When I had planned to take a short vacation with my family to Delhi and other places around I thought of booking tickets in this airline. I booked a round trip tickets from Chennai to Delhi. I booked the tickets thro the net for 6 persons
(including 2 children). As I had planned for this vacation sometimes back I booked the tickets two months back. I got the tickets for Rs.3800/-(per person) and Rs.2300/- for the children (less than 12 yrs old).
We all arrived around 5.20 am for the flight scheduled to take off at 6.05 am. We were late and I expected this as it is easier travelling alone but with your family it is always a difficult task bringing them all together. There were too many luggages and as I knew you are only allowed 5kgs as hand baggage and 15kgs as checkin baggage. There was no problem with all the checkin luggages as they were within the prescribed weight. But one of the hand baggage my mother had weighed around
12 kgs and I never knew that she had stuffed all kind of provisions and eatables to all the relatives in Delhi. To my surprise the Deccan staff allowed the baggage without any fuss (maybe because we were already late and we still had to
complete the security check). We were given the boarding pass and as expected we got last seat in the aircraft. Nothing to blame the airline as it was our mistake of arriving late.
That is when one of the Deccan airway guy came around and took us straight to the security checkin. The security checkin area was crowded and this guy took us and made the security checkin without any problem. I was really impressed and thanked him. We boarded the bus and proceeded to the flight around 6am. The flight took off around 6.20 am. The flight was an Airbus A320. The interior was good and I should add the seat was not very comfortable and the leg space was just ok. There were three Hostesses and they managed the entire flight quite professionaly. There is nothing to say about the inflight entertainment. You get to watch some yoga and CNBC news channel and that too if you purchase a headphone from them.The food is sold inside the flight and that too you get only junk food. The sandwich was better and the price seemed to be ok but I noticed that before they could reach the rear with their food trolley we had reached Hyderabad. I think it would be better if atleast they could provide water for free.
The flight arrived in Delhi around 10.20am. I should add that the take off and landing were smooth. All in all it was a pleasant flight from Chennai to Delhi. The checkin baggage also arrived fast. I always had a fear with this Airline that
they might cancel the flight suddenly but I think this happens more often in the ATR route.
The flight from Delhi to Chennai was not a pleasant one. Though we arrived in time the boarding pass issued had seat numbers in different locations. This happened to all the passengers who travelled on that day. Imagine a 3 year old child sitting
next to a stranger in the front and her mother is given a seat number in the rear. These were the kind of confusion that happened in the Delhi Sector and the flight was also delayed one and half hours late and many passengers were upset as they
had to take connecting flight. The checkin baggage had an excess weight and I was prepared to pay for it. But strangely they told that the billing machine was not working properly and to my surprise the deccan guy told me to take the two excess
baggage as cabin baggage. I still don’t understand the concept of this.
To sum up I think the Deccan airways in south is more organised than in other parts of the country and I would also add that as far as service is concerned the Deccan is good but not comparable to the professional service of Jet airways. It would
take some time for Deccan to improve their service as more competition is expected in this sector.