Siege like situation could be seen at the offices of the Pakistan Telecommunication Company in the city where people had gathered to ask for deletion of Rs 199 arbitrarily included in the call charges bill for the month of December 2007.
On Monday, January 28, being the last date for PTCL bill payment, people had thronged its offices for the deletion of "Pakistan Package" charges but finding it difficult due to rush of people, could neither pay the bill nor could get it corrected.
Outside PTCL offices there were no one to guide the harassed customers regarding the location of correction counter or to ask them to make queues so that process of correction could be carried out peacefully and efficiently. The staff of the PTCL at the Nazimabad centre ritually observed prayers/lunch break for more than one hour. During the break, the number of customers unmanageably swelled. Brawl, among the agitated customers, could also be seen.
The customers were still not satisfied by the removal of Rs 199 from their bills. They wanted adjustment in the central excise duty as well. The staff correcting bills was seen advising customers that the bill for January payable in February would be up by a few rupees as calculations were not being carried out correctly.
They were seen advising customers to bear with corrected bill and wait till bills for subsequent months would be dispatched to them. The customers who got caught in the Pakistan Package's rigmarole, and failed to pay their bills in time, could take a sigh of relief as extension in last date of payment of bills till January 31 has been announced.