Damages suit: TCS chief executive summoned for Feb 18

Complainant says courier company cost her lucrative job.

LAHORE: A consumer court on Saturday issued notice to the chief executive of The Courier Service (TCS) for February 19 in a suit seeking Rs1,000,000 in damages from the company for allegedly providing defective services.

Complainant Rabia Fakhar, resident of Harbanspura, submitted that on December 22 she sent her application for the post of ‘head of institution’, advertised in a newspaper on December 20 by the Punjab Daanish School and Centres of Excellence Authority, with closing date December 27, through TCS.

The complainant said that she clearly wrote the address and contact numbers of the officer concerned of the institution.

She said that she was stunned when her document was returned with the objection that there was “no such consignee given address”. She said she contacted TCS customer services representative Harris Jahangir, but in vain.

She stated that she was an eligible candidate for the said post and if she had been selected she would stand to get a salary of Rs150,000 per month with benefits and accommodation.

Fakhar said that she served a legal notice on the company but had received no response. She asked the court to direct the respondent to pay Rs1,000,000 in damages for putting her through “mental torture, distress, agony and financial loss”.

TCS head of security and safety Major Ghulam Murtaza said that he could not understand why a courier would return a letter to the sender if the complete address had been supplied.

He said the TCS customer service people had reported that the letter did not bear the complete address and informed Fakhar, and she had responded that she would visit the address personally.

Murtaza also rejected the petitioner’s claim that she had lost a job opportunity owing to the incident, since the complainant, according to the record, had appeared for an interview for the said post.

Published in The Express Tribune, January 30^th,  2011.