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Tuesday, December 1, 2020

Ease of booking a Gas Cylinder ... .. all important change in Telephone Number

Corona and lockdown has changed lives of many people ~ now many Gents who had hitherto had never lit their stove, do some cooking, cleaning of vegetables, cutting them and preparing food too !!  ~ this is an important post – for from 1.11.2020, the Telephone number for booking refill of gas cylinders has changed.

There is one eternal negativist in social media who would cry hoarse trying to mislead people stating  that LPG cylinder is more than Rs.1000/-  - I posted on his FB page  with diligent proof that it is not so  ~ unable to digest the reality, he put an acerbic comment on my looks ! and more so, on my Srivaishnava mark .. that is his calibre !  : TWO certain lies : 1)  the price that he tries to put would never take in to account the subsidy that he enjoys 2) the price at Chennai for the past 1 year has never touched that figure even



Half a century ago, there were less than a handful of houses which had a gas connection  – cooking was done in  kerosene stoves and kerosene was the most sought after commodity.  Housewives were afraid of pressure cookers too.. there were lot of jokes of wives forgetting the close the gas stoves, coming to see movies and calling back their nearby homes (no mobiles those days and owning a telephone was aristocratic)  to check whether they have switched the stove off – remember that there would be slides in Cinema theatres urging the people to ensure that they switch off the gas stoves immediately once the cooking is over…..

The red cylinder containing LPG is a prized possession for households and there is always concern as to how many days the connection would last and whether refill would be readily available. Now a days, most households have double cylinders and some have multiple connection too… still, people of worried of regular supply.  The distributor is a very important person and the arrival of gas delivery boy is heralded with happiness.  Do you know the rate of a gas cylinder ??  for  all of us who  have a domestic LPG cylinder –– the biggest worry in earlier times was :

          When will I get the refill ?

          How many times will I have to go the distributor

       Am I getting a cylinder which was clandestinely used in a hotel or some other eatery elsewhere

All of them have  vanished ! ~ the biggest advantage now in present times :

o         Ease of booking [tele call / sms / web / visit too !]

o       Transparency in booking and availability (actually there has been no shortage at all in recent years)

o         Up dates on billing / availability / release / delivery

o         Fraud control mechanism preventing misuse of domestic cylinders

LPG – liquefied petroleum gas, is mostly a mixture of propane and butane.  Propane is a three-carbon alkane, normally a gas, but compressible to a transportable liquid.  It may also contain small amounts of propylene and/or butylene. An odorant such as ethanethiol or thiophene is added so that people can easily smell the gas in case of a leak.

In case you do not know – the price of 14.2 Kg LPG cylinder – the one that we use at home is Rs.610.42.

For many years there was subsidy being credited to the SB account of the user – at the request of honourable Prime Minister, many of us gave up the subsidy and me too did in the month the request was announced.  Due to Covid-19 pandemic, the government is providing three free LPG cylinders to all below poverty line families who are subscribers of cooking gas under Ujjwala scheme. But other customers are now paying full amount for the cylinder without getting any subsidy support from the government. The Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana provides free cooking gas connections to families living below the poverty line.  The aim of the scheme is to provide clean cooking fuel to every poor household, especially in rural areas, where household air pollution from traditional cooking fuels like wood and coal is a major health hazard. Connections are given in the name of the adult woman in the house.

Now the subject matter of the post .. .. .. Gas Booking Number change.

Effective  1 November 2020, the Indane Gas booking number stands changed. Indian Oil has proposed one common number for Indane LPG (Liquefied petroleum gas) refill booking across the country for customer convenience. To book a gas cylinder you now have to call 7718955555. This service is available 24×7 for the customers.

According to a press release issued by Ministry of Petroleum & Natural Gas, “The current system of telecom circle-specific phone numbers for booking Indane LPG refills will be discontinued after 31.10.2020 midnight and the common booking number for LPG refills i.e. 7718955555, will be in force.”  Notably, Indane LPG booking can be done using the customer’s REGISTERED MOBILE NUMBER only.

The revised process of LPG refill booking and mobile number registration is as follows:

a.       If the customer’s number is already registered in Indane records, IVRS will prompt the 16-digit consumer ID. Please note that this 16-digit consumer ID is mentioned on the customer’s Indane LPG invoices / cash memos / subscription voucher. Upon confirmation by the customer, the refill booking will be accepted.

b.       If the customer’s mobile number is not available in Indane records, then one-time registration of the mobile number should be done by customers by entering their 16-digit consumer ID starting with 7. This should be followed by authentication in the same IVRS call. Upon confirmation, the customer’s mobile number will get registered and the LPG refill booking will be accepted. This 16-digit consumer ID of the customer is mentioned on Indane LPG invoices/ cash memos / subscription voucher.

• The new IVRS (Interactive Voice Response System) number has been configured to serve Indane customers across India.

• One can apply for an LPG refill booking either through SMS or IVRS.

• Indane LPG booking can only be done using your registered mobile number.

• When the refill cylinder arrives at your home, you will be required to furnish the One Time Password (OTP) to the delivery agent.

In Sept. 2012, the Government  announced restriction of the supply of subsidised cooking gas to 6 cylinders per household in a year to fetch an additional Rs 20,300 crore.  The CCPA decided that each household will get 6 cylinders of 14.2-kg per annum at the subsidised rate and any requirement beyond that would have to be procured at the market rate.   Modiji went a step ahead – linked Bank Account with Gas account and Aadhar – whilst critics were busy commenting that this would never become a reality –  within  a few months, people forgot  that they were getting gas cylinders at a lower rate.  They starting paying the full value and got  credited to their Bank Account the subsidy value instantaneously, eliminating most frauds that prevailed erstwhile  in gas cylinder distribution.

Happy customer**

With regards – S. Sampathkumar

9th Nov. 2020.

 

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