APAI may approach CCI over air ticket cancellation charge hike

Fliers body APAI is likely to approach competition watchdog CCI next week, urging it to investigate an alleged "cartelisation" by domestic carriers in hiking flight ticket cancellation charges.
Air Passengers Association of India, which lobbies with the policy makers in the interest of fliers, is at present awaiting airlines' response to the aviation regulator DGCA on this issue, APAI's founder and national president, Sudhakara Reddy said.
Domestic airlines including budget carrier IndiGo recently effected a massive hike in the ticket cancellation charges, prompting the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) to write to the carriers seeking an explanation on the arbitrary move.

"We are preparing to petition to the Competition Commission of India (CCI) to probe the recent hike in the ticket cancellation charges by the Indian airlines. The way these airlines have announced the increase one by one, the pattern definitely suggests an anti-competition practice," Reddy alleged.
Besides, APAI is also gathering additional information on the issue, he said, claiming, "in the past also, airlines have resorted to similar moves."
"How can all airlines have almost similar cancellation charges, and this is what we would like the CCI to probe," he said, adding the APAI plans to approach the CCI on this issue next week.

Last week, Gurgaon-based IndiGo had done away with the slab system for charging ticket cancellation fee and made it uniform at Rs 2,250.

Besides, as part of its revised cancellation charges, which came into effect from April 1, customers booking their tickets on IndiGo flights will not get any refund for the bookings cancelled 0-2 hours before the scheduled departure.
"The DGCA has written to all the airlines across the board, asking them to explain the reason for increasing ticket cancellation fee, which in some cases now is almost equivalent to the airfares charged for a short-haul journey," a source had said last week.

The airline are supposed to respond to the regulator on the issue by Friday.
National carrier Air India too had in February affected a massive hike of Rs 500 on cancellation of its flight tickets, which now stands at Rs 2,000 per ticket.
IndiGo had last time revised these charges in February, under which it was charging Rs 1,900 for tickets cancelled more than seven days before the scheduled departure and Rs 2,250 for tickets cancelled two hours to seven days before scheduled departure of the flight.