Tips on Writing an Effective Consumer Complaint Notice

As a complainant, you may find a dozen tips on how to write an effective consumer complaint notice that gets due attention from the brand. But how would you know that the tips that you are following actually going to help you with an effective notice. The brands face a huge number of consumer complaints on a daily basis and there is a relatively petite number of complaints that these authorities will satisfy.

So, an important question is ‘which consumer complaints are most likely to contend?’

If you are thinking – the most justified one…. then you are absolutely wrong.

The notice that might lead to resolution would be the one that looks like and smells like a real “TROUBLE”. So, its time you write your notice in a manner that actually looks and smell like ‘trouble’ to the brand.

We are sharing a few tips on this, writing an effective notice is an important part of the Procedure To File Complaint In Consumer Court –

1) The notice must be on a good and clean paper with content that is printed using a good printer and is clear and concise.

2) Before you begin, explore the internet and look for information whether there are other consumers facing the same issue. Make use of the information posted by other consumers.

3) Start the notice with a complimenting statement, “I have been a faithful consumer of your brand for the last 15 years. I never experienced any issues with your products or even with your customer service. But then, there is first time to everything and my last purchase, noted below, took me completely by shock. I strongly believe that this might be a single case of occurrence and shall be remedied quickly”.

4) In your notice, you better stick to the facts and do not add anything that you can’t prove. Also, avoid editorializing brand’s corporate responsibilities – they very well know they have responsibilities. It can act as a distraction and would add unnecessary length to the notice.

5) Make sure you let them know in clear words, what relief you are expecting but in a polite way.

6) Never allow your anger to show through your words. Be professional, and anger, snide remarks will portrait you as an amateur. Do not expect a quick response, anyhow you don’t have any control over this, then why mention it. The simple statement would be “I look forward to your response in due course”.

7) Do not predict their “response”. For any refusal, let the brand put up this in writing with valid reasons. This will give you a chance to respond to their denial.

8) Just the way you started your notice on a positive note, the ending should also be the same i.e. positive, however, with a question. One best example to this, which will get you an immediate response would be “'If I am in error on any of the facts I have noted above or, on any other aspect of the case I have outlined, please advise.” This will put the responsibility on the brand and they will end up responding in detail. These lines will help you in finding any flaw in your notice content and you will get time to rectify at a much early stage.

9) Finally, use “Respectively yours” – politeness and courteous words along with a notice will reinforce the fact that you being reasonable and respectful all the time.

10) Threatening won’t work here, resist yourself from adding your influential references and similarly do not threaten them to take the matter to the consumer forums or court. It is just the beginning, using such information would strike an unnecessarily negative tone and definitely the mark of an amateur. Understand the fact that you are letting the brand know about your issues for the first time and at this stage, they are absolutely blameless.

Be ready with your follow up correspondences. This notice to the brand complaining about the product or service may not necessarily be your last correspondence with the brand. In view of that, the first and second correspondence is not for issuing any threats. The first notice is to state in plain words the facts and issues that you are facing with their product and put forward a well-reasoned, respectful request for a relief.

And if you are still in a fix and finding it difficult to write such notice, consider having a professional help. A well written notice is important to your success against the brand. For more information on further Procedure To File Complaint In Consumer Court, visit www.consumersathi.com/

Important Information on Consumer Rights

What is Information?

We often come across the word “information” and yes, it is a simple word but do we actually know what information is? Information is any factual data in any form, for instance – records, reports, documents, e-mails, memos, advice, opinions, circulars, press releases, orders, circulars, contracts, log books, papers, reports, models, samples and data material held in any form.

What is Right to Information?

A citizen under the Consumer Protection Act has a right to obtain any of the above-mentioned information types from a public authority either maintained by the public authority or is maintained under its control and to some extent the right even extends to private organizations as well. The Right to Information or RTI includes – Inspection of records, documents and work, taking extracts, notes or certified copies of records or documents, taking attested sample of factual information maintained by the public authority or maintained under the control of the public authority.

The legal resident has a right to seek any of these information types in the form of floppies, diskettes, video cassettes, tapes or in any other electronic types or even via printouts, on condition that the requested information is stored in a computer or in some other device wherein the information can be transferred further to any other storage system, like- diskettes, floppies, etc.

The benefits of this Act offer the RTI only to the Indian citizens. However, the act is not obliged to make provision for offering any such information to companies, associations, corporation and so forth, as these are legal entities or persons but not the citizens of India. Nevertheless, if an access to information is initiated by an office-bearer or employee of any company, association, corporation, NGO, etc. with his proper identity (name, etc) and if such office-bearer or employee is a citizen of India, it becomes the duty of the authority to entertain him/her with the required information. Such instances would be assumed as, a citizen has requested for information at the address of a company, association, corporation, NGO, etc.

Right To Information Before Private Companies

A citizen of India has every right to obtain information on a privately owned business or company, despite the fact that the entity is in the private sector, proviso the entity reports to a government body or is owned partially or considerably by any such governing body.

NRI’s Right To Information

Likewise, the Consumer Protection Act offers NRIs the right to information. Section 4 of the RTI Act, 2005 empowers NRIs and Persons of Indian Origin (PIOs) to approach and get access to the desired information. The RTI rights for NRIs and PIOs are defined by the Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs. As one of their fundamental rights, in case of any query or grievance, people under this category can contact the Protector General of Emigrants (PGE). The DOP (Department of Post) has started the e-IPO, which is the electronic version of Indian Postal order, this is a facility that helps the NRIs to make online payment for obtaining information under Right to Information Act.

Content And Format Of Application

For the information request to be heard and adhered to, it should follow a specified format, which is easy and concise way of delivering your requirements to the concerned authority-

a) First and foremost, it is important that the applicant writes the queries as a numbered list. This order will be maintained by the PIO as well. Also, it is imperative to maintain the same number sequence for further appeal levels, for instance – first appeal, second appeal, Consumer complaints, etc.)

b) The applicant can write “N” number of paras and sub-paras in a single application. There is no such restriction on as to what amount of information can be obtained in a single application. The initial fee applicable on RTI application remains the same. However, an important thing to know is that each para/point should contend with just one part of information, record or work. It is allowed to pen-down sub-points or sub-paras.

c) Focus specifically on the reason or purpose of obtaining any such information.

d) The applicant should frame his queries in a concise and crisp way and makes it impossible for the authorities to wriggle out whole or part of the application.

However, before preparing the appeal or application, it is important that the applicant is well-versed with all the RTI rules framed by the High court or by the concerned State government. The applicant can also ask for a free, detailed copy of the Citizens Charter (a document setting out the rights of citizens) to be provided with the reply. 

For more information on RTI or when can and how to report an RTI Consumer Complaint Online, visit http://www.consumersathi.com