Long check-in queues in late evening hours at airport ‘scare’ IndiGo flyers

Pune: Serpentine check-in queues in the late evening hours are frequently giving IndiGo flyers the scare of missing flights at the city airport.
Ankit, a flyer, posted pictures and videos on X on April 16 and wrote, "No airport crushes your spirits as the Pune airport. One hour waiting line for IndiGo check-in. The complete apathy is appalling. Five-fold line to just get to the check-in counter's entry and another six-fold line to get to the counter."
In a short talk on X, Ankit told TOI that it took him an hour to complete the check-in process. "It happened between 10pm and 12midnight," he said.
Avinash Kumar posted a similar picture of long queues and chaos at the airport on April 10. "Utter mismanagement," he wrote on X. He told TOI that the picture was of check-in queues for several IndiGo flights departing from Pune around 11pm.
Many flyers claimed that the 10.30pm to 2am time period had become "risky hours" for check-in at the Pune airport. TOI sent a detailed WhatsApp message in this connection to IndiGo's spokesperson, but the response was awaited.
A source in the airline passed the blame to the airport's infrastructure. "It is happening because of the infrastructure issues at the airport and its operator will be the right person to speak on this," the official said.
Pune airport director Santosh Dhoke said he was aware of the issue. "The check-in counters at the old building were not dynamic and assigned to the airlines. In the new building, the counters are dynamic by nature and any airline can use them. We have told the airlines to use more counters during the peak hours and make sure that their management is to the mark. While I am not sure, manpower issues of the airline concerned might be causing the serpentine queues. The airline has started using more counters from Thursday and we are monitoring the situation continuously," Dhoke told TOI.
The airport's new terminal building has 34 CUTE (common use terminal equipment) check-in counters against 38 in the old building. These can be used by any airline after the user ID and password are fed into the system. Besides, the new building has 15 CUSS (common use self-service) kiosks, as in the old building. Yet, check-in at night often leads to a crisis situation.
"I mostly take late-night (red-eye) flights and have seen the situation myself. Long check-in queues have become very frequent. Flyers really get worried and many look for CISF personnel or IndiGo officials to explain to the latter that they might miss their flights. I have started coming at least four hours in advance for flights, so that I don't have to worry," Sajal Latamble, a frequent flyer to Delhi, told TOI.
Delhi's Chhavi Negi and her husband recalled the queue on April 10. "It was very scary. At one time, we were convinced that we wouldn't make it to our aircraft. There shouldn't be any kind of issues or hassles at the new terminal building of Pune. How come these problems are cropping up? The airport authorities need to act," Negi, a business executive, said.
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HL: AT A GLANCE
202 to 204 daily flight movements in Pune at present
The total flight movements reached 210 earlier this week
18-20 departures happen at the airport from 10pm to 2am
Of them, 12-13 flights are of IndiGo to different destinations
150 flyers are average capacity of each aircraft
Ends
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