sue these a**holes for fooling the consumers.