Air India customers unhappy with cutbacks in plane sizes

Cutbacks in the size of planes and what passengers say is poor service are causing travelers using Air India to complain bitterly about their experiences.
Complaints about very late departures, flight cancelations, and poor communications between the airline and its customers have become a chorus.
Passengers say the airline has canceled flights without giving prior notice to its passengers.
The problems began in December when Air India failed to renew its lease with Boeing and shifted to 777 aircraft from the 747s it was flying.
The move cut about 100 seats from each flight.
S. Venkat, executive director-finance and spokesperson for India, said in an e-mail that the airline made the change in planes flying between Newark and Mumbai, and canceled some of its flights.
Venkat said it's 3-year-lease expired on the large planes and "despite our best efforts to locate replacement capacity in the market, we could not do so due to a tough lease market for wide bodied aircraft."
However, he said by this summer, the wide-bodied 747 service to Newark will be restored.
Venkat did not comment on the flight cancelations and allegations of poor service and late departures.
04/02/07 Ritu Jha/New Brunswick Home News Tribune, US

To Read the News in full at Source, Click the Headline

Categories: air india feb 2007, foreign feb 2007