May 25, 2009 12:03 AM
2765 Views
I have been supporting Yatra.com by buying from them as many domestic tickets from them as I can; One reason could be because I am a R-ADAG fan and hold their shares and also I know that R-ADAG is an investor with Yatra.
I have never had problems as I just booked domestic tickets and flied. Never changed dates or cancelled; Most of the times fares are expensive compared to buying form airline directly. Trouble started when I went ahead and booked an international flight with them. I fly every 6 weeks and has so far used the company travel ahent who was expensive but did the job just perfect. I booked a ticket which was onward Air India and return by Lufthansa;
Air India issued ticket; I completed onward trip and wanted to change return ticket. And called Yatra from Norway; Yatra refused to help me in doing this change as they dont want to deal with Air India to change the ticket. And Air India does not have infrastructure to take my credit card and make an online transaction and make a date change. I should say that Air India was supportive but Yatra customer care was dicey and finally they ahd to say No; Just 2 days below.
I sent my passport copy etc to a relative in Chennai and got ticket changed. Got the changes done somehow but I spent so much money on taking with Air India and Yatra on international calls; I interacted with Pooja Misra of Yatra and Sonal of Air India; I should complement Sonal; Pooja was the most dicey customer care person I have seen. She kept saying yes and finally no; I was ready to pay extra to get this done. But they simply refused. I also fell for their promotion that they will give 4000 Rs worth vouchers but let me say that when I got it, it was very conditional;
Those are discounts when I make expensive buys from expensive online places; I am sure it is useless; I have few questions: 1) If Yatra cannot change ticket issued by Air India, why dont they state it upfront when booking tickets? 2) If Yatra can sell tickets issued by Air India, why cant they change ticket issued by Air India? 3) Why do they state in their websites that for changes involving Air India tickets, they are helpless 4) They should mention in the Fare Rules on this fact that they dont entertain changes; 5) Why do I go to a travel agent? Not to fill their coffers. I need services through them. But if I cant get basic services like this, will I come back to them again? Verdict: Domestic ticketing has been ok but not intl; I have now decided to do all ticketing - domestic through airline sites and intl travel using company travel agent; I DID NOT GET ANYTHING BY TICKETING WITH YATRA AND WOULD NEVER DEAL WITH THEM AGAIN.
