Tamil Nadu - Coimbatore   

Plea to revise conditions for LPG refills

Staff Reporter

Coimbatore: The Coimbatore Consumer Cause (CCC) has appealed to the Union Minister for Petroleum to direct the petroleum corporations to revise the conditions imposed on consumers for getting LPG refills.

In the wake of misuse of subsidised domestic LPG cylinders for commercial purposes and as auto-fuel, the corporations imposed conditions on refill requests. One condition was that there should be a gap of 21 days between one refill and the next.

The Secretary of CCC, K. Kathirmathiyon, said that the conditions instead of penalising those misusing the cylinders were putting the genuine consumers to hardship. A customer could not book a refill before 21 days of having got the last cylinder.

After booking, the distributors took time ranging from 5 to 10 days for honouring the request. Ultimately, the waiting period would come to 30-35 days. In certain cases, even the second cylinder available with the consumers got exhausted if there was a rise in the consumption.

Mr. Kathirmathiyon suggested that the dealers/distributors should be asked to book refill requests any time. Under this system, the consumer would be assured of the next cylinder between 21 and 25 days of the previous refill.

When contacted, the BPCL officials said that the distributors were clearly instructed to take the refill requests at any time. In case of any difficulty with any of the BPCL distributors, the consumers could call 0422-2534336.

Senior Area Manager of Indane (IOC) A. Balaravi also said that distributors were told not to defer booking of refill requests and in case of any difficulty, Indane customers could approach the Area Office (LPG) at 2217396.

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