The Ministry of Civil Aviation is pushing for an ombudsman – a key person who would look to address passenger complaints – but private airlines have been resisting any such move for more than three years. As of today, if an airline loses your bags, makes you run around for a refund or if its staff misbehave with you, all you can do is write letters of protest and wait. There is no systematic redressal of passenger complaints.
Which is perhaps why Civil Aviation Secretary K N Shrivastava has called a meeting of all airline CEOs today where, among other things, he is expected to once again bring up the issue of an airline ombudsman.
An airline CEO told Firstpost that private airlines are worried about any Government-appointed ombudsman being “intrusive” in their day-to-day functioning. Not only do airlines fear that an ombudsman could become a tool for competitive snooping, they also wonder about the very concept of an ombudsman when no clearly defined service standards really exist for the airline industry.
17/05/13 Sindhu Bhattacharya/First Post.com
