Wouldn't recommend Air Deccan

LazyGirl

This happened a few weeks ago - we turned up at the Air Deccan checkin in Kolkata, only to find that our flight to Bhubaneswar, that we'd booked ten days beforehand, had been cancelled. In fact the evening flight from Kolkata to Bhubaneswar had been completely cancelled - removed from the schedule - and the one remaining daily flight was, not surprisingly, full for the next few days, leaving us pretty much out of luck.

Having studied this forum I was prepared for long delays and even cancellations with Air Deccan, and I made sure not to rely on my air deccan flight for any other connections. But I wasn't prepared for the flight just disappearing, and the shrugged shoulders, "we can't help you we're a no frills airline" attitude from the staff. Other people I mentioned this to in India seemed to think that this was a standard occurrence with Air Deccan.

So if you can't rely on Air Deccan to get you there even within a couple of days of your reservation then why bother? In future I think it's Jet Airways or the train for me.

Postscript: After we had calmed down and stopped railing against the situation it all worked out fine at the end. My partner refused to reschedule our flight to Bhubaneswar (he made the excellent point that if Air Deccan were to leave us stranded for a couple of days in Bhubaneswar this could mean missing our flight home to the US, and that was something we did not want to do) and the trains were all full, so we found a hotel in Kolkata, and the next day we pulled out the credit card, headed for the Jet Airways office and ended up spending five days in Aurangabad which we loved.

InsideTheOutdoors

Hmm.... Something like that happened here in Mumbai too.... abt the passengers being stranded after a flight got cancelled.

Don't know the exact details but it was in the local news et al....

Moral of the story: when u book a flight with air deccan, also have a backup hotel... :-) else dont fly with them...

any other experiences..?

__________________
"Live, Love, Shanti, Shiva

LazyGirl

Hi InsideTheOutdoors,

I found this - it could be the story you're referring to. I like the bit about the passengers scuffling with desk staff!

What type of "other experiences" were you asking about - other cautionary tales or experiences in general?

shubho

couple of months back... was trying to get to calcutta in a hurry, had a week's leave left... bought a ticket online, showed up at the delhi airport... then waited for 9 hrs for the plane to take off.
the reason? our flight to bombay hasnt landed yet, no permission from authorities... i assume it meant the plane was circling bombay for many hours.
on the way back (calcutta - delhi), the air deccan plane was late by only 4 hrs.
moral of story: dont fly air deccan if you're in a hurry.
the planes were good, though - brand new airbuses, not the shoddy jet airways 3nd hand aircraft leased from kazakh airways.

ksrao801

I have a booked flight from Calcutta to Hyderabad on Air Deccan for Dec 6th. Should I make another reservaton on Indian Airlines or Railways as an insurance?

phantom

Yeah, even my air deccan flight from bangalore to bombay was delayed by 2 hrs. I would anyways recommend "Kingfisher" to one and all. The seats were good, the plane was nice, it has TV screen for each seat, with 7 video and 7 audio channels, Delicious food and yummy air hostesses (sadly they are only for the tease)
I am not gonna look towards any other airlines from now on.

InsideTheOutdoors

Hi KSRao,

You could check out the newest entrant - Spicejet for air services… Personally I haven’t gone on one of their flights but from what I heard from my friends, buddies and colleagues (all Mumbai – Goa sector..!!), they give neat service and their USP being their ticket prices with almost no delays/cancellations in flight times etc…. So if you just wanna reach from Point A to Point B without burning a hole in your pocket, you might be interested in this carrier…

I checked this out for you: An adult ticket (one way) from Calcutta to Hyderabad is only Rs.1949 for DEC 6….
Check out their website: www.spicejet.com for more details….

I personally wouldn’t want to travel by Deccan cos’ of all the stories I’ve heard about them.
Anyways, in the end, you’ve gotta do what YOU’ve gotta do I guess.

Cheers and keep walking.

joepubli

ouch! jut booked a flight on AirDeccan before I read this. I was nervouse enough booking Air India from London to CCU with a 4 hour connection to Air Deccan. Seems that won't be a problem anymore!