Pay Rs 6 lakh within six weeks or face trial Judge Regupathi of the state consumer commission on Friday ordered the Cox and Kings tour company on a complaint by a consumer that the firm had failed to take him on a European tour and withheld his passport for four years.
The jude also ordered the company to give back the Rs 1,25,478 deposit of petitioner V. Thangavel Samy, a retired college professor of Madurai, adding that withholding the passport was unnecessary.
“I was overjoyed seeing an advertisement by Cox and Kings regarding a European trip in 2007 for 10 days. I immediately paid the deposit and planned for the trip,” Samy said.
“However, just before the trip, the company staff told me that my trip had to be cancelled because they arranged the trip in ‘twin-sharing’ and my companion had not got visa clearance. Otherwise, I had to pay Rs 25,000 extra to make the trip,” he said.
Samy decided to take the next trip as the company assured him that they make more than 40 trips to European countries every year.
The petitioner said he did not receive any call from the company and when he asked then they told him to pay Rs 50,000 cancellation charges and take back the rest of the money .
The petitioner said he refused to pay the cancellation charges and asked for the deposit but they did not return his passport. Aggrieved, he moved the Madurai consumer court and got an order in his favour.
However, he was not satisfied with the compensation of `10,000 ordered by the Madurai court and moved the state commission.
Cox and Kings staff said they have printed the terms and conditions on the pamphlets that they would not return the money. The judge said the text was in small print and the counter arguments were unworthy.