Passengers complain as Vistara cancels and reschedules several flights in February

According to aviation industry sources, Vistara has cancelled and rescheduled a significant number of its February flights during the last few days. In recent days, many of the affected passengers have expressed their difficulty getting in touch with Vistara customer service on social media.

Nonetheless, the spokesperson for Vistara told PTI that the airline is adjusting "capacity to demand" due to the "volatility" in the Indian aviation market caused by the COVID-19 wave and the resulting restrictions from the states.

During the last 48 hours, ISRO scientist Shibasish Prusty has tweeted that his flight from Delhi to Bhubaneswar has been canceled and that Vistara's customer care number has been busy.

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Vistara has cancelled another passenger's flight for Delhi-Kolkata for February 12 and unresponsive customer service representatives are answering his calls. This report comes from Arpit Singh Khurana on Twitter.

Cancer patient Pronab Kumar Mandal said on Saturday that he will need chemotherapy on February 9, but Vistara canceled his flight from Kolkata to Mumbai on February 8. Throughout the last two days, Mandal said he has been trying to contact the airline. 

According to Mohammed Dawood, his Delhi-Kolkata flight for February 10 has been canceled without any option for rescheduling. "Now, fare cost is double and your customer service is extremely unhelpful, even the call doesn't get connected," he told. The airline has not responded to his calls, tweets, emails, and tweets since Sunday afternoon, he tweeted.

Sanjit Kumar Das, a Vistara passenger, said on Sunday afternoon that his Bhubaneswar-Delhi flight has been cancelled and he has attempted to reach customer service "without any luck".

Vistara spokesperson told PTI about the rescheduling and cancellation of February flights, "After a sharp decline in demand for air travel, due to the surge in COVID-19 numbers and restrictions imposed by various state governments, we are observing a marginal increase in traffic in February compared to the previous month."

The spokesperson also added, "However, in view of the volatility, we continue to closely monitor the situation and adjust capacity to demand."

The airline is offering to waive the change fee for one-time rescheduling on all direct bookings with travel until March 31 in order to minimize customers' inconvenience, the spokesperson explained. They do not include tickets booked through travel agents like MakeMyTrip, Yatra, Cleartrip, etc.

According to a spokesperson, "We are also assisting the impacted customers with rescheduling, refunds etc., as applicable. We have also advised and empowered our travel agent partners to extend support to customers, as and when required."

With inputs from PTI

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