Panel slaps fine on hospitality chain, hotel for failure to provide booked accommodation to student

Mumbai, Dec 4 (PTI) A consumer commission here has held hospitality chain OYO Rooms and its partner hotel in Gujarat's Surat of deficiency in service, and slapped Rs 20,000 fine on them for failing to provide accommodation to a student despite advance booking.

In its order passed on Tuesday, the District Consumer Dispute Redressal Commission (Mumbai Suburban Additional) held that it was the "moral and legal duty" of a hotel to provide best possible services to its customer, and invoked the Sanskrit phrase "Atithi Devo Bhava" (guest is god) to drive home the point.

Allowing the student's plea seeking compensation from OYO Rooms and its partner hotel, the commission asked them to refund the booking amount of Rs 583 and pay Rs 10,000 each for causing mental harassment to the complainant.

As per the plea, the complainant had booked a room at a hotel in Surat for June 11, 2022, through OYO Rooms' online portal. He was going there to appear for the recruitment process of the Railway Recruitment Board.

The complainant said that he had paid the total amount for this room reservation and got an email confirmation for the same. However, on reaching the hotel, he was denied accommodation there as per his booking.

Later, the management provided him accommodation in another hotel and forced him to pay again for the stay, the complainant said.

He said he felt cheated due to such treatment meted out to him and sent notices to both OYO Rooms and its partner hotel in Surat.

However, as no solution was offered to him by any of them, the student decided to file a complaint before the consumer commission.

He pleaded for refund expenses incurred on the bookings and compensation for mental agony.

The commission had sent notices to both OYO and the hotel, but the former didn't appear before it.

The hotel filed an affidavit, saying the complaint was "false, frivolous, vexatious and not maintainable".

The complainant paid the booking amount to the opponent number 1 (OYO), which had not transferred the amount to them, the hotel said.

It further stated that the complainant misbehaved and used abusive language with the staff and the receptionist.

The commission, after perusal of documents on record, said, "It is highly impossible that a student appearing for any recruitment exam in another state alone will misbehave with any hotelier in their own business establishment." It ruled that allegations are "unwarranted and not supported with any evidence" and are not at all connected with the cause of the matter.

Invoking the phrase "Atithi Devo Bhava", the commission observed, "It is the moral and legal duty of the service provider to provide the best of the service possible to their customers." "Unfortunately, we observe that Opponent No. 2 (hotel) failed in their duty to act polite and provide good service to the complainant," it added.

The commission concluded that both the OYO Rooms and the hotel are guilty of providing deficient services on the count of not providing room as per the bookings made by the complainant. PTI AVI NP