Maid or Nanny Agency Took Fee, No Staff Sent: Refund Guide 2026

If a domestic-help or placement agency took your registration or advance fee and did not send the promised staff, you have three parallel rights: (a) a civil refund under the Consumer Protection Act 2019 for deficiency of service, (b) a criminal FIR under Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita 2023 Section 318 for cheating where intent to deceive is visible, and © a regulatory complaint through NCH 1915 and e-Daakhil. Act in this order: written demand within 24 hours, NCH ticket within 72 hours, police complaint by day 7 if no refund, e-Daakhil filing by day 30.

A placement or domestic-help agency is any firm, sole proprietorship or “consultancy” that supplies maid, nanny, cook, driver, caretaker, elderly-care attendant, patient-attendant, governess, security guard or housekeeping staff against a one-time registration fee, replacement-period commitment, or monthly retainer. Fraud occurs the moment the agency has taken your money and done one or more of the following:

• Has not delivered any staff after the promised window (typically 48 to 72 hours).
• Sent one person who left within hours and is now refusing free replacement that was sold as part of the package.
• Used forged Aadhaar, fake police verification certificates, or recycled photographs to pretend the staff is “verified”.
• Switched off all phone numbers, locked the shutter, deleted the Google Maps listing, or blocked you on WhatsApp.
• Demanded additional “security deposit”, “uniform charge” or “training fee” after the first payment, with no service in return.
• Is operating without GST registration on a fee above the threshold, without a Shops and Establishments licence, or without the state-mandated placement-agency registration where the state has one.

You do not need every one of these to act. Even a single broken commitment, plus refusal to refund within a reasonable time, is enough to trigger the Consumer Protection Act 2019 route. If the operator has disappeared or used forged documents, the criminal route opens too.

Three drivers have made placement-agency fraud one of the top urban household scams of 2025-2026:

1. UPI made advance fees frictionless. A scammer can collect Rs 8,000 to Rs 25,000 from each household in 30 seconds, then disappear. There is no cheque trail to chase.
2. Instagram and Facebook Marketplace gave low-cost reach. A two-week-old page with stock photos of “smiling didi” can run paid ads in a metro for Rs 500 a day and pick up 40 inquiries.
3. No central placement-agency regulator. Only a handful of states (notably Maharashtra, Karnataka, Kerala) have specific domestic-worker welfare laws with agency registration. In most states the agency is just another small business with no licence requirement, which makes vanishing cheap.

The result: by mid-2026, NCH 1915 and state consumer commissions are seeing a steady rise in “advance taken, staff never arrived” complaints, often clustered around tier-1 metros and IT-corridor suburbs.

Run this checklist the moment you suspect fraud. Each step is timestamped so the paper trail builds itself.

1. Screenshot the agency's website, Instagram or Facebook page, Justdial listing and Google Maps profile. Include the URL bar so the date and domain are visible.
2. Screenshot every WhatsApp chat from first inquiry to last message. Use the “export chat without media” function and email it to yourself.
3. Open your UPI app, tap the transaction, and take a full screenshot showing the UTR or RRN number, beneficiary VPA, beneficiary name as registered, amount, and timestamp.
4. Save the call log: in most Android phones, Settings → Phone → Call History → export to CSV.
5. Photograph any printed receipt, business card, registration form or “verification certificate” the agency handed you.

Email and WhatsApp the agency a short, dated demand for refund or service. Do not threaten; just state the facts and the deadline. A template sits in the Sample complaint section below. Mark a copy to your own secondary email so a timestamped record exists.

• Punch the beneficiary VPA into your UPI app's “Verify Name” feature and screenshot the registered name. If it does not match the firm name shown on the website, that mismatch alone is strong evidence of misrepresentation.
• Search the GST portal at gst.gov.in with the firm name to see whether GST registration exists at all.
• Search the MCA21 portal at mca.gov.in if the agency advertises itself as a Private Limited or LLP entity. A missing CIN is a red flag.
• Search the state Shops and Establishments portal for the trading name.
• Note down the Google Maps “Owner” if visible, and screenshot the page before they delete the listing.

• Call NCH 1915 or open the National Consumer Helpline portal at consumerhelpline.gov.in and lodge a complaint. Keep the docket number.
• If you paid by UPI and the operator's number is off within 24 hours of payment, dial 1930 for the Cyber Crime Helpline and lodge a parallel ticket on cybercrime.gov.in. UPI-based vanish-after-payment now qualifies as cyber-enabled cheating in most state SOPs.
• If the agency took your Aadhaar copy or that of your staff applicant, raise an identity-misuse alert on uidai.gov.in.

By the end of 30 minutes you have a paper trail, a regulator ticket, and (if applicable) a cyber-helpline reference. You can now choose the legal route best suited to your case.

Print this and tick as you go. The consumer commission, the police and the bank will all ask for the same bundle.

• Government photo ID of the complainant (Aadhaar or driving licence).
• Address proof matching the service location.
• Full transaction receipt: UTR, RRN, beneficiary VPA, beneficiary name, amount, timestamp.
• Bank statement page for the date of payment, downloaded as PDF (not a screenshot, the commission may reject screenshots).
• Agency's printed or digital quotation, brochure, or advertisement showing the rate quoted and “replacement-period” promise.
• Signed registration form or receipt the agency handed over, even if it is just a thermal-printer slip.
• Screenshots of the agency's website, Instagram, Facebook, Justdial, Sulekha or UrbanCompany listing.
• All WhatsApp and SMS exchanges, exported to PDF.
• Call log showing the date the number went offline.
• Copies of any verification certificate, “police-verified” stamp, or staff photograph the agency sent. These are often forged and become evidence of BNS Section 336 forgery.
• Names and phone numbers of at least two neighbours, society watchmen or family friends who can corroborate that no staff actually arrived. Affidavits are not required at the FIR stage but help at the commission stage.

The same fact pattern can attract more than one statute. Pick the route that matches your goal: refund, prosecution, or both.

Section 2(11) defines “deficiency” to include negligence, omission and willful withholding of service. A placement-agency contract is a “service” under Section 2(42). Section 35 lets you file before the District Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission for claims up to Rs 50 lakh; the State Commission handles Rs 50 lakh to Rs 2 crore. Filing fee for claims up to Rs 5 lakh is nil since the 2021 amendment. You can claim refund of the fee, compensation for harassment and mental agony, costs of litigation, and (where the commission is convinced of high-handedness) punitive damages. The e-Daakhil portal at edaakhil.nic.in lets you file entirely online.

BNS replaced the IPC on 1 July 2024. The placement-agency fraud patterns map cleanly to:

• Section 318 (Cheating). “Dishonestly inducing the person so deceived to deliver any property” carries up to seven years imprisonment when the cheating is coupled with a fraudulent or dishonest delivery of property. Taking a Rs 15,000 advance with no intent to provide the service is textbook Section 318.
• Section 336 (Forgery). If the agency handed you a fake “police verification certificate” with a stamped seal of a police station that never issued it, Section 336 read with Section 340 (use of forged document) applies. Each carries up to two years and a fine, more if used to cheat.
• Section 316 (Criminal breach of trust). Where the agency was holding the advance as a fiduciary deposit (rare but contractually possible), criminal breach of trust may apply on top of cheating.
• Section 111 (Organised crime). If investigators uncover a syndicate (same operator running multiple firm names across cities, using rotating bank accounts), Section 111 BNS lets the police invoke organised-crime provisions. This route is heavy and usually invoked by state crime branches, not local police stations, but mentioning it in your complaint anchors the seriousness.

BNSS replaced CrPC on 1 July 2024. Two sections matter at the police-station stage:

• Section 173 BNSS (information in cognisable cases). Replaces the old CrPC Section 154. The duty officer must register an FIR for any cognisable offence; cheating under BNS 318 is cognisable when the value involved crosses the offence threshold. Most placement-agency fraud crosses it.
• Section 175 BNSS lets you approach the Magistrate directly if the police station refuses to register the FIR. The Magistrate can direct registration under Section 175(3).

This Act regulates “contractors” who recruit workmen from one state for deployment in another. Many domestic-help agencies operate exactly this model: recruiting in Jharkhand, West Bengal or the Northeast, deploying in Delhi NCR, Bengaluru or Mumbai. The Act requires licensing of the contractor and registration of the principal employer. Where the agency has not bothered with these licences, it is operating in breach of a Central labour statute, and you can attach this to your consumer complaint and FIR.

A few states have their own laws regulating domestic work:

• Maharashtra Domestic Workers Welfare Board Act 2008, which set up a tripartite welfare board.
• Karnataka notifications under the Minimum Wages Act covering domestic workers.
• Kerala schemes under the Kerala Domestic Workers (Regulation of Employment, Conditions of Work, Social Security and Welfare) Bill drafts.
• Tamil Nadu Manual Workers (Domestic Workers) Scheme.

These do not directly handle refund disputes, but they give you a forum to lodge a parallel grievance, and they place a statutory duty on the agency to register.

If your staff was being supplied by an agency claiming to be a registered “unorganised workers' service provider”, the e-Shram database is a quick way to verify whether the workers it sends actually exist on the national register. A missing trace is one more brick in the misrepresentation wall.

Move up the ladder only after the previous rung has been given a fair chance, except where the operator has obviously vanished, in which case skip straight to police and bank.

Email plus WhatsApp plus registered post (Speed Post with delivery proof). Give 24 to 72 hours, depending on whether any partial service was rendered. Cite Section 2(11) of the Consumer Protection Act 2019.

Open a ticket at consumerhelpline.gov.in or the NCH app. The helpline will forward your complaint to the agency for response. If the agency is registered as a “convergence partner”, NCH can mediate a refund in 7 to 15 working days. Even where the agency is not registered, the NCH docket number becomes a paper trail you can cite later.

If you paid by UPI, raise a dispute in your UPI app within 30 days. The dispute will travel through NPCI's Unified Dispute Management System. Outcomes are mixed for service-related disputes, but a “merchant did not deliver service” ticket forces the beneficiary bank to ask the agency for proof. Many fly-by-night agencies cannot respond and the bank then locks down the VPA.

File at the police station whose jurisdiction covers either your residence or the agency's registered address. Carry the evidence checklist plus a typed complaint signed by you. Insist on a copy of the FIR with the FIR number and the date stamp. If the SHO declines, file under BNSS Section 173(4) escalation to the Superintendent of Police, then BNSS Section 175 to the Magistrate.

Where the fraud is UPI-led and the operator vanished within 24 hours of payment, file at cybercrime.gov.in and dial 1930. The “golden hour” framework lets banks freeze the beneficiary account if you reach 1930 quickly enough.

File the formal consumer complaint within two years of the cause of action at edaakhil.nic.in. Filing fee is nil for claims up to Rs 5 lakh. Attach the entire evidence bundle. Pray for refund, compensation under Section 39, and costs.

In Maharashtra, Karnataka, Kerala and Tamil Nadu, lodge a parallel grievance with the state welfare board. This rarely yields cash refund but it can lead to deregistration of the agency, which prevents the next family from being defrauded.

Eight to twelve weeks after your FIR or NCH ticket, file an RTI to the relevant police station, NCH, or consumer commission asking for the action-taken status. RTI is the lever that unsticks dormant complaints. The RTI Wiki AI RTI Drafter at https://righttoinformation.wiki/tools/ai-rti-draft-app.html generates the application in two minutes.

Adapt the placeholders to your facts and send by email plus WhatsApp plus Speed Post.

From: [Your full name]
[Your address]
[Your phone] | [Your email]

To: The Proprietor
[Agency trading name]
[Agency address as printed on receipt or website]

Date: [DD MM YYYY]

Subject: Demand for refund of Rs [amount] paid on [date] for non-delivery of
domestic-help placement service. Notice under Section 2(11) of the Consumer
Protection Act, 2019.

Sir or Madam,

1. On [date], I engaged your agency for placement of a [maid / cook / driver
   / nanny / patient-attendant / caretaker] at my residence at [address].

2. On the same date, I paid your agency Rs [amount] by UPI to VPA
   [beneficiary VPA] under UTR [UTR number], a copy of which is annexed
   as Annexure A. The agreed delivery window was [48 hours / 72 hours
   / specify].

3. As of the date of this notice, no staff member has reported to my
   residence, and your office numbers [list] are either switched off or
   unresponsive. WhatsApp messages sent on [dates] remain undelivered or
   unread. Screenshots are annexed as Annexure B.

4. The above conduct amounts to "deficiency in service" within the meaning
   of Section 2(11) of the Consumer Protection Act, 2019, and an "unfair
   trade practice" within Section 2(47).

5. You are hereby called upon to refund the entire sum of Rs [amount] to
   the same UPI VPA from which it was paid, within 72 hours of receipt of
   this notice. Failing such refund, I shall be constrained to:

     a. File a complaint before the District Consumer Disputes Redressal
        Commission through the e-Daakhil portal under Section 35 of the
        Consumer Protection Act, 2019, claiming refund, compensation,
        litigation costs and punitive damages;
     b. File a First Information Report under Section 318 of the Bharatiya
        Nyaya Sanhita, 2023 for cheating, and where applicable Section 336
        for forgery, before the jurisdictional police station;
     c. Lodge a complaint with the National Consumer Helpline (1915) and,
        where the transaction was UPI-led, the Cyber Crime Helpline (1930)
        and the National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal.

6. This notice is without prejudice to any other right or remedy available
   to me in law or equity.

Yours sincerely,

[Signature]
[Your full name]

Carry two printed and signed copies. The SHO keeps one and stamps the other for you.

To: The Station House Officer
[Police Station name]
[District]

Date: [DD MM YYYY]

Subject: Complaint for offences under Section 318 (Cheating) and Section 336
(Forgery) read with Section 340 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023.

Respected Sir or Madam,

I, [Your name], aged [age], resident of [address], holder of Aadhaar number
ending [last four digits], do solemnly state as follows:

1. On [date], I responded to an advertisement placed by [Agency trading
   name] on [platform: Instagram / Justdial / Facebook / Google] for the
   placement of a [maid / cook / driver / nanny / patient-attendant] at
   my residence.

2. The agency, represented over phone and WhatsApp from numbers [list],
   promised verified, police-checked staff within [time window] against a
   one-time registration fee of Rs [amount], with a free replacement
   guarantee for [period] days.

3. On [date], I paid Rs [amount] by UPI to the VPA [beneficiary VPA], UTR
   [number]. A WhatsApp confirmation was issued by the agency at [time].
   [If applicable: a photograph of a "police verification certificate"
   bearing the stamp of [police station name] was also sent.]

4. As of the date of this complaint, no staff member has been deployed.
   All phone numbers of the agency are switched off. The Instagram and
   Justdial listings have been deleted. The photograph of the "verified"
   staff member sent to me earlier matches a stock photo found on a
   reverse-image search.

5. The above conduct discloses, prima facie, the commission of the
   following offences:

     a. Cheating under Section 318 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, 2023,
        by dishonestly inducing me to part with Rs [amount] without any
        intention of providing the agreed service;
     b. [If applicable] Forgery under Section 336 read with use of forged
        document under Section 340, in respect of the fabricated police
        verification certificate;
     c. [If applicable] Criminal breach of trust under Section 316.

6. I respectfully request registration of an FIR under Section 173 of the
   Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita, 2023, freezing of the beneficiary
   bank account through the appropriate nodal officer of the concerned
   bank, and a thorough investigation including the linkage of the
   beneficiary account to other similar complaints, which may disclose an
   organised pattern under Section 111 of the BNS.

7. I am annexing herewith the following: (i) my Aadhaar and address proof;
   (ii) UPI transaction receipt and bank statement; (iii) full WhatsApp
   chat export; (iv) screenshots of the agency's online presence;
   (v) [other documents].

I undertake that the facts stated above are true to the best of my
knowledge and belief.

Yours faithfully,

[Signature]
[Your full name]
[Phone]
[Email]

Refund recovery is half the story. Many of these agencies routinely send untrained, undocumented or trafficked workers to households. If the staff did arrive and you have any reason to suspect they themselves are victims of exploitation or trafficking, two parallel helplines apply:

• Childline 1098 if the worker is or appears to be under 18.
• Anti-Human Trafficking Unit of the state police, reachable through the local Superintendent of Police, if the staff has been recruited under deception or held without ID.

Reporting these does not weaken your refund claim. On the contrary, it often accelerates investigation against the agency because trafficking adds a heavier statutory layer.

• Paying the “second instalment” after the first 24 hours of no service. Once the second payment is in, the agency uses it as evidence of “ongoing relationship” and stalls.
• Deleting WhatsApp chats once the agency promises a refund “by Friday”. Every chat is evidence. Keep all of it.
• Letting any staff member start work without seeing original Aadhaar and recording the Aadhaar number against the chat history. Agencies sometimes recycle the same forged ID across households.
• Filing only with NCH and waiting six weeks. NCH is mediation, not enforcement. Run police and e-Daakhil in parallel.
• Naming the agency by its trading name only in the FIR. Always pair it with the registered firm name pulled from GST or MCA records, and the UPI beneficiary name from your bank statement.
• Threatening “I will go viral on Twitter” in writing. It hands the agency a counter-claim of intimidation. Keep your demand polite, statutory and clinical.

A household in a Bengaluru gated community paid Rs 18,000 in March 2026 to an agency that advertised a “Kerala-verified Malayali nanny” via Instagram ads. The agency sent a photograph and an Aadhaar number on WhatsApp, promised arrival in 72 hours, and went silent on day 4. The complainant ran the action plan: WhatsApp demand letter on day 5, NCH 1915 ticket on day 6, FIR under BNS Section 318 on day 9. The beneficiary VPA, run through the UPI name-verify feature, returned a name unrelated to the agency. The bank, on the police's request under BNSS Section 94, locked the beneficiary account, recovered Rs 11,400 of the original sum, and remitted it to the complainant under court orders. The full Rs 18,000 was eventually recovered through an e-Daakhil order eight months later, with Rs 25,000 compensation and Rs 5,000 costs added. Total elapsed time from payment to full recovery: ten months. Total cost to complainant: Rs 0 in filing fees, about Rs 1,800 in printing and Speed Post, and roughly 14 hours spread across nine months.

Yes, in substance. Under Section 2(11) of the Consumer Protection Act 2019, failure to render the service paid for is “deficiency”. The agency owes refund plus compensation. Whether the written contract uses the words “non-refundable” or not is largely irrelevant; an unfair contract term under Section 2(46) cannot override a statutory right.

Yes. There is no minimum value for cheating under BNS Section 318. The offence is the deceit, not the size of the amount. Police stations sometimes deflect small-ticket complaints; if so, escalate under BNSS Section 175 to the Magistrate.

Generally no. A clause that lets the agency hold your money for 30 days while doing nothing is an unfair contract term. The District Commission has held in many cases that the “reasonable time” for a household service starts at the window the agency itself advertised. If they sold “48-hour delivery” and did not deliver in 48 hours, that is the breach.

You still have rights, but the evidentiary burden rises. Gather every WhatsApp message, call log, witness statement and bank ATM withdrawal slip showing you took out the exact amount on the date. The FIR can proceed on these. The consumer commission is more flexible than civil courts on cash transactions; oral testimony plus corroborating circumstantial evidence has succeeded.

Run them in parallel. UPI dispute through your app is fastest (sometimes resolved in 10 to 20 days) but uncertain for service disputes. e-Daakhil is slower (4 to 12 months) but yields a binding order plus compensation. Together they maximise your chance of full recovery.

Legally risky. Defamation under BNS Section 356 can be triggered by naming a person or firm with imputations of crime before due process. Use the legal channels first. Once an FIR is registered or a commission order issued, you may share the FIR number and the order copy factually.

The platform may itself be liable as an intermediary under the Consumer Protection (E-Commerce) Rules 2020 where it actively curated or promoted the agency. Add the platform as a co-respondent in the e-Daakhil filing. Also flag the listing through the platform's in-app “report” feature, which builds the platform's record of negligence.

That is a classic two-stage scam: the agency pockets your registration fee, the “staff” pockets the training fee, and both vanish. Treat the staff as a co-conspirator at the FIR stage and include the staff's Aadhaar copy (which the agency sent you) as evidence. Police verification of that Aadhaar often shows it is forged or stolen.

There is no central database of “police-verified placement agencies”. The phrase is marketing. What you can check is whether the agency itself is registered for GST, Shops and Establishments, and (in a few states) the state placement-agency register. Verification of individual staff members is supposed to happen under the local police's “tenant and servant verification” scheme, which is free and household-initiated. Use the local police station's online tenant-verification portal directly; do not outsource it to the agency.

Yes. Cheating committed against a senior citizen, person with disability or other vulnerable group invites enhanced sentencing under BNS sentencing principles and triggers Maintenance and Welfare of Parents and Senior Citizens Act 2007 provisions where applicable. Mention your age and vulnerability prominently in both the FIR and the e-Daakhil complaint. Most state consumer commissions also have a fast-track docket for senior citizens.

• Interior designer or contractor took advance and disappeared
• Wedding photographer not delivering: refund and FIR guide
• 1930 cyber-fraud helpline: word-for-word script
• Bank freeze after cyber fraud: how to act in the golden hour
• NCH 1915 consumer helpline: full walkthrough
• e-Daakhil online consumer commission filing guide
• Consumer Rights pillar page
• Middle-class household traps: index
• Citizen RTI playbook

• AI RTI Drafter: https://righttoinformation.wiki/tools/ai-rti-draft-app.html
• First Appeal Builder: https://righttoinformation.wiki/tools/first-appeal-app.html
• AwaazRTI voice tool: https://righttoinformation.wiki/tools/awaaz-rti.html
• PIO Reply Checker: https://righttoinformation.wiki/tools/pio-reply-checker

• National Consumer Helpline: https://consumerhelpline.gov.in or dial 1915
• e-Daakhil portal: https://edaakhil.nic.in
• National Cyber Crime Reporting Portal: https://cybercrime.gov.in or dial 1930
• Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita 2023: https://www.indiacode.nic.in
• Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita 2023: https://www.indiacode.nic.in
• Consumer Protection Act 2019: https://consumeraffairs.nic.in
• Inter-State Migrant Workmen Act 1979: https://labour.gov.in
• Unorganised Workers' Social Security Act 2008 and e-Shram: https://eshram.gov.in
• GST taxpayer search: https://services.gst.gov.in/services/searchtp
• MCA21 company and LLP search: https://www.mca.gov.in
• Childline: 1098
• Senior Citizen Helpline: 14567

A wide cinematic illustration in the style of a 1200×630 banner. Foreground: a worried Indian family at the door of their apartment looking down a long empty corridor. Middle ground: a smartphone in mid-air showing a UPI payment receipt fading into ghostly outline, beside a torn paper “verified” certificate with a question mark. Background: faint silhouettes of a maid, a cook, a nanny and a driver dissolving into pixels. Mood: concerned but determined. Palette: deep navy, warm amber accents, RTI-Wiki green seal in the bottom right corner. No real faces, no logos, no text inside the image, no agency names.