Passengers complain as Vistara cancels and reschedules several flights in February

Vistara has cancelled and rescheduled a significant number of its February flights during the last few days, aviation industry sources said on Sunday. Moreover, during the last few days, a considerable number of affected passengers have stated on social media that they have been facing difficulties in contacting Vistara’s customer care. Vistara spokesperson, however, told PTI that the airline is adjusting its “capacity to demand” in view of the “volatility” in the Indian aviation market due to the current COVID-19 wave and resultant restrictions imposed by the state governments. ISRO Scientist Shibasish Prusty tweeted on Sunday that his Delhi-Bhubaneswar flight for 5 February has been cancelled and Vistara’s customer care number is a “cheap gimmick” as it has been busy for the last 48 hours. Another passenger Arpit Singh Khurana said on Saturday on Twitter that his Delhi-Kolkata flight for February 12 has been cancelled by Vistara and his calls to the customer service number are going unattended.

 Pronab Kumar Mandal said on Saturday that he is a cancer patient and he needs to have his chemotherapy session on 9 February, but Vistara has cancelled his Kolkata-Mumbai flight, scheduled for 8 February. Mandal said he has been trying to contact the airline for the last two days.

A passenger named Mohammed Dawood said on Saturday that his Delhi-Kolkata flight for February 10 has been cancelled and he has not been provided with the option to reschedule.

“Now, fare cost is double and your customer service is extremely unhelpful, even the call doesn’t get connected,” he told Vistara.

On Sunday afternoon, he tweeted that he has been trying to reach the airline through calls, tweets and emails, but there has been no response. A passenger named Sanjit Kumar Das said on Sunday afternoon that his Bhubaneswar-Delhi flight has been cancelled and he has been trying to connect with Vistara’s customer service “without any luck”.

A similar set of complaints were posted on Twitter by the airline’s passengers whose flights have been rescheduled without prior discussion.

In response to PTI’s queries regarding the rescheduling and cancellation of February flights, Vistara spokesperson told PTI, “After a sharp decline in demand for air travel, due to the surge in COVID-19 numbers and restrictions imposed by various state governments, we are observing a marginal increase in traffic in February compared to the previous month.”

“However, in view of the volatility, we continue to closely monitor the situation and adjust capacity to demand,” the spokesperson added.

With the objective of minimising inconvenience to our customers, the airline is offering waiver of change fee for one-time rescheduling on all direct bookings with travel until March 31, the spokesperson mentioned.

Direct bookings are tickets that are booked directly with the airline and they do not include the ones booked through agent websites such as MakeMyTrip, Yatra, Cleartrip etc.

The spokesperson stated, “We are also assisting the impacted customers with rescheduling, refunds etc., as applicable. We have also advised and empowered our travel agent partners to extend support to customers, as and when required.”

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