Jet Airways, IndiGo dump MakeMyTrip in protest against opaque fares scheme

Jet Airways and budget carrier IndiGo, which fly almost half the total air-passengers of the country, have pulled out inventory from Nasdaq-listed website makemytrip.com in protest against the 'opaque fares' scheme the portal deployed on its website.
 
Jet Airways

The move came even as the portal claimed that it had absolved itself from such practices, after the government disallowed airlines from participating in such schemes.

'Opaque fares' was a scheme offered by a few travel portals such as yatra.com and makemytrip.com, which offered heavily discounted air tickets without disclosing the airline name until the payment was made. However, the country's aviation regulator DGCA had directed all airlines to "immediately withdraw" participation from such schemes through a directive on March 28.

IndiGo, India's second largest airline by market share, sent out an official statement on Tuesday saying it has withdrawn all content from makemytrip.com as "the arbitrary display of fares and opaque pricing is anti consumer and in violation of DGCA norms and directives."

The airline President Aditya Ghosh, in a text message, further said, "We have raised this with MMT on several occasions but unfortunately, there has been no resolution. We were, therefore, left with no choice. IndiGo can't be seen supporting a blatant violation of the law and something that is apparently anti-consumer."

Meanwhile, Jet Airways, which had earlier called opaque fares a scam and had threatened to pull out inventory from makemytrip.com last month, also confirmed the move.

"Jet Airways has not pulled out its inventory from makemytrip.com. However, we have limited the inventory available to them for sale," the airline spokesperson said through a text message.

A person from the travel industry, who did not want to be identified, however, said that these protesting airlines are deploying pressure tactics to make the travel portal drop Kingfisher Airlines from its list. "You will soon see everything fall back into place. These airlines are trying to thwart ailing Kingfisher's chances," he said.

The aim of this scheme (opaque fares), described variously as discount or special fares by the portals, was largely to get rid of tickets of Kingfisher Airlines, a debt-laden carrier. Some passengers, unaware that they were buying Kingfisher tickets, have subsequently been booked on flights that have later been cancelled.

Meanwhile, an official statement from makemytrip.com said that all fares are displayed with the approval of participating airlines.

"We would like to maintain as before that fares and inventory on our website is controlled by the airlines. All the fares are displayed as per the guidelines received and approved by airlines, including the special fares that has been approved by the participating airlines. As India's leading online travel agency, MakeMyTrip strives to give customers the best quality of services and value based offerings," the company said in an emailed response.

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