Flyers Left Stranded at Hyderabad Airport with Tickets for ‘Fictitious’ Go First Flight
Arather bizarre incident occurred at the Rajiv Gandhi International Airport (RGIA) in Hyderabad when people were told by the authorities that no such flight exists despite having valid tickets with PNRs. The people in question here had tickets for a Go First flight from Hyderabad to Delhi. The CISF personnel on duty didn’t let the passengers in while the people were shocked to know that Go First had already discontinued its operations on this route nearly one month back.
Why did the airline allow the portal to sell tickets when there was no service? Why was our PNR live on the airline website? We received absolutely no communication from either party,” said a flyer to Times of India who was travelling for a family emergency. Several passengers leveled allegations of forgery and cheating on the airline while urging DGCA to initiate a thorough probe and take stern action.
The people also pushed for action against the ‘dubious’ web portal Happy Fares which was responsible for issuing them the tickets in October last week. Go First had suspended the services on Oct 1, yet the Guwahati-based online website was issuing tickets. The passengers speaking to TOI were found to be part of a group ticket, a total of 10 individuals, sold by Happy Fares. Some of them even had to pay double the amount to reserve the ticket. “We tried to call the number on the ticket, but the person didn’t respond,” the flyer, travelling with her father, added.
Texts and calls went unanswered to Go First while the mailed questionnaire also could not elicit a response from the airline. However, upon dialing the number printed on the tickets by TOI, it turned out to be Ankit Agarwal, owner of GoFlySmart, who also happens to be a sub-agent of Go First which buys tickets from the airline and sells these to Happy Fares. Reportedly, Agarwal accepted the mistake on his part and shared an email received by him from Go First on Oct 26 which stated that the Oct 31 flight between Hyderabad and Delhi has been “changed due to operational reasons”. “But since the PNR was live on the Go First website, we thought the flight would be operated. There has been a mistake,” he said.
