4 min readNew DelhiJun 17, 2026 10:26 AM IST
First published on: Jun 17, 2026 at 10:23 AM IST
A district consumer forum in Tamil Nadu’s Kanniyakumari has ordered a home appliance brand to pay Rs 29,204 to a man who bought a vacuum cleaner for his wife from the online marketplace Flipkart, but the cleaning device stopped working the following month.
A bench of president Y Gladstone Blessed Tagore and member S Nagendran was dealing with the plea of a man who purchased the vacuum cleaner for Rs 4,204. The commission awarded a refund of the purchased amount, besides Rs 15,000 for mental strain, mental agony and deficiency in service, and Rs 10,000 as litigation cost.
“The vacuum cleaner bought by the complainant stopped working within a month. The customer care centre of the 1st opposite party delayed and harassed the complainant. All these are deficiencies in service. This would have given severe mental strain and mental agony to the complainant, the commission said on May 26.
Complainant’s stand justified: Consumer forum
- From the categorical evidence of the complainant, it appears that the vacuum cleaner he bought in February 2025 stopped working the following month, the consumer forum noted.
- The evidence submitted by the complainant proves that in spite of several efforts, the customer care personnel of the company did not respond properly, and the defects in the vacuum cleaner were not at all rectified.
- The company came forward to replace the vacuum cleaner only after the complainant submitted a complaint to the National Consumer Helpline.
- The complainant, however, refused the offer to replace at this stage, on the ground that the company had caused much delay and gave mental strain to him.
- The complainant is justified in refusing to accept the offer to replace the device.
‘Repeatedly approached company’
The complainant purchased a vacuum cleaner in February 2025 for Rs 4,204 through Flipkart for his wife. The warranty period was one year. But in March 2025, it stopped working. The complainant then repeatedly approached the brand to rectify the defects.
He alleged that the brand’s customer care personnel caused a delay and did not rectify the issue. He subsequently submitted a petition to the National Consumer Helpline. It was only after that the opposite party (company) came forward to replace the vacuum cleaner with a new one. Since the opposite party caused a delay and committed a deficiency in service, the complainant refused the replacement offer.
‘Complainant not a consumer’
It was argued that the product was purchased by one Tina Albert from Kerala, and the complainant is not a consumer. The company claimed that the product was sold in Kerala and the purchaser too lived in the state.
It was submitted that the complainant had not produced any proof that he bought the product for his wife, and when the technicians visited the address of the complainant to rectify the fault, the complainant did not allow them to attend to it.
Significance
This judgment matters as it confirms that a person paying for gifts is a consumer, even if the invoice lists a relative. It affirms local jurisdiction for residents and penalises manufacturers for service delays, establishing that mental agony from poor support warrants significant compensation.
It was only after the complainant approached the National Consumer Helpline that the company came forward to replace the vacuum cleaner with a new one, the forum noted. (AI-generated image) 
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