RBI Internet Handling Fees for Movie Tickets Illegal
In response to a Right to Information (RTI) Act application, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) said that it is illegal for the online movie-ticketing platforms to charge "Internet Handling Fees".
These days booking movie-tickets has become very easy due to online movie ticket booking websites.These websites do not book the tickets free of cost. They always charge a certain amount known as “Internet Handling fees” over the cost of the tickets. Recently the President of Hyderabad-based "Forum Against Corruption", Vijay Gopal filed a Right to Information Act (RTI) application with the RBI questioning the validity of these fees. In response to this RTI, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) said that online movie-ticketing platforms cannot charge "Internet Handling Fees".
The RBI said that these websites are breakings the regulations of the RBI's Merchant Discount Rate (MDR).The MDR is a payment which the trader has to pay to the bank, for handling all the internet transactions. The RBI said that online movie-ticketing platforms can not ask customers to pay this amount.
After receiving RBI's response, Vijay Gopal filed a case in a Hyderabad consumer court against online movie-ticketing platform BookMyShow and multiplex chain PVR] for charging "Internet Handling Fees".He even filed a case against the Department of Information Technology for not enforcing the regulation. According to Vijay Gopal, the "Internet Handling Fees" is also charged by online cab booking services and food delivery Apps.
