HYDERABAD: The District Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission-III, Hyderabad, has penalised a courier company for causing damage to lifesaving medical supplies during transit. The drug supplier company Hetero Health Care Ltd. and its representative New India Assurance Co. Ltd. (an insurance company) sued Gati Kintetsu Express Pvt. Ltd. for damaging the highly valued medicines.
On April 24, 2017, Hetero Health Care Ltd. dispatched a consignment of 348 packages of lifesaving drugs valued at Rs 55.47 lakh from Hyderabad to be delivered to Kolkata. Though the said consignment was packed in aluminium foil strips inside craton boxes, the courier company failed to hand it carefully. When the consignment reached Kolkata on May 5, 2017, 400 strips were found damaged, and 200 strips were missing.
Finding fault with the courier company on account of deficiency of service, the Commission directed Gati Kintetsu Express Pvt. Ltd. to pay Rs 1.21 lakh for the damaged strips and Rs 1.54 lakh for the missing ones with 9 per cent interest.