Royal Jordanian vs Shakuntala Rani

THE Royal Jordanian Airlines (hereinafter referred to as the Petitioner) has filed the present revision petition against the order of the State Consumer Disputes Redressal Commission, Chandigarh (hereinafter referred to as the State Commission) wherein it had held the Petitioner guilty of deficiency in service and passed an order in favour of Smt.Shakuntla Rani & Ors. (hereinafter referred to as the Respondents) who were the original complainants before the District Forum.

THE facts of the case are that the Respondents had obtained two confirmed tickets from the Petitioner Airlines, through M/s Shergil Travels for Rs.63,000/- the route being Delhi-Amman-London and London-Amman-Delhi for 23.06.2003 and 10.07.2003 respectively. On reaching England, as per the requirements of the Airlines which required reconfirmation of the tickets by passengers who break their journey for more than 72 hours at least 72 hours before departure of the flight, Respondents made phone calls to the office of the Petitioner Airlines from Birmingham to confirm that they would be flying back on 10.07.2003 and again on 08.07.2003 from Scotland even giving their contact phone numbers in both places. In response they were told that the tickets had been reconfirmed. However, when Respondents reached Heathrow Airport on 10.07.2003, they were informed by the checking staff that since they had not reconfirmed their reservations, the London-Amman sector of their ticket had been cancelled but the reservation from Amman to Delhi was intact. Respondents issued a legal notice to the Petitioner Airlines seeking compensation of Rs.5 lakhs which was repudiated by the Petitioner Airlines. THE Respondents, therefore, filed a complaint before the District Forum on grounds of deficiency in service. THEy claimed Rs.5 lakhs as compensation as also Rs.10,000/- for expenses that they had to incur in London including on two days stay in a hotel and for mental agony and harassment. The Petitioner denied that Respondents had reconfirmed the tickets and stated that they had received a phone call from the Respondents from Birmingham only to give their contact telephone number which cannot be treated as reconfirmation. No phone call was subsequently received on this issue. Therefore, Petitioner was well within its rights to cancel the tickets in the absence of reconfirmation.

The District Forum accepted the complaint. The operative portion of the order of the District Forum reads as follows: Every passenger is supposed to reconfirm his/her intention of continuing the return reservation at least 72 hours before the departure of the flight in case there is a break in the journey for more than 72 hours. The complainant in para No.8 of the complaint, has submitted that the complainant called the Ops at London from Birmingham on 30.06.2003 as per the instructions on the ticket/jacket of the ticket and confirming to them that the complainant shall be flying from London to Delhi on 10.07.2003 as stipulated. The complainants have further called the office of the OP on 08.07.2003 from Scotland and complainants were told that their booking stands as scheduled for 10.07.2003 from London to Amman and 11.07.2003 from Amman to Delhi. Ops in their reply (in para-8 of the reply) has admitted that the complainant contacted their office at London on 30.06.2003 and gave her contact number. The OP further says that the complainants did not contact that office for reconfirmation of the return journey, thereafter. The contention of the OP that the complainant gave the contact number on 30.06.2003 cannot be believed as there can not be any other purpose of contacting by the complainant on 30.06.2003 except that the confirmation of their return flight on 10.07.2003 as stated by the complainant. We, therefore, accept the submission of the complainant that she contacted the Ops at London on 30.06.2003 and confirmed their return journey schedule for 10.07.2003 and find that the Ops have been deficient in cancellation the reservations of the complainant for their return journey.

THE District Forum directed the Petitioner as well as Shergil Travels and Jet Airways(authorized agent) (who were also opposite parties before the District Forum) to pay the Respondents Rs.25,000/- as compensation and Rs.2500/- as costs. Petitioner Airlines as well as the other two parties filed an appeal against the order of the District Forum. Respondents also filed an appeal before the State Commission seeking enhanced compensation of Rs.5 lakhs. Since all the three appeal had arisen out of a common order of the District Forum, the State Commission decided this by a single judgment in which it held that Shergil Travels is not liable to pay compensation because there was no deficiency on their part and Jet Airways being only an authorized agent of the Petitioner Airlines also cannot be made liable for the deficiency of the principal i.e of the Petitioner Airlines. It further accepted that there was need to enhance the compensation to the Respondents and increased the same to Rs.1 lakh along with Rs.2,500/- as cost of litigation to be paid by the Royal Jordanian Airlines through their Marketing Manager. Aggrieved by this order, Petitioner has come in revision before this Commission. Learned counsel for both parties were present and made oral submissions. Learned counsel for Petitioner stated that the contention of the Respondents that despite reconfirmation they were not permitted to board the airlines to accommodate Jordanian Embassy passengers is incorrect because in fact no reconfirmation message was received from them. In fact on the rare occasions when passengers have to be offloaded even when the tickets are confirmed, the Airlines invariably compensates them monetarily and also pays for their hotel accommodation. In the instant case this was not done because the tickets were not reconfirmed by the Respondents. Further the State Commissions award of a compensation of Rs.1 lakh when the entire tickets cost only Rs.63,000/- was also very much on the higher side.

COUNSEL for Respondents stated that the learned fora below had carefully weigh the evidence produced by both parties and had reached a finding of fact that the Respondents had reconfirmed the tickets as required by the Airlines not once but on two occasions. As observed by the fora below there was no need for Respondents to have made the phone calls just to give their contact numbers. COUNSEL for Respondents further submitted that the Respondents had to incur significant expenditure and inconvenience and harassment by having to spend one night in the airport and two additional nights in a hotel before they could be accommodated in a flight. Under the circumstances, they were entitled to compensation which was commensurate with the expenses and mental agony caused to them. It was further prayed that the revision petition be dismissed. We have heard learned counsel for both parties and have gone through the evidence on record. We agree with the well-reasoned and detailed order of the District Forum and the State Commission that there was adequate and credible evidence on record that the Respondents made more than the required efforts to reconfirm their tickets to the Airlines and that their not being allowed to board the plane, by cancelling their tickets in one sector was unjustified. The fact that only one segment of the travel was cancelled and the other segment remained intact lends further credence to the Respondents version that their ticket on the London-Amman sector was cancelled despite reconfirmation to accommodate some favoured passengers. It is also on record that the Airlines did not pay any compensation to the Respondents nor did they arrange for their hotel accommodation thus leaving them literally in the lurch. We, therefore, are in total agreement with the findings of the learned fora below that the Petitioner Airlines is guilty of serious deficiency in service. Under the circumstances, the compensation awarded by the State Commission is reasonable and adequate. The revision petition is dismissed accordingly. The Petitioner is directed to pay to the Respondents Rs.1 lakh as compensation including the costs of stay at London and Rs.2500/- as costs of litigation.