Passengers often face some common issues while traveling through airlines like missing baggage or unhygienic food. No matter how reputed the airline is something always comes up that disappoints the passengers. This time an incident made it to the headlines that is not much heard. The situation faced by the passenger traveling on an Indigo flight is quite serious.
Recently, a passenger traveling to Nagpur boarded the Pune to Nagpur IndiGo flight only to find out that half of her allotted seat’s cushion was missing
The Nagpur resident Sagarika Patnaik found half her seat missing in the Indigo aircraft.
Sagarika was traveling to Nagpur for work on an IndiGo flight – 6E-6798 early on Sunday.
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Subrat Patnaik, Sagarika’s husband, told the Times of India that the airline allotted a window seat, number 10A to his wife.
Subrat Patnaik took to the social media platform X (previously Twitter), and wrote,
#Indigo !! #Flight 6E 6798 !! Seat no 10A ! Pune to Nagpur!!! Today’s status … Best way to increase profit 😢😢…Pathetic …
#Indigo !! #Flight 6E 6798 !! Seat no 10A ! Pune to Nagpur!!! Today’s status … Best way to increase profit 😢😢…Pathetic … pic.twitter.com/tcXHOT6Dr5
— Subrat Patnaik (@Subu_0212) November 25, 2023
Sagarika looked for the cushion around the seat but was not able to find it. Even after the passenger raised the issue as the boarding process was still underway, she was asked to wait in the aisle. This created a fuss for her co-passengers. Finally, after some time, one of the cabin crew members brought her a cushion from a spare seat and placed it on the faulty seat.
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Pointing out that a plane is thoroughly inspected before the boarding of the passengers, Subrat Patnaik said,
“How could such a seat cushion just vanish? This is certainly not expected from an airline brand like IndiGo”
“Did they not notice the missing cushion? And the first to enter an aircraft is the cabin crew, couldn’t they spot the lacuna?”
According to reports, sources in the airline conveyed that the previous cushion was dirty so it was taken out for replacement. So, a spare cushion was supplied to ensure the hygiene standards of the aircraft.
The airline finally replied to Subrat Patnaik that was not considered satisfactory
The airline replied to Subrat on the microblogging site X and said,
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“Hi, that’s certainly not good to see. At times, the seat cushion gets adrift from its Velcro. The same can be repositioned with the help of our crew. Further, your feedback will be shared with the concerned team for review. Hope to serve you better in the future.”
To this Subrat added,
Hi, appreciate ur response. But surprise that how this missed by ground staff as well as the crew to check the cleaning status before boarding? This is affecting the image of a great brand like Indigo.
To which Indigo replied back,
We completely understand your disappointment, Sir. We have duly noted your feedback. looking forward to serving you better in the future
Other frequent flyers of Indigo Airlines also shared their views on the same
Businessman Kanishka Gupta was quoted as saying by TOI, this kind of carelessness has become common now, giving an example from one of his trips, Gupta said that when he was traveling from Delhi to Canada a month ago, none of the screens were working. He added,
“On domestic flights as well, I have seen life jackets scattered and not in their place”
Aviation analyst and expert Dhairyashil Vandekar said this incident was unacceptable, and that no matter what the situation is, airlines are not supposed to provide broken or unusable seats to passengers. Vandekar said,
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“The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has warned the airlines on this regard in the past. Despite that is such incidents take place, then the DGCA must carry out strict actions”
Adding to the list of inconveniences in the airline, six passengers of a Chennai-bound IndiGo flight revealed that they were “tricked” into getting off the aircraft at Bengaluru airport. Because the airliners were not willing to fly to the destination with only six persons on board.
May be its a trial. Sooner or later Indigo may start charging 250-500 for cushions
— Nanu (@Nanu94117665) November 27, 2023
What a shameful service by Indigo airlines
— DBV 123 (@123Dbv21541) November 27, 2023
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