Spicejet playing fair?
 

Can an airline prepone flight departure by an hour 24 hours before and then claim innocence on basis that they "informed"?


Last evening I was booked to fly on Spice, ticket booked by daughters from SG site on my verbal instructions over phone. ticket was booked on wed and return flight was at 2120 hours. Spice was chosen because they were the cheapest on the route as shown on makemytrip.

on Friday, we get SMS on wife's cell (her cell-number was used on booking) that check-in for this flight was 120 mins because of congestion at airport (AMD). Ignored message after 15 mins of cribbing as one of those LCC things.

Nows the fun part, on Sat evening, get a recorded call on wifes cell number informing of preponing of flight by an hour and closing of checkin desk 1 hour before the departure etc. Since I was driving the daughters to dinner, wife recd the call. I cant believe the airline can prepone a flight 24 hours before and i assume the wifey has imagined things ( has happened before).

on sunday evening, we reach the check-in desk at 2040 or so only to be told the checkin desks for flight have closed. I say we are 1:40 before dep and she says no the flight has been preponed and passengers were informed 12 hours before! We were still 40 minutes before revised departure but the SpiceChild at the airport refused to check us in saying DGCA regulations forbid checkin 40 mins before flight. 15 mins of arguments later, the manager says we cant go because boarding has already been completed! 30 mins before? When I ask them to process my refund, they say i classify as "no show". another 30 mins of arguments later i am told that since this is the second segment of a return ticket i am not eligible for refund anyway! :(

Can an airline really prepone scheduled departure by 1 or 2 hours in this manner with just a pre-recorded message to inform passengers? What happens if passenger is outside of network coverage area (hey it happens in my line of work).

one week in advance, we can adjust somehow. But 24 hours before departure how can airline get away with this sort of thing?

Duplicate

I think they can do that anytime, provided they inform the passengers. IMO, it's not a good idea though as some passengers are bound to be caught unawares, for which, the airline should be prepared to make alternate plans.
Such changes can be made due to a number of reasons, including, but not limited to cancellation of the flight you were booked on.
Once, we were to go DCA-EWR-DEL on CO in business class, departing DCA at 4:00 p.m. and EWR at about 8:00 p.m. At 9:00 a.m. we got a phone call from CO telling us that the 4:00 p.m. flight has been delayed and there was impending bad weather along the east coast. WE had to catch the 12:30 p.m. flight if we wanted to be sure of catching the flight to DEL.
Twenty four hour notice is plenty of time.
In your case, you received the SMS, as well as a voice message/call on the phone whose number was provided. You ignored the messages. You were definitely a NO SHOW. Your refund will be governed by rules of the fare you purchased.

I usually find your posts to be reasonable and am surprised that you deliberately ignored the messages. Blaming the airline for everything seems to be quite common here.
Schedules are not written in stone. You have to realise that your flgiht is not the only flight the airline is operating. Schedules can change due to weather, or other operational requirements, including airport operations. It's not good to ignore the messages and then argue with the airline staff.

Yaatri: the SMS message was not for preponing flight but for checkin 120 mins before. This was received on Thu (day after booking) and we did reach at 1940, about 120 mins before the schedued dep on our ticket.

the recorded phone call was received by Mrs on Sat (1 day before return flight) and I thought she had heard/understood wrong as I have never come across this situation before of airline preponing departure of scheduled flight by an hour that too just 24 hours before. I was thinking of writing a piece on this later.

Does this sort of thing happen often at LCC airlines? What are the rules/protection built in to protect passengers?

Suppose I am planning a return by 9pm flight so as to complete all meetings, and flight is preponed by 1 hour which means i have to miss one meeting or risk a no-show?

SG has been tinkering with their schedules a lot for the last few months...

As Yaatri said, Schedules are subject to Change and 1 Hr is not much considering great scheme of things,

Though Spicejet informed the change to the given number in 24 Hrs, they should also be more accommodating when you showed up 40 Mins before the revised Departure.

What if you were not reachable on the given number, SpiceJet Could've/Should've given a refund for the unused portion of the ticket.

In US, you can claim the trip is in vain and claim refund if the schedule changes.

Check the CoC or T&C, I think there is a clause of 4 Hrs reschedule is allowed (Or I may be wrong about this)

I think there is no rule regarding this anymore in the US.

i see your point but at the end of the day they did inform you....i've had something similar happen to me on an ai flight earlier this year....even i thought it was strange for them to change the flight time 24 hours before departure but i showed up early....

That pretty much sums up your thread.

What you should have done was make a quick call to SG or run a Google search on Flightstats to check revised timings.

A schedule change that disrupts your plans should make you think about changing your meeting schedule or prompt you to call the airline and rebook you on another flight.
Your time line was a bit confusing, but that's not important.
As I have said before, schedule change happens due to operational reasons. Whether the airline can inform every passenger, or that some passengers cannot be reached is not a consideration for whether or not to reschedule a flight.
However, the airline should be willing to accommodate the passenger on another flight if there are some passengers who could not be informed. In your situation, that was not the case.
Accommodation would mean putting you on the next available flight. By your own admission you ignored the message and did nothing to ensure that you catch the flight. Deliberately ignoring the message and then arguing with the employee is not likely to get you any sympathy from the airline.
You see, we have our schedule and requirements while airlines have their own schedule and constraints. In my experience airlines do try to accommodate you if arrive at the airport too late to check-in, due to traffic issues, but not just because you chose to ignore the message. . At small airports from which I travel frequently, I have even been able to call the gate agent directly when I am running late. Sometimes they are able to hold the flight, sometimes not. If I miss a flight because I ignored the schedule change, I don't deserve any sympathy.
Did you tell the agent that you ignored the message?

update: while the remote station was not refunding the ticket, walking into their DEL office after landing on an AI flight, resolved the issue: got a refund minus 300 rupees.

Guess the rules are little more flexible at the HQ than in remote station? Or mebbe it was the "PRESS" card displayed prominently that did the trick! :)

The only airline not afraid of PIB cards is AI :)

Good for you that you got something for your "no show". I hope you will pay heed to messages about schedule changes and, more importantly, DON'T dismiss what your wife says. :D

I think i am off SG now! Heard in the office that they do this schedule thing more than other carriers.

lets hear you say that after you have been married 27 years! :)

There is.. atleast on AA. If they change schedule by more than 15 mins, have a right to rebook on another flight, day or nearby airports and have the right to refund the amount such that it can be used for transport on alternate carriers!!

Multiple times this has happened to me... Corporate travel desk used to be at pains to tell us that if your flight is re-scheduled, dont just go and cancel the ticket as that becomes non-ref.. call us, we initiate a refund based on schedule change!

yaatri has probably been married longer....:D

The key is knowing when to listen and when to ignore without l=giving them a clue. Take it form the wise man. ;)

I understand your frustration. Carriers should try as much as possiblethat scheduled flight leave on time, not earlier in any case. There will alays be people who will be caught unawares. You were guilt because you were contacted by the airline on phone. What if your wife did not have a cell phone. What if she had been doing something important like her nails, seated in a hair salon, or in a meeting?
DL did changed the schedule by 15 minutes after check-in and sent me an e-mail. I did not miss the flight, but I could have, had I been busy buying up booze in duty free. I think advancing departure of a flight is not a good idea even though the carrier is well within its rights when doing so.

P.S. In this case, the should have clearly paid heed even if it goes against the totality of your experiences in 27 years.
Never give your wife's cell phone number to the airline. Better yet, don't give her a cell phone. :D j/k Strange things can happen when your wife talks to the airline.
"My husband is very highly placed and is on a very important mission. You had better leave on time, better yet, an hour earlier, or else......." :D

Actually, my wife is quite good. She keeps track of where I am, when in air, makes schedule changes and seat selection for me, when I am unable to. She used to be an elite before we gave up on every one being a plat.

SG has been fiddling with their schedule quite a bit recently.

AA has their own policy on this, probably a vestige from the era of regulated airlines. There is no uniform code/legislation regarding this issue afaik. Would be happy to be wrong on this.

I don;t know why anyone would say that there is no rule in the U.S. regarding this. There are rules.
To respond to your claimed right, when you don;t contact the airline even when a message has been delivered to you or to your agent, the wife in this case, you forfeit that right. You have to act in order to exercise your right. If you haven't received the message, most airlines will accommodate you on their next available flight. But being confrontational will not help you.

It seems the stars are conspiring to get me to stop flying SG! I had sworn off flying SG based on last experience. But i was so taken in by the friendly staff at the SG office in DEL last time when i went to resolve issue that I thought i would try them again.

I booked a return flight from DEL to BLR and back 2 days later. Ticket was booked on phone through call center by my office staff as I rushed home to pack and left for airport. Based on my instructions, staff had pre-ordered NonVeg meal on outbound sector DEL-BLR.

I barely made it to airport in time and rushing through checkin I boarded aircraft with seconds to spare before they closed. I took the printout for the ticket at the counter and though I was told they charge for providing print, they did not do so this time.

Once inflight, the meal carts were rolled out, and when asked what meal i would like to buy, i said I have pre-booked meal. FA checks her manifest and says no meal has been booked in my name. She checks my boarding-card and says that if i had pre-booked meal, my boarding pass should read NVML under a column called "SSR". Now i did not know this otherwise I would have pointed it out to checkin staff. I showed the attendant my ticket printout and it did say "Non veg meal" but did not specify which sector. She replied that it may be for the return sector. I assumed someone at my office may have goofed up while making the booking. Since I have to eat every few hours and i had not done so, i purchased a meal for 300 bucks: since NonVeg wasnt available, a Veg would have to do.

Now on the return, while check-in my Boarding card was still blank under SSR and this time I pointed it out only to be told that my BLR-DEL segment does not show any booked meals. Staff asked me to check with the booking office inside the terminal. Their records showed that my meal was booked for DEL-BLR segment! The staff at the airport asked me to show them the boarding card of my DEL-BLR flight and since I did not have that, i basically had no case! :)

On arriving in DEL on Wed, I called up their call-center to report the matter. 2 days later, i am contacted by SG staff who tell me that their records show that since a Non-Veg meal was not available, a Veg meal was offered instead and consumed by passenger! When i told them I had paid for it and the background, they promised to get back. 2 further days later I get word that a princely sum of Rs.50 will be refunded to the credit card that made the booking!

WHy was my name missing from the manifest? Poor systems?

If they closed and then reopened the flight for you (because you were late), your service request might have been wiped out.