Ranchi, March 2: Numerous complaints of cell phone bills not reaching their destinations have forced the Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited, Ranchi, to revert to the good old department of posts and telegraph to ferry their bills.

Harried subscribers who never got their bills on time can take heart from the fact that they were not alone. No less a person than the chief minister had to face the same problem.

Courier agencies have in the past returned bills of the chief minister and the Ranchi deputy commissioner. Incredibly, the reason for the delay was stated as “address not found.”

A senior BSNL official said, “The decision to send bills through the government agency was taken only after the private courier agencies either failed to deliver the bills on time or returned them completely as the addresses could not be traced.”

Plans to rope in the agencies for couriering land line bills have been abandoned.

“When they failed to deliver a few thousand cellular bills on time, it is unlikely that they can deliver bills to over a lakh basic phone owners,” the official said.

Even private cellular operators have renewed their trust in the department of posts. Reliance Telecom, which has only 2,000 -2500 post paid subscribers, however, continues to send bills through courier agencies.

“Besides demanding almost 50 per cent more than the government postal department, the courier agencies also demand a commitment for at least a year. ,” the official said.

The men from the postal department are better equipped and acquainted with every nook and corner of the city and villages, he added.

The courier agencies, however, have their own set of grouses.

A DTDC franchisee Ashok Murarka said, “We are equipped to deliver 20,000 consignments within 24 hours, but on our terms and conditions. No one can handle BSNL consignments without a proper infrastructure. We had asked it to enter into an agreement for one year and give us two departmental (free) phones to handle complaints. Those never materialised.”

“We also stopped dealing with them as we had to run from pillar to post to get the payments cleared. They paid us Rs 4 per bill while we wanted Rs 6. The BSNL had also approached us to distribute basic phone bills. The deal was nearly finalised at Rs 5 per bill, but we wanted a minimum commitment of a year, which they were not willing to consider. ,” Murarka added.