Indian travel agents squeezed as fliers demand cash refunds

Bloomberg

Customers demanding cash refunds for flights axed because of the coronavirus are putting the squeeze on India’s travel agents, who are only receiving virtual money from airlines solely to be used for future bookings.
Indian authorities have told airlines to repay passengers in cash for tickets booked during the nationwide lockdown, but there’s no such obligation when it comes to travel agents. That leaves them digging into their own pockets to appease disgruntled customers.
The default option for most travel agents in other countries is to give credit notes and only provide a refund if asked.
“My wallet balance is increasing, but the cash balance in my bank account is falling,” Easemytrip CEO Nishant Pitti said, referring to the credit he is accumulating from airlines. “It’s the travel-agent community that’s getting hurt,” he said in an interview with Bloomberg News.
Easemytrip, one of India’s leading online travel companies, has paid out about 500 million rupees ($6.6 million) to customers in the past few weeks, while its wallet balance has ballooned to 750 million rupees, Pitti said.
The strain India’s travel agents are under is yet another sign of the damage that the coronavirus is inflicting on aviation and related industries. The pandemic has led to drastic restrictions on movement and the grounding of airline fleets. Countries such as China are seeing a rebound in domestic air travel, but that’s not the case in India as flights have been banned since March 25. Hundreds of thousands of trips have had to be cancelled.
Hangsha Deka, a 33-year-old real-estate consultant, booked a ticket on April 1 to fly from New Delhi to Guwahati on April 15 to be with his wife for the birth of their first child, but the flight was canceled. Easemytrip has provided a refund, according to Deka, who eventually got special permission to drive the 1,900 kilometres to the city in northeast India’s Assam state.
An Air India spokesman said the company has clearly mentioned its refund policy on its website, and it adheres to that for every customer. The policy states that the airline will waive no-show charges and protect the “full value” if a passenger holds a ticket for travel between March 23 and May 14.