It was meant to be a privileged flight jaunt, but in reality it turned out to be nightmare not once but twice for this privileged customer of the national carrier.

Alpana Dutta, a privileged customer of Air India during one of her recent trips to Goa with her family, went through an ordeal that she would rather forget. The nightmarish experience started when Dutta along with her husband and son were to board a flight to Goa from Bangalore on December 14.

A few hours before they were to board the flight, they were informed that the flight which was to depart at 2.30 pm was delayed. And later on,  they were told that it was cancelled.

“The airlines’ Customer Care Executive kept telling us that the flight was delayed and finally by evening, told that the flight was cancelled - throwing my holiday schedule to a toss. The airline staff also refused to make alternative arrangements and no reimbursement was made as the tickets were booked using the bonus points redemption,” said Dutta.

The nightmarish experience with the airliner did not end there. On their way back to Bangalore further trouble was in store.  The family decided to cut short their trip by two days as their son was ill and had conveyed to the airlines’ customer care centre to get the tickets advanced from December 19 to 17.

“They had agreed to advance the ticket for which I was told to pay Rs 2,850 (Rs 950 per passenger, of which Rs 750 will be charged towards the rescheduling charges and Rs 200 towards the upgradation to the next class). However, on December 17 we were informed to pay Rs 4,200 and latter Rs 4,800 at the ticket counter in the airport and that the amount mentioned earlier was wrong,” she added.

The family finally paid the revised ticket fare and boarded flight IC-919 to Bangalore. “The whole incident is nothing short of forgery.  The airline authorities never bothered about the misery I had to undergo at the airport, with my ailing child,” she added.