Consumer Affairs Secretary urges FMCG, food and retail to strengthen grievance redressal

With consumer complaints nearly five times higher than five years ago, the government is pressing FMCG, food and retail companies to improve redressal systems, alongside AI-enabled testing expansion and simpler BIS standards.

— Source publishedTue, 4 Aug, 2026, 17:26 IST·First seen Tue, 4 Aug, 2026, 17:34 IST·Source The Hindu BusinessLine

What happened

Department of Consumer Affairs · Consumer Affairs Secretary Nidhi Khare urged India’s FMCG, food and retail sectors to strengthen grievance systems amid rising

Key facts

  • Consumer complaints are nearly 5 times higher than five years ago
  • Testing capacity target: 30 samples per day to 300 samples per day
  • Quality Control Orders reduced from about 700 to 624
  • BIS has set at least 24,000 standards
  • World Standards Day: October 14

Why this matters

Prioritize partnerships or acquisitions in customer-experience workflow, complaint analytics and AI-enabled quality-testing capabilities to turn regulatory compliance into a trust advantage.

What to watch

  • Consumer Affairs Ministry advisories, mandatory grievance-service benchmarks or sector-specific compliance guidance.
  • National Consumer Helpline complaint data showing persistent increases in food, FMCG, e-commerce or retail categories.
  • CCPA actions, product recalls, testing failures, misleading-advertising cases or penalties against prominent brands and platforms.
  • BIS notifications simplifying standards or broadening testing, certification and labeling requirements.
  • Marketplace policy changes on seller suspension, refund timelines, return disputes and consumer complaint reporting.
  • Public disclosure by major retailers or FMCG companies of grievance metrics, AI-led quality testing or expanded recall protocols.
  • Audit complaint volumes, closure times, repeat-complaint rates and unresolved cases by category, seller and geography.
  • Set visible resolution SLAs for refunds, replacements, warranty claims, food safety and misleading-label complaints.
  • Integrate customer-care, marketplace seller, store, QA, recall and regulatory case-management data into a single escalation workflow.
  • Review supplier contracts for traceability, testing records, indemnities, recall funding and response-time obligations.
  • Train frontline store, call-center and seller-support teams on consumer-rights requirements and mandatory escalation paths.
  • Prepare a regulator-ready dashboard covering complaint intake, root causes, corrective actions and closure evidence.

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