Refund for Tickets booked for Air Travel during lockdown: Who will be eligible for refunds? DGCA clarifies in affidavit before SC

The Directorate General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) has filed an affidavit before the Supreme Court clarifying its position on the issue of refunds for tickets booked for flights that stood cancelled during the COVID-19 pandemic and the resultant lockdown..The Apex Court had sought a clarification from the Centre as regards certain aspects of ticket refunds in the previous date of hearing and had asked the Centre to furnish classification for those queries..Can air tickets be refunded now that flights have resumed? Supreme Court asks Centre.These included queries as regards the category of passengers proposed to be covered under the decision for refund, the period of booking of flights for which such refund can be availed, and the duration of credit shell that can be given by the Airlines..As regards the category of passengers to be covered, all the tickets booked for domestic flights, whether through travel agents or from airlines directly, would be covered by this refund, the affidavit says. .In relation to international travel, passengers who had made bookings on Indian carriers or foreign carriers originating from India would be eligible to claim the refund..The period of booking was the crucial aspect on which clarification was sought by many parties. The framework that the Centre had come up earlier suggested that the refund was valid only for the flights that were cancelled during the first leg of the nationwide lockdown..However, clarifying the issue, the DGCA has categorised the passengers in three categories:For those who made bookings prior to lockdown for a period up till May 24, the refund would be governed by the credit shell scheme and the incentives thereunder. For bookings made during lockdown for travelling during lockdown, refund shall be made by airlines immediately "as the airlines were not supposed to book such tickets." For bookings that were made for travelling in dates after May 24, the refund would be governed by the Civil Aviation Requirements (CAR)..The threshold of May 24 is set for dividing the passengers in these categories since operation of domestic air travel had begun in a calibrated manner May 25 onwards..The DGCA also elaborates on the credit shell scheme which was stressed on by the association for tour operators and travel agents. Explaining the scheme in this regard, the affidavit says,."if the Tour operator has already paid the money to the airline for purchasing the ticket for the client but the client is yet to pay that money to the agents. then on cancellation of ticket and converting it in to credit shell, the ticket will remain in the name of passenger and in case passenger utilizes the credit shell he will pay to the agent and not to the airline. However, in case the passenger does not utilise the credit shell till 31st Mar 2021, then the airline will have to refund the amount as per proposed formulation and money will go back to same account of the agent from which the ticket amount was paid to the airline.".It is also specified that all the refunds made will be credited to accounts from which the bookings were initially made and paid for. In case of credit shells, the ticket will remain in the name of the passenger but should the event of refund arise, the amount would be credited to the account of the operator or agent that made the booking..The Bench of Justices Ashok Bhushan, R Subhash Reddy and MR Shah is likely to hear the batch of petitions on the issue of air ticket refund on Wednesday, September 23.