Several aircraft belonging to low-cost carrier SpiceJet were stopped from operating by Air Traffic Control (ATC) at the Delhi airport on Friday morning as the airline didn’t make the requisite daily payment to Airport Authority of India ( AAI). Passengers of SpiceJet flights on Friday took to social media to complain how their flights at Delhi airport were delayed.
The airline’s spokesperson said the daily payment was delayed due to a software glitch and the flights are now operating normally. “Due to a technical snag in SAP, the automatic daily payment could not be processed. This is being made manually to AAI which has been apprised of the issue. SpiceJet’s flight operations are now continuing as normal,” a SpiceJet spokesperson said.
Sources said that Air Traffic Control, which is an arm of AAI, was instructed not to give clearance to the airline’s aircraft to take-off as the payment was not made. Generally, airlines pay for facilities provided by AAI like route navigation, landing, parking etc on a monthly basis. Under cash and carry mode an airline has to pay daily for the facilities used at an airport.
AAI has put SpiceJet on “cash and carry” mode since 2020, due to the airline’s inability to clear airport dues. SpiceJet has to make daily payments to the AAI to operate flights after the airline was put on a “cash and carry” basis by the authorities as it had failed to clear its previous dues.