Jain family pays six times fare

AHMEDABAD: Imagine you have confirmed air tickets before two months, but on the day of travel airline denies you boarding and you have to shell out six times more fare to reach your destination. Exactly , the same thing happened with Ahmedabad-based Maitry Jain and her family of eight last week.
After having enjoyed their vacation, the Jain family were flying from Bangkok to Ahmedabad via Mumbai.They landed at Mumbai international airport on November 17 at 10 pm via Thai airways flight and had a connecting flight to Ahmedabad at 1.45am via Air India flight AI-331.
"When we reached the Air India counter, the lady staff member denied us boarding giving reason that the flight was over booked, though we had confirmed tickets two months prior to the travel.There was a next scheduled Air India flight at 5.30 am to Ahmedabad but they denied the boarding in that too giving the same reason," said Jain.
Jain said that despite having tie-up with Jet Airways, the Air India personnel did not accommodate in Jet's flight too. She questioned, "Isn't it the airline's responsibility to give priority boarding in the very next flight to the off loaded passengers from the previous flight?" Ultimately the family had to pay Rs 17,000 per ticket for Ahmedabad and travel by another airline. While the Air India did issue them a receipt saying that they would get full refund."How does that make for Rs 14,000 fare difference that we had to pay despite having confirmed tickets," added Jain.
When contacted the Air India, it said it was still investigating the matter.
The trouble for off loaded passengers did not end there. "There were many passengers with us including a family with a two-year-old child who was suffering from high fever. The Air India staff showed no sensitivity towards the child. Moreover, the family's luggage was checked in and they were denied boarding.The airline didn't even provide accommodation for three hours," added Jain.
Earlier this month, the Air India gro unded its AhmedabadNewark flight, follo wing a technical snag while the passengers were made to wait for hours without refreshments or water. The Newark flight did not take off that day. As many as 70 passengers even cancelled their tickets and took refund.
According to Pritee Shah, chief general manager at Consumer Education and Research Center, her organization receives many cases of negligence by airlines where in passengers have been made to suffer either on account of delays, cancellations or overbooking. "The foreign airlines respond with more maturity .They either make alternate arrangements or give the passengers an option of free flight next time. While the domestic carriers are unresponsive and make the passengers suffer," said Shah.
In a classic case of negligence, in 2013, Ahmedabad-ba sed Ashish Shar ma and his five friends had booked six tickets on June 24 through the Air India's website and got confirmation for flight No. A-13450 on June 27, 2013. All of them did web check in on June 26 but when they arrived next day to catch the plane at Leh airport, the Air India officials told them that such plane did not exist and they had wrongly booked tickets in Army's chartered plane, hence they could not board it. When the Air India failed to provide any solution, all the six passengers were forced to take a private airline's flight for Rs 11,000 per ticket, almost six times for what they paid to the Air India.
Earlier this year, a Nadiad-based elderly couple bound for Sydney had to wait for several hours outside Mumbai airport due to the airline's apathy .