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stealthpilot · Member Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 2325 Location: BLR, DXB

According to Wikipedia...

Captain G. R. Gopinath, the Managing Director of Air Deccan is a graduate of the prestigious National Defence Academy and has served the Indian Army.
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the_380 · Posted: Sat Mar 24, 2007 2:11 pm Post subject:

Gopinath is not ex-IC...
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iflytb20 · Posted: Sat Mar 24, 2007 6:12 pm Post subject:

he is ex-Indian Army....Army Aviation to be exact

HAWK21M · Posted: Sun Mar 25, 2007 5:49 pm Post subject:

blrsea · Member Joined: 25 Mar 2007 Posts: 182

Capt Gopinath is in fact ex-army, and it is freely available on the web.

INTERVIEW/ G.R. GOPINATH

Nimish · Posted: Sun Mar 25, 2007 8:07 pm Post subject:

stealthpilot · Member Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 2325 Location: BLR, DXB

blrsea · Member Joined: 25 Mar 2007 Posts: 182

blrsea · Member Joined: 25 Mar 2007 Posts: 182

I have travelled on 3 flights on DN over the last three weeks on the BLR-HYD sectory, and I am pretty satisfied with the experience. They get you from point A to point B, and thats all I need. I found the plane seats to have taken quite a beating. Some aircraft didn't have any way to recline your seats. One other aircraft did have it ( looked like ex-UA, might be wrong), but the seats were so depressed as though elephants had sat on them Very Happy

Also flew Spice jet and Air sahara for first time. SpiceJet is a pretty decent operation. Nice clean jets, good FAs, and get you where you want to go. A little better than DN in terms on aircraft cleanliness, and you get some water on board. But otherwise, not much difference. Air Sahara was a full service flight, and got tickets cheaper than DN and SG. Good service, and liked the flight. DN and S2 had convinient timings for BLR-HYD flights ( 7:30am/8am in morning), while SG had a later departure( 10:30am) which doesn't work well with people travelling on business. On HYD-BLR sectors, DN has their flight leaving HYD at 5:45am, which is too early. A 8:00am flight would have been nice. But atleast they have a 6:00pm flight which works well too.

The FAs on all three carriers were young and did their job well. And most of them were fair to good looking. The DN uniforms make the FAs look more like cleaning crew than cabin crew ( a little harsh, but God, I hate that uniform Smile

). SG's uniform is a bit similar to IT in that both wear red skirts and white shirts, though IT's FA wear a red jacket too. Sahara FAs were the best according to my experience, looking good in their nice sarees, and prettiest of the lot. They had that nice Indian woman looks in their sarees, which somehow I am a biased towards Smile

Yet to try IT, 9W and GoAir/Indigo. GoAir appeared to have dropped their BLR-HYD flights from their summer schedule, and Indigo doesn't appear to fly those routes too.

ABN397 · Member Joined: 27 Dec 2006 Posts: 113 Location: India

Nilanjon · Member Joined: 22 Dec 2006 Posts: 85 Location: Bangalore

blrsea · Member Joined: 25 Mar 2007 Posts: 182

malQ · Posted: Thu Mar 29, 2007 12:49 pm Post subject:

Personally, I would certainly hesitate before flying Air Deccan, but that is for the following reasons which may not impact others:-

a) Lack of pre-assigned seating. This is terrible and very demeaning for passengers if still practised. (DN have to solve this.)

b) Selling food on board at prices higher than MRP. This is absolutely illegal. (Solution - don't buy, carry your own, which is now possible from many airports.)

c) Not providing ample and free drinking water on board. This again is simply not legal. (I wonder what DN will do about this.)

d) Attitude issues by counter staff towards passengers. This leads to a lack of mutual respect. (Has this been fixed? I shall find out soon)

e) Arrogant pronouncements by Warwick Brady and bit of me too stuff from Vijaya Menon, their corp.comm person. (Well, nothing to say here)

Towards being fair and getting the latest actual position - I know one flight is not a good sample size, but then what else can one do? - I am going to fly Air Deccan within the next 48 hours and let this board know what my experience was.

+++

Placing all this aside, fact remains that Air Deccan has swung a whole new dimension into air travel at reasonable prices, within India. in addition, they have brought out a change in the attitude of the Government towards airlines and airline passengers.

For generations of Indians who remember and were given much worse treatment by Air India and Indian Airlines in the pre-liberalisation era, and then faced a certain element of cartelisation from 9W and S2 with IC till DN came along, it doesn't matter if DN slips up now and then.

Personally, having good knowledge of how the tv channels don't do their homework, I would take the CNN-IBn report with a BIG BIG pinch of salt.

Nilanjon · Member Joined: 22 Dec 2006 Posts: 85 Location: Bangalore

DN had told DGCA that they will shift Rs. 150 from congestion surcharge to the basic fare itself.

I've just discovered the next set of deceptive tactics from Air Deccan.

They have increased all their fares by Rs. 150/- but not yet removed the congestion surcharge.
By telling the DGCA that they would remove the congestion surcharge, they have found another means to make small money.

I wonder what they think of their customers - fools or what ?

I can imagine that they have some really creepy guys in their commercial department. Which is why probably Gopi/Brady are getting in Manab Bose (ex HR Head at Tata Sons) in the near future to clean up their internal people mess.

himmat01 · Member Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 1392 Location: DEL

I have made a booking on BLR-IXE-BLR for April 10th. They have not added the congestion charge to the basic fare of Rs. 24.00 on BLR-IXE sector and Rs. 624.00 on the return leg.

The taxes charged were PSF: Rs. 225.00 and Fuel Surcharge: Rs. 750.00
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Nilanjon · Member Joined: 22 Dec 2006 Posts: 85 Location: Bangalore

Looks like they updated their booking engine this afternoon. Sorry, I jumped the gun.

karatecatman · Guest

CNN-IBN responds to Air Deccan

http://www.ibnlive.com/news/cnnibn-responds-to-air-deccan-query/37239-3.html

CNN-IBN Correspondent Ruksh Chatterji replies to Ms Vijaya Menon, Head of Corporate Communications, Air Deccan, regarding the company’s allegations against story. Below is his detailed response to the issues raised in the above-mentioned email.

The three stories aired on CNN-IBN were the result of an investigation, which lasted over one-and-a-half months beginning on January 29, 2007. The investigation was undertaken following complaints from passengers on the flight DN763, on the above-mentioned date.

....

A lot of effort has been taken to check and crosscheck facts before it made it to the story. The Documentary / Video / Oral Evidence used in the story is listed here:

malQ · Posted: Thu Mar 29, 2007 6:06 pm Post subject:

Well, I just read Ruksh's transcript and does it make for interesting reading! And Capt. Gopinath does have a bit of a loose lip, doesn't he, accusing others of accepting bribes?

Vaise, to tell the truth, I have seen the Air Deccan counter staff purposely going slow and working to add to the confusion at check-in counters.

Nimish · Posted: Thu Mar 29, 2007 6:15 pm Post subject:

VABBy · Member Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 823 Location: DEL

Terrific Mazaa agaya let DN respond now and see what they have to say....
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stealthpilot · Member Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 2325 Location: BLR, DXB

malQ · Posted: Sat Mar 31, 2007 1:31 pm Post subject:

a) The exemption for selling packaged priced goods above MRP is applicable to members of the NHRAI. it doesn't automatically move to airlines.

b) DGCA rules specify drinking water availability on passenger aircraft, which point was admitted by DN in a response to me, where they also claimed that the water in the toilet was potable!

c) I ended up flying S2 yesterday instead of DN because it was at the same price.

karatecatman · Guest

Three counters of Air Deccan was ransacked by some Mumbai-bound passengers today after the airline denied them boarding passes on the plea that they arrived late, police said, says a UNI report.
Twenty passengers who had booked tickets three months ago went berserk when airline officials said that boarding passes cannot be issued, police.
The passengers approached the counters at 0515 am, 15 minutes ahead of the flight departure and by which time, the counters had been closed, police said.
Police intervened and pacified the agitated passengers, besides ensuring their journey by next flight.
But the passengers became extremely abusive, spat on and threatened to beat up the airline's ground staff. One passenger is alleged to have threatened to even defecate on the airline's counters.

himmat01 · Member Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 1392 Location: DEL

That's really sick. These guys really need to be locked up for sometime.
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Nilanjon · Member Joined: 22 Dec 2006 Posts: 85 Location: Bangalore

Another case where DN itself has admitted to overbooking.
http://www.ibnlive.com/news/india/03_2007/air-deccan-does-it-again-in-jaipur-37411.html

I re-iterate what I wrote in another thread based on my parents' own experience of travelling DN :
The switchover from IterGlobe to Radixx was unplanned and sudden, and they have lost many old bookings. As a result many seats booked on Interglobe's booking-engine show up as unsold inventory in Radixx database, and et sold again. So, if Radixx books a full flight, you will have as many seats overbooked as the number of Interglobe database bookings which got lost !!

This loss of bookings is what Capt. Gopi calls "Software Glitch" !!

himmat01 · Member Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 1392 Location: DEL

What exactly happend with Interglobe? Why did DN have to switch over to Reddix?
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himmat01 · Member Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 1392 Location: DEL

DN is at it once again. This time in Goa.

http://oheraldo.in/node/23694
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Boeing7xx · Member Joined: 23 Dec 2006 Posts: 477 Location: WSSS

Deccan has quite a few expats working right? Brady is ex-Ryan Air, he should know how to run the show here!!! Overbookings are common, but it looks like Ops and Commercial are not talking to each other here. I guess petty politicking is getting the better of the airline right now.

karatecatman · Guest

Brady comes across as one smug *******.

Has a very condescending attitude --- at least thats what strikes you when you watch his interviews.

Latest is that he is ducking the issue about the booking software by saying its the same that AIX uses!!

ABN397 · Member Joined: 27 Dec 2006 Posts: 113 Location: India

blrsea · Member Joined: 25 Mar 2007 Posts: 182

Doesn't matter when he reached the rank of captain. He did come out rather early. If I remember right, he tried his hands at various business including silk farming, renting out helicopters etc, and finally moved into LCC airline business when conditions were right.

Irrespective of how DN is run, it has made air travel affordable to many Indians, and it wouldnt be wrong to say that without DN, we probably wouldn't have seen Rs 99-299 fares from other LCCs. And the presence of DN does keep fares low in some sectors.

They need to run their operations better, clean the aircraft during turn-arounds and better inform their passengers. Trying to save a few rupees by not having clean aircraft is too cheap of a strategy. And they need to maintain their interiors better. Nothing which is too difficult if the people at top give enough attention. Otherwise, DN will be stuck with its bad reputation and will not attract business passengers, nor will it build brand loyalty. Southwest airlines in USA does have a loyal following, but its operations are well run and is not like DN. If DN continues the same way, spicejet and indigo might well overtake it.

Aiel · Member Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 927 Location: Bangalore

When you graduate out of the National Defence Academy, a cadet comes out with the rank of Captain.
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karatecatman · Guest

http://www.dnaindia.com/report.asp?NewsID=1089009

Air Deccan to outsource cabin crew jobs
Tie-up to ensure more jobs
Megha Chaturvedi
Thursday, April 05, 2007 00:04 IST

Airlines are coming up with new ideas for cutting down their costs and introducing in-flight training activities. Air Deccan on Wednesday announced an exclusive tie-up with Frankfinn Institute of Air Hostess Training. This implies that pass-out students from Frankfinn will be inducted as Air Deccan's cabin crew.

sammyk · Posted: Thu Apr 05, 2007 12:02 pm Post subject:

Frankfinn Institute of Air Hostess Training

Heh, that is quite the politically incorrect name for that type of company. Unless of course it only trains women.

himmat01 · Member Joined: 19 Dec 2006 Posts: 1392 Location: DEL

karatecatman · Guest

Five Air Deccan passengers were not allowed to board the Kolkata-Aizawl flight at the NSC Bose International airport here this evening ‘‘due to late reporting time,’’ airlines sources said, says a UNI report.
The passengers, who had already been given boarding passes, were prevented from boarding the plane at the last minute and their luggage offloaded by the airlines, an airport official said.
Despite protests from them, the plane left for its destination sans the five men.
Airport sources said since the flight was already getting delayed, the airlines authorities had to readjust the departure time and apprised the five about the new timings.
But they allegedly turned up at the last minute, the sources said.

Nilanjon · Member Joined: 22 Dec 2006 Posts: 85 Location: Bangalore

DN's booking engine (based on radixx platform) seems to have stabilized.

I'm finding Dn's fares also coming up now on other travel websites like Flightraja.com, Cleartrip.com, Travelguru.com.

The goof up of having lost bookings was openly admitted by Capt. Gopinath - he admitted in Kolkata that DN had lost about 25000 bookings while migrating to Radixx and that was the root cause of the overbooking drama. See the link http://www.thestatesman.net/page.news.php?clid=23&theme=&usrsess=1&id=154210

karatecatman · Guest

Air Deccan seems to be churning,

Its withdrawing quite a list of flights for a while and is permitting rescheduling.

Website has more details:
http://www.flyairdeccan.net/AirDeccan.htm#