A case against ICICI Bank for doing unfair trade practice

Another case of unfair trade practice by ICICI bank has come into lime light. For this the bank has been directed to pay Rs 20,000 as compensation to a complainant and Rs 2,200 as litigation costs. The District Consumer Disputes Redressal Forum found the bank guilty of deficiency in service after a sanctioned loan of Rs 1, 02,000 was shown to the complainant against the told Rs 91,000. The bank has also been directed to restore the loan account of the complainant.

The forum in its ruling said, “It is yet another case of unfair trade practice on part of the bank in disbursing the loan to a third party instead of the complainant and thereby causing a loss of Rs 11,000 to the complainant and benefiting their stooges by giving them benefit of the aforesaid amount”. The forum also blamed the bank of teaming up with the Car Bazaar in order to serve up their vested interests.

Surjit Kumar Gupta in his complaint stated that in November 2005, an ICICI executive approached him with the offer of financing his old car at a low rate of interest. At that time he was assured a loan of Rs 1 lakh with equated monthly installments (EMI) of 36 months. He was then given a cheque of Rs 91,000 with an EMI of Rs 3,560 every month. The complainant was regularly paying the installment but he was not satisfied with the service of the bank, therefore he approached it to clear the whole amount. According to him the outstanding amount shown by the bank at Rs 46,218 in October 2008, was highly inflated.

When the complainant asked for the explanation but the bank neither returned the excessive amount nor gave any satisfactory reply.

In its reply, to the forum the bank stated that the full amount of loan sanctioned was Rs 1,02,000 as availed by the complainant. Bank denied that it made a short disbursal of Rs 91,000.

The forum, headed by president Jagrup Singh Mahal, found merit in the argument that Max Car Bazar is being supported up by the employees of the bank in order to favor them with a wrongful gain and to cause a wrongful loss of Rs 11,000 to the complainant. The forum apprehended “The payment was made to Max Car Bazar instead of making the same directly to the complainant. It is an unfair trade practice on the part of the bank.”