More such BSNL service centres will come up shortly. Picture by Biju Boro

June 29: The Bharat Sanchar Nigam Limited (BSNL) has decided to set up customer service centres in key localities of the city in the face of growing complaints of poor customer service from its CellOne subscribers.

BSNL sources said the centres would come up within a few days in the Ulubari and Ganeshguri areas. “These will be followed by some more centres in Narengi, Beltola, Maligaon and Chandmari.” At present, there are only two customer service centres — at Panbazar and Dispur.

The move has also been necessitated by BSNL’s decision to give 40,000 new CellOne connections. The source said they have already sold 30,000 forms for the 40,000 connections to be offered during this phase. The company will distribute SIM cards for the new connections from July 7..

“The connections will be provided in a phased manner according to the dates of submission of forms,” the source said. He said they are also planning to provide another 20,000 new connections if the demand increases. BSNL had started distributing forms for the new CellOne connections on June 18.

The source said the department had not increased the number of centres earlier as they had a subscriber base of only 13,719. “The two centres were sufficient to meet the complaints. It has been just a couple of months since we launched our mobile services here. We are trying our best to upgrade the system and the service centres,” he added, admitting complaints were on the rise.

Apart from the customer service centres, BSNL has also introduced the online bill payment system for the convenience of the its customers. The official also added that they had some problems with the billing system which is currently undergoing upgradation. He also admitted that the bills did not always reach subscribers on time due to some “management” problems. “But we are trying to improve the facilities as the subscriber base is increasing,” he added.

Many subscribers have complained of discrepancies in the bills. They allege that BSNL charged them for calls which they never made. This had led to much harassment for the subscribers who had to shuttle from one official to another to get their bills rectified.

The public sector telecom major has also been facing criticism from subscribers about the billing of the land line connections. The BSNL has recently registered a number of complaints from its land line subscribers for disconnecting their lines on the ground of outstanding dues.

The subscribers complained that the company had included bills, pending since 1997, which they never received. However, the BSNL authorities said they would take steps to preempt these problems in the mobile service. They also assured that the bills would be despatched on time and they would monitor the delivery.