India’s leading airlines including IndiGo, SpiceJet and Jet Airways have termed the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA)’s rule >to reduce fee for carrying five-kg baggage on flights as “illegal.”
The airlines have also opposed most of the other proposed ‘passenger-centric’ norms such as enhanced compensation for denying boarding and flight delays and demanded a higher cap on ticket cancellation fee. Additionally, the airlines have requested the government to allow them to charge a fee for providing equipment such as wheelchair for people with reduced mobility.
“…Airlines follow a lenient policy towards passengers carrying nominal excess baggage. In cases when customers come with nominal excess baggage, our staffs are trained to adjust the same against any unutilized hand baggage allowance of the customers,” according to a letter sent by Ujjwal Dey, Associate Director, Federation of India Airlines (FIA) – a body which represents IndiGo, Jet Airways, SpiceJet and GoAir — to the Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) earlier last week.
Increase airfares>The airlines also threatened to increase the airfares as the move may impact their operating viability due to consumption of more fuel by carrying excess baggage, they said.
The FIA had recently moved the Delhi High Court opposing this move. Although the High Court refused to stay DGCA’s directive, it will hear the matter on July 8 after getting the replies from Civil Aviation Ministry and the DGCA.
A DGCA directive, effective from July 1, had allowed passengers to carry five kilos extra baggage over the free allowance of 15 kg on a flight, by paying Rs.100 a kg to the airline. Private airlines presently charge passengers Rs.250-Rs.350 for each extra kg.
“Such determination by the DGCA in the Air Transport Circular No. 02 of 2016 is illegal and beyond the statutory jurisdiction of the regulator…The Aircraft Rules 1937 further do not empower the DGCA to determine tariff while permitting issuance of directions,” according to the letter.
Airlines claimed the DGCA didn’t consider the objections raised by airlines during its discussion with the government via exchange of e-mail letters. “Passengers are offered cabin baggage of 7 kg in addition to the 15 kg free allowance of cabin luggage, i.e. a total of 22kg of free baggage per passenger,” SpiceJet and IndiGo had said in its representation to the government, as per the letter.
Cancellation fee In a separate letter, the airlines opposed the government’s proposal to disallow airlines to levy cancellation fee more than the ticket’s base fare. The airline suggested they be allowed to charge cancellation fee up to a total of the base fare and fuel charge component of the ticket. The government had observed that often cancellation charges were higher than the cost of the ticket due to separate penalty levied by both airline and the travel portal.
The airlines said the proposed multi-fold increase in compensation for denial of boarding, flight delays and cancellations lacked “quantitative analysis that assesses impact on the airline industry” and “unfairly penalise airlines.”
“The compensation levels at 200 per cent and 400 per cent of the fare are also too high, for an industry that is still reeling under a high cost regime, notwithstanding the comparatively low ATF price regime that now appears to be on its way out,” FIA said.
‘No penalty’ The letter stated that airlines “should not be penalised” for “a majority of cancellations” that happen “directly or indirectly” due to limitations imposed by air traffic control (ATC) and “inefficient infrastructure at airports.”
It also marked its opposition to the draft rules not being applicable to foreign airlines saying it will create an “unfair playing field, and put Indian carriers at a disadvantageous position.”
