Air India Express cancels several flights due to a shortage of cabin crew
As part of the consolidation of its aviation business, Tata Group is merging Air India Express and AIX Connect, as well as Vistara with Air India.
Air India Express has canceled “dozens of flights” due to a shortage of cabin crew members as some of them called in sick in protest against alleged mismanagement at the Tata Group airline, sources said.
Discontent has been brewing among some of the budget airline’s cabin crew for some time, especially after the start of the merger process of AIX Connect, formerly AirAsia India, with itself.
The sources said on Wednesday that several cabin crew members started reporting sick since Monday evening and due to not enough cabin crew members, “dozens of flights” have been canceled at several airports including Kochi, Calicut and Bangalore.
Late last month, a union representing some of Air India Express’ cabin crew alleged that the airline is poorly managed and that there is a lack of equality in the treatment of staff.
Air India Express Employees Union (AIXEU), a registered trade union, which claims to represent around 300 cabin crew members, mostly senior citizens, had also alleged that the mismanagement of its affairs has affected employee morale.
Many passengers took to social media on Wednesday to complain about the sudden cancellation of flights.
In response to a passenger’s message on
“As part of our service recovery process, you can choose to reschedule the flight within the next seven days or request a full refund via our chatbot Tia…” the airline said in a post on X.
The development at Air India Express comes a month after Tata Group full-service airline Vistara witnessed pilot issues, forcing the company to temporarily reduce capacity by 10 percent or operate 25 to 30 flights a day.
As part of the consolidation of its aviation business, Tata Group is merging Air India Express and AIX Connect, as well as Vistara with Air India.
(Only the headline and image of this report may have been reworked by Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is automatically generated from a syndicated feed.)
First print: May 8, 2024 | 9:33 am IST