Indian flyers unhappy with airline services; SpiceJet, IndiGo, Air India tops the list

The recent controversies, along with the gaps in the services, have landed airlines in a tough spot with the dissatisfied authorities and the passengers as well.

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Indian air travellers are become increasingly frustrated with the nation's airline services, as revealed by a recent survey. The unhappiness of the flyers is a result of deteriorating services and air staff's bad behaviour, as per Bloomberg's survey. The survey findings are not surprising considering the incidents of the misbehaviour with the passengers and reports of tardiness in services. The survey by Bloomberg analyses many other aspects of air travelling in the post-Covid-19 world, highlighting the facts above.

LocalCirceles (a social media platform) conducted the groundwork of the survey. The sample size of the survey consisted of 15,000 airline passengers, 79 per cent of which believed "carriers in India are compromising on passenger comfort and cutting corners as a result of the pandemic." Passengers feel that the airline employees' deteriorating standard of customer service came post-pandemic.

The survey covers all the airlines and ranks them in the order of unsatisfied subjects in their sample size. Based on the list, 28 per cent of the people in the survey were dissatisfied with Spicejet putting it on top of the list. The airline was followed by IndiGo and Air India in second and third positions, respectively.

It is to be noted that following the recent incidents and controversies, India's aviation regulator, DGCA, has announced several directives and warnings for the airlines. The most notable of the incidents remain the incident of Indigo mishandling a specially-abled child. Moreover, DGCA recently warned airlines against providing unserviceable seats to passengers resulting in inconvenience.

The reason for the lack of good services can be explained by the number of air travellers dropping at the time of the pandemic. Airlines that lacked adequate cash reserves, government backing, or a strong private player were the first to succumb to mounting pressures. However, it is not only the airlines that have changed. Returning customers expect them to adapt to their changing travel habits following COVID while still providing good service in exchange for competitive fares

Furthermore, the airlines are currently grappling with a substantial staff shortage, and existing employees are overworked as a result of the rapid increase in passenger volume. And, with airlines grappling with the growing fuel prices while also keeping an eye on ticket pricing, customer service appears to have slipped down the priority list.