Air India passenger says airline downgraded him to economy class, gave his seat to pilot: ‘Horrible experience’

Air India passenger says airline downgraded him to economy class, gave his seat to pilot: ‘Horrible experience’

By Sanya Jain

Jan 16, 2025 10:13 AM IST

An Air India customer has accused the airline of downgrading him to economy class and giving his seat to a crew member instead.

An Air India customer has accused the airline of downgrading him to economy class and giving his seat to a crew member instead. Nilesh Bansal wrote about his “horrible experience” with Air India in a post on Meta-owned Threads.

An Air India Boeing passenger has accused the airline of downgrading him to economy class(Reuters)

The disgruntled passenger said that he and his four-year-old son were kept waiting for more than 90 minutes even as Air India crew repeatedly assured them that seats were available on their flight. Later, however, their business class seats were allotted to an Air India pilot, while the passengers were downgraded to economy class.

Bansal also accused the full service carrier of leaving his son’s stroller back in Delhi, leading to further difficulties for the family.

“Today Air India flight AI-2055 downgraded me to economy class, but what shocked me was my seats were allocated to Air India crew and while they kept me and 4 yr old kid waiting for more 1.5 hrs even after telling me that seats are available. Their pilots and more important for them than the customer who has actually paid for that seat,” Bansal wrote on Threads.

“They even left my son’s stroller back in Delhi. Horrible experience Air India. Shameful,” he added.

HT.com has reached out to Air India for a statement and will update this copy on receiving a response.

The post led to a discussion on the recent rise in complaints against Air India and whether the airline was right in giving priority to a pilot over a passenger.

Some people in the comments section claimed that airlines, by law, are required to fly pilots in business class.

“Pilots are more important because they would need rest to do the next sector,” wrote one person in the comments section. “They are contractually obliged to fly their pilots business class. I am not saying what happened to you was right but the pilots are worth way more to them than an individual customer,” another said.

Other users, however, argued that the airline should have reserved a seat for the pilot in advance instead of taking one away from a customer who paid for it.

“To all those saying pilots deserve rest, I agree… so why sell the seats? Don’t they know their pilot schedules in advance and reserve their seats in advance?” a user asked.