Consumer affairs secretary reviews redressal of complaints under edtech consortium

Consumer Affairs Secretary Rohit Kumar Singh met members of the Indian Edtech Consortium (IEC) in New Delhi in a closed-room meeting to review the progress made by the self-regulatory body in resolving consumer complaints.

Members of the IEC, including its co-chairpersons Divya Gokulnath, co-founder of Byju's and Mayank Kumar, co-founder and Managing Director of upGrad, briefed Singh about the ongoing efforts of IEC in safeguarding consumer interests through feasible offerings. The meeting happened on November 17, a person directly involved with the discussions said.

The Consumer Affairs Secretary agreed to support IEC to constitute a joint working group for laying down advertising guidelines to sanitise the edtech ecosystem,  Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI), under which the IEC is set up, said in a statement on November 21.

"Such meetings are happening regularly now as the IEC needs to understand what the Department of Consumer Affairs (DoCA) is doing etc," the person quoted above said, requesting anonymity discussing a private matter.

"The DoCA wants the IEC to come up with standard operating procedures for all IEC members and other things, so that got done. The IEC also shares their complaints, status of the complaints, updates from the IGRB (internal grievience redressal board) etc with the DoCA," the person added.

Currently, IEC comprises Indian edtech companies and represents 95 percent of the Indian learner community, IAMAI said. The meeting also saw participation from other edtech companies including Unacademy, Times Professional Learning and Great Learning, along with Byju's and upGrad.

“IEC was formed with a mission to safeguard the interest of its consumers and we shall continue to take corrective measures in this regard. This indeed, is a big step and we are thankful of the government to have provided us with enough support for building an all-inclusive ecosystem that encourages ethical and transparent communication for its learners and key stakeholders,” said Kumar of upGrad.

The IEC members also presented a report highlighting the efficacy of the 2-tier grievance redressal and IGRB, which claimed to be successful in resolving 99 percent of the complaints raised in the last 10 months, IAMAI said.

"We want Indian Edtechs to grow, but until we eliminate the wrongdoings completely, we will not be able to achieve our mission. We would like to work closely with IEC in formalising set templates and operating guidelines for Edtech companies to keep unethical practices within advertising and communications at bay. It shall foster a holistic operating environment for both entrepreneurs and consumers to offer a fair chance of growth and learning,” said Singh.

Singh's move to take note of the redressal of complaints comes at a time when edtech companies in India have been under fire for alleged mis-selling and overselling to parents and learners. The country's largest edtech companies, including Byju's-owned Great Learning, Unacademy's job guarantee vertical Relevel,  Byju's core business have come under fire for unfulfilled promises.

Moneycontrol had earlier reported how Unacademy's Relevel was struggling to get its candidates placed. In July, Byju’s had to settle a consumer court plaint filed by a parent by offering a refund of Rs 99,000 and compensation of Rs 30,000, according to a media report. Great Learning, too, allegedly misled learners by selling a Continuing Education and Quality Improvement Programme (CE&QIP) offered by IIT-B as a PGP (post-graduate programme).