Subject: Very bad customer treatment from a Bharat Petroleum retailer in at Trivandrum, Kerala.

Dear Sir,

Please be informed that I am writing this with immense emotional stress due to a mishap happened today morning at one of the Bharat Petroleum retailer – filling - A VV Iyer and Co, Bharat Petroleum Retailer, FF – TC15/696, GF – TC15/1696, Vazhuthacadu, Trivandrum, around 10:10 am in the morning.
Regularly I use to fill petrol for my car at this out let and even it is for 100 Rs, they use to accept debit card and credit card every time. Further to that, recently - occasionally they do not accept debit card and credit card for amounts such as 100, 150and up to 200. This created a lot of discomfort nowadays for common people like us.
Today morning when I went to the same out let and gave the pump staff, my HDFC debit card to fill petrol for 150 Rs, he rejected and another old man of the pump came to me and agreed with the staff, and harassed me verbally by shouting and in anger. This is the 3rd time I am getting such sort of misbehavior from that same pump and from the staffs there.
After that, I asked them why you people won’t accept debit cards and swipe for 150, he shouted at me and gave the explanation as - for such small amounts we do not accept cards and it’s a heavy loss for us and also the telephone charges will also go high for them if they swipe for such small amounts. For the last three times he gave me the same answer. But occasionally the staffs use to swipe the card also.
I was with my wife and was really annoyed in front of other people standing there and when enquired, came to know that a lot of people suffered such misbehavior from that pump, by this old man and the staffs there.
This created a lot of mental stress for me and my wife, and also a lot of time was wasted for this at the pump itself during the morning rush hours. As I being an IT professional working here at Techno park, this incident totally made my day lost and I was forced to take a half day leave due to late arrival at office.
Please understand the difficulty we common people are facing due to these behaviors of Petrol pump staffs. Despite of the morning rush and huge hike in petrol prices, incidents like this are creating heavy burden and also will cause the reputed Bharat Petroleum company a bad mark in the industry.
So humbly requesting the concerned authorities to take immediate action against such pumps at the earliest to avoid such mishaps.
Sincerely
Nidhin R
Trivandrum 18 -01- 2011