Air India hires from Jet, offers special fares
As Jet Airways announced its suspension, state-owned Air India told State Bank of India that it was exploring the possibility of leasing five of its wide-bodied Boeing 777 aircraft that have been grounded and operate them to destinations such as London, Dubai and Singapore.
Air India has also completed hiring 150 cabin crew members from Jet Airways for its international operations on Boeing 777 and Boeing 787 aircraft.
It has further offered special fares to passengers with confirmed return tickets for travel till April 28 on Jet Airways’ flights on 19 international routes.
According to certain reports, the number of refunds would cost around Rs 2,000 crore because of the disrupted flights. Meanwhile, Jet Airways has almost Rs 800 crore held up with credit card companies and International Air Transport Association.
IATA in a statement release has said, “Passengers who purchased Jet tickets through IATA-accredited travel agents are advised to submit their refund only through them as soon as possible. The travel agent will then liaise with IATA and Jet to process the refund.”
“With deep sadness and a heavy heart we would like to share that, effective immediately, we will be suspending all our domestic and international flight operations,” Jet Airways said as they released the official statement.
“Late last night we were informed by SBI, on behalf of the consortium of Indian lenders, that they are unable to consider our request for interim funding. Since no emergency funding from the lenders or any other source of funding was forthcoming, it would therefore not have been possible for us to pay for fuel or other critical services to keep the operations going,” the statement continued to read.
