ADDITIONAL BENCH STATE CONSUMER DISPUTES REDRESSAL COMMISSION, PUNJAB, CHANDIGARH.

First Appeal No.20 of 2023 Date of institution : 11/01/2023 Reserved on : 27.05.2024 Date of decision : 14.06.2024 Vandna Luthra Climing Centre (VLCC), SLS Tower, 1^st Flor, 100 Ft.

Road, East Mohan Nagar, Amritsar through its Centre head.

…..Appellant/Opposite party Versus Benu Gupta W/o Rajesh Kumar resident of House No.130/12, Gali Narain Wali, Behrampur Road, Gurdaspur, Punjab …..Respondent/complainant First Appeal under the Consumer Protection Act, 2019 against the order dated 04.10.2022 passed by District Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission, Tarn Taran (Camp Court Amritsar) Quorum:-

Mr. H.P.S.Mahal, Presiding Judicial Member Mrs. Kiran Sibal, Member Present:-

For the appellant : Sh. Atul Goyal, Advocate For respondent : Ex-parte KIRAN SIBAL, MEMBER The instant appeal has been filed by the appellant/opposite party against the order dated 04.10.2022 passed by District Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission, Tarn Taran, Camp Court Amritsar, (in short, the “District Commission”) in RBT/375/2017, whereby the complaint filed by complainant against opposite party (in short ‘OP’), under the Consumer Protection Act, was allowed as under:-

“7. In view of above discussion the present complaint is allowed and the opposite party is directed to refund the amount of Rs. 2,85,963/- to the complainant. The complainant has been harassed by the opposite party for a long time, the complainant is also entitled to Rs. 25,000/- (Rs. Twenty Five Thousand only) as compensation on account of harassment and Rs. 10,000/- (Rs. Ten Thousand only) as litigation expenses. Opposite Parties are directed to comply with the order within one month from the date of receipt of copy of the order, failing which the complainant is entitled to interest @ 9% per annum, on the awarded amount, from the date of .

complaint till its realisation .”

2. It would be apposite to mention that hereinafter the parties will be referred, as have been arrayed before the District Commission.

3. Brief facts for the disposal of the appeal are that in the month of August 2015, the complainant availed the services of opposite party for weight loss. The central head of the OP had assured the complainant that its products are very effective and she would lose 10 K.G. weight within three months. Believing the assurance and guaranty given by the opposite party, the complainant purchased the package for the services i.e. sliming, beauty package alongwith hair rebounding and paid the price of the same as mentioned in the complaint. The complainant attended the sliming classes, for about 8 months i.e. from August 2015 to March 2016, but hardly lost even a single gram of weight. At the time of joining the classes, her weight was 113 kg and when after 8 months the complainant left the classes, her weight was 111 kg. It was guaranteed by the opposite party that complainant would lose 10 kg in 3 months, whereas only 2 kg was lost in the span of 8 months. After the expiry of 8 months, the opposite party told the complainant that the therapy was exhausted and the complainant had to buy more therapies, which she bought on 14.2.2016 by paying Rs.30,936/-. There was no positive result of the therapies suggested and applied by the opposite party upon the complainant for weight loss, for which she had paid huge money to the OP. The complainant asked the opposite party to refund the money, which it had taken for further therapies and has not been used till date, but the OP openly refused to refund the money on the ground that there is no policy of the opposite party to refund the amount even if the services of those therapies are not availed or used. Thereafter, on 28.4.2017, the complainant sent an e-mail regarding the refund of unused packages to the centre head i.e. opposite party but it had not replied to the same. The act and conduct of the OP amounted to deficiency in service on its part and the complainant had suffered