Delivery app, eatery fined for serving non-veg food to veg consumer
The district consumer disputes redressal forum fined a food delivery app and a restaurant for mixing up orders and delivering a non-vegetarian dish to a woman who ordered a vegetarian dish.
{Biryani blunder}
The district consumer disputes redressal forum fined a food delivery app and a restaurant for mixing up orders and delivering a non-vegetarian dish to a woman who ordered a vegetarian dish.
The eatery, Behrouz Biryani, and delivery app, Swiggy, have been directed to pay ₹50,000 to the complainant, Vasu Gupta.
In her complaint, Gupta said that she is a vegetarian Hindu and the non-vegetarian order caused her significant distress.
The commission, headed by president Sanjeev Batra and member Monika Bhagat, announced the decision in favour of the complainant, a resident of Haibowal Kalan.
Vasu Gupta said she follows a strict vegetarian diet and had ordered a spicy subz-e-biryani (Hyderabadi veg biryani) through Swiggy on January 14, 2022. However, when her order arrived, she found that it was lazeez bhuna murgh (chicken biryani). The mix-up left her feeling nauseous for several days due to her inability to tolerate the smell of chicken, she said in the complaint.
Distressed by the incident, Gupta contacted Behrouz Biryani through emails to report the mistake. The restaurant apologised and offered a refund in the form of coupons, which Gupta declined. She continued to communicate her grievances through emails and messages, detailing how the error violated her religious beliefs.
In their defense, the food delivery service submitted that they had refunded ₹164, the price of the meal. However, the court ruled that the refund did not compensate for the mental agony and harassment Gupta faced.
The court highlighted the responsibilities of the food delivery aggregator and the restaurant under the Consumer Protection Act, 2019, and the Consumer Protection (E-Commerce) Rules, 2020.
These rules prohibit unfair trade practices and mandate that e-commerce platforms must have a consumer grievance redressal mechanism to resolve complaints within a month. However, in this case, after a few initial responses, the companies stopped communicating with Gupta, which the court deemed a deficiency of service.
The court ordered the restaurant and Swiggy to pay Gupta within 30 days from the date the order was pronounced, that is July 23, 2024. If the payment is not made within this period, the companies will have to pay interest at a rate of 8% per annum from the date of the complaint until the payment is made.