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Indonesian authorities suspend Tigerair Australia Bali flights

written by WOFA | January 11, 2017

Tigerair Australia Boeing 737-800 VH-VOR operating the airline's inaugural flight Bali. (Tigerair Australia)
Tigerair Australia is flying Boeing 737-800s to Bali from Adelaide, Melbourne and Perth. (Tigerair Australia)

Tigerair Australia has been forced to cancel flights between Australia and Bali due to what it says are “new administrative requirements” from Indonesian authorities.

The low-cost carrier said its four scheduled flights for Wednesday – TT1 Melbourne-Bali, TT17 Adelaide-Bali, TT24 Bali-Perth and TT6 Bali-Melbourne – have been cancelled, with Thursday’s flights under review.

Affected passengers would be contacted and put onto alternative flights, provided with accommodation or given a full refund, it said.

“Tigerair Australia has cancelled several flights to Denpasar (Bali) today following a decision by the Indonesian government to impose new administrative requirements for the operation of its flights between Bali and Australia,” the airline said in a statement posted on its website.

“Tigerair is working with the relevant Indonesian authorities to meet the new requirements and is hopeful of having flights up and running again as soon as possible.

“Tigerair Australia sincerely apologises for the inconvenience caused by today’s cancellations.”

The airline, which is owned by Virgin Australia, said its Australian domestic flights were operating as normal.

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Tigerair began flights to Bali in March 2016, taking over the Adelaide, Melbourne and Perth to Bali routes from parent Virgin.

The low-cost carrier is using three Virgin Boeing 737-800s that have been repainted in Tigerair livery to operate its first international services. The aircraft, which remain on Virgin’s air operator’s certificate (AOC) and are flown by Virgin pilots alongside Tigerair cabin crew, feature 180 seats in an all-economy configuration with five extra-legroom rows available for purchase as an optional extra.

Tigerair was currently in the midst of applying to Australia’s Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) for two changes to its AOC. The first was for the addition of the 737 onto its AOC as it transitions from Airbus A320s to 737-800s, with pilot training for the 737 already underway.

The second is to secure approval to operate international flights under its own AOC, rather than the current arrangement for its services to Bali.

5 Comments

  • deano

    says:

    What issues would the Indonesian with Tiger
    If it is simply an administrative requirement, then could that not be sorted out with flights continuing whilst the issue is resolved
    It seems a bit heavy handed to simply cancel the right to fly
    There is no mention of Virgin flights being canceled….

    VA a simple quick fix would have been to swap frames and crew and operate the flights as Virgin rather than Tiger until the administrative requirement have been met….

  • Daveo

    says:

    Virgin & Tiger have had 10 months to comply completely with the Indonesian authorities, they are to blame not the Indonesians!

    Families save for sometimes years to have a Bali holiday then on the day of departure, sorry here is your money back, goodbye is not good enough. the Australin athouritie neet to revoke the operation licence for this organisation !

  • Mike

    says:

    The issue is that TT has a licence for a “charter” operation to Indonesia, which means every passenger it brings in it is supposed to return to the point of origin. It sold some one-way tickets to passengers going on to Singapore on TR which was a breach of the licence. These are not “new administrative requirements” at all. Jetstar has the same restriction and cannot transit passengers to Jetstar Asia. However QF could transit passengers to EK or VA could transit passengers to SQ.

  • Tim

    says:

    This article does not cover the entire story. On paper Tigerair is operating charters to Indonesia. Tigerair sold one way tickets which was a breach of the licence.

  • Adrian P

    says:

    I thought a charter was where a third party hired an aircraft, for example a sports team or a tour operator.

    The third party is then taking the financial risk of not filling an aircraft not the aircraft operator.

    An airline operating a RPT service selling direct to the public I would suspect is not a charter regardless of it being a one way or return ticket.

    So is the problem using Tiger Cabin crew? If Tiger hires Virgin Australia aircraft with an all Virgin crew then it becomes a charter service with Tiger being the third party.

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