The ministry of civil aviation (MoCA) on Wednesday expressed dissatisfaction over airline companies defaulting on refunds to passengers over flight tickets that were booked for travel during the lockdown last year but got cancelled.
“MoCA Secretary has chaired the meeting today with all the airline companies regarding credit shells refund and expressed dissatisfaction towards airline companies who did not refund the money. GoAir and IndiGo have submitted their undertaking to the ministry that they have refund all the credit shells to the passengers”, an official told ANI.
Last December, the government said that airlines had refunded almost three-fourth of such tickets. But many passengers still have no clarity on the status of their refund even as the date mentioned in the SC order looms close.
The SC of India had ordered MoCA to clear all the credit shells and refund the passengers after the deadline of March 31.
India’s low-cost airline SpiceJet wasn’t able to refund credit shells to the passengers, “Refunds are governed by the order of the Supreme Court and we are adhering to those directions.
SpiceJet had written to all its travel partners and agents in March 2021 to share details of pending credit shell PNRs so that the airline can immediately reverse the credit shell amount back to the agency ID,” a spokesperson for SpiceJet said.
National carrier Air India is also yet to refund total credit shells to the passengers. As per sources said Air India has to clear credit shells to around five lakh twenty-five thousand passengers which amount to around Rs 2000 crore.
“Air India is committed to processing its pending refunds claims expeditiously. Dissemination of information regarding refunds is already initiated. Air India has cleared close to Rs 1000 Crore from 1st April 2020 till date in India. We are also addressing queries related to refunds from passengers through our social media platforms.” Air India Spokesperson said.
