Indigo Airlines

India's largest passenger airline is still IndiGo. As a low-cost airline, the firm focuses on three
pillars: providing inexpensive fares, being on time, and providing a pleasant and hassle-free
experience. It primarily serves the domestic air travel market in India.

In order to compete as a Low-Cost budget airline in India's rapidly expanding airline market,
Rakesh Bhatia and Rakesh Gangwal established Indigo Airline as a private holding company
in 2006. In Gurgaon, Haryana, the business is headquartered. In regards to the quantity of
passengers it transports as well as the size of its fleet, it is India's biggest airline.

It has become synonymous with being on-time. It started as a carrier with one plane in
August 2006 and today has a fleet of 280 aircraft. As One of the most dependable airlines in
the world, IndiGo has a uniform fleet for every type of operation, high operational reliability,
and a service that consistently wins accolades.

Currently, it offers flights to 91 locations, including 67 domestic and 24 foreign destinations.

Turkish Airlines is also taking orders for 14 additional codeshare destinations. Budapest
(BUD), Brussels (BRU), Tel Aviv (TLV), Malta (MLA), Paris (CDG), Dublin (DUB),
Copenhagen (CPH), Prague (PRG), Vienna (VIE), Zurich (ZRH), Amsterdam (AMS),
London Gatwick (LGW), and London Heathrow are among them (LHR).

In order to keep costs down, IndiGo does not offer free meals on any of its flights, but it does
have an in-flight meal programme that passengers can purchase.

There is no entertainment on board. Passengers can read Hello 6E, the in-flight magazine that
IndiGo produces. IndiGo provides premium services to customers who are willing to pay a
higher fare, such as a pre-assigned seat, multiple cancellations, and priority check-in.

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Service offered by Indigo
IndiGo is renowned for its developments in consumer comfort and convenience. The company
has implemented several methods to delight the customer while maintaining operational
efficiencies, starting with one of the industry's least cluttered websites and continuing with
self-check-in kiosks, a sleek boarding pass, step-free ramps, an intuitive food menu, and in-
flight garbage collection.

 Minimalism is one of the defining characteristics of both user interface (UI) and
customer experience (CX). IndiGo offers the least cluttered interface when compared
to the majority of other low-cost carriers in India.

 The airline virtually started a trend for maintaining cleanliness on aeroplanes by

becoming one of the first to adopt customer-assisted waste pickup.

 One of IndiGo's most notable initiatives has been in the area of diversity and inclusion,
particularly with a focus on travellers with disabilities. Passengers with disabilities can
easily and comfortably browse the website thanks to IndiGo's Web Content
Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) certified website.
 In 2014, the business was a pioneer in the use of stairlifts, followed by step-free
boarding ramps that make it simple for people in wheelchairs and stretchers to board
aeroplanes..

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  • Although step-less boarding ramps and auto-steps in buses were primarily designed
for passengers with impairments, these technologies have improved convenience for
all passengers and sped up the carrer's turnaround time.
 In January 2013, IndiGo was the first Indian carrier to introduce its menu and Safety
Briefing Card printed in braille.
 The most recent innovation is IngiGo's collaboration with vehicle rental company
Urban Drive, which enables its customers to book chauffeured and self-driven services
in 60 Indian cities. Customers could hire a taxi when purchasing tickets on the IndiGo
website.

Building a strong consumer brand

 • "On-time" is one of IndiGo's brand commitments. Even though the airlines haven't
consistently ranked first among Indian competitors for on-time performance, the idea
persists.
 Every time an aircraft takes off, the flight attendant would announce, “the flight is
taking off at xxxx hrs, IndiGo Standard Time”. In case it’s taken off or landed before
time, they won’t miss making a point of it.
 The branding for the in-flight meals is another striking design. These food items,
known as "6E Tiffin," are packaged and created specifically with the brand's appeal for
both leisure and business travellers in mind.
 Creative announcement of destination added to its international flights has been
another point of attraction. It shows the funny side of the brand.
 Another creative channel for the brand to engage the audience is the in-flight
magazine, "Hello 6E."

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Service Blueprint for Indigo Airline:

Observations:

 They have many counters which cater to the boarding of luggage and issuing of
boarding passes to the customers.
 It was noted that the Indigo counters include plenty of indications and tags for
identification and are simple to analyse.
 Indigo Airlines' front-line staff members are kind and always willing to assist
passengers. They have an internal computer system that provides them with the
necessary knowledge regarding the flight and other inquiries.
 The Indigo Airlines team has received the necessary training to deal with a variety of
situations.
 One of the consumers described how she had misplaced her phone and received
prompt assistance from the Indigo employees with its recovery and search.
 The crew has received training, and Indigo has created a suitable system to ensure that
customers with special needs have a positive travel experience. The personnel

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 appeared to have wheelchairs and other equipment available for elderly and
differently abled travellers.
 Indigo has created a system to assist a variety of consumers who somehow manage to
miss their flights.

Service Gap Model

Also known as SERVQUAL, it uses customer expectations and perception to assist
organisations in identifying strategies that may be used to improve critical areas where the
firm is deficient.

This model is based on some key dimensions which are:

1.Tangibles: These are things you can see, touch or observe, such as facilities, employees and
equipment.

2. Reliability: Are you able to deliver the promised service reliably and accurately?

3. Responsiveness: This is the speed and efficiency of your customer service.

4. Assurance: Do your employees have the knowledge and courtesy to instil trust and
confidence?

5. Empathy: Your ability to show concern and attention to customers.

The main aim is

1. Identify the gaps between what the customer is expecting and the actual services that he is
getting at different stages of service delivery.

2. Close all the identified gap and thus improving the customer service.

Five different types of Gaps are:

Gap between expectation of client and perception of management

To be able to exceed customer expectation and insuring customer satisfaction, the company
management must have a clear understanding and the perception of the customer
expectations.

Gap between perception of management and service quality specification

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Even if the company management accurately perceives the expectations of customers, then
also there are chances of customer dissatisfaction which can be resulted from the gap in the
planning quality of the service as per the customer expectations.

Gap between specification of quality and the delivery of service.

This relates to the failure of providing the efficient specified quality service because of
incompetent workforce or inefficient working conditions.

Gap between the delivery of service and external communications.

In this case, the company management employees have all the relevant skills and willingness
to provide the efficient specified quality service, but the dissatisfaction arises due to external
factors.

Gap between perceived and expected service.

One of the most common cause for customer dissatisfaction in the service sector is because of
the gap between the customer expectations out of the service and what they think have
received.

Indigo Service Gap Model:

Gap 1:

• Lack of upward communication:

• The employees of Indigo airlines don’t do upward communication with their senior
manager and because of which manager are not able to understand what is happening in the
organization at the ground level.

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• The employees of “Indigo Airlines” are not able to implement the service of good quality
food to customers properly leading to dissatisfaction among the customers

Gap 2:

• Absence of customer driven standard

• In the economy class, there is a problem that Indigo airlines does not provide customers
driven standard and quality of service to the customers.

• In Indigo airlines, the airhostess takes a lot of time in delivering the customers’ orders.

Gap 3:

• Problems in Supply chain management

• Customers doesn’t take the responsibility to keep the premises of the flight/airlines clean,
due to which lot of cost and time incurred in cleaning the flight and surrounding of airlines.

Gap4:

• Lack of integrated marketing communication.

• Inadequate horizontal communication. The advertising and promotional activities of the

Indigo airlines is very low due to which customers are not aware about the scheme and
discount on flights and benefits that they can get.

Service Recovery:
The series of actions a business takes to turn a disgruntled client who is ready to stop using its
goods or services into a regular customer is known as service recovery. It is one of the crucial
processes that is carefully planned and decided in the current market environment. In fact, a
lack of effective service recovery can result in a significant loss of face for the organisation in
today's environment where people have more freedom to post their ideas and spread someone
else's words across platforms. Only two sorts of solutions exist:

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Fix the Customer:

a. Tone of Messaging: The tone of messaging is soft and careful, it does not seem to be
automated
b. Turnaround Time: Another key factor in determining the willingness of company to
stay in touch with customers is their readiness to resolve the query as quickly as
possible
c. Personalized messages: Any comment can be broadly classified into two classes, for
Public information or for personal reply. Both have their own importance but the
personalized responses create a sense of connect between company and customer.
d. Following up on complains: For an airline industry giant following up on complaints
is one of the key factors. The timely reply and prompt action are only ways to avoid a
loss of face.
e. Presence on major complaint forums: These are like suicide points for companies.
Complaint forums are followed by customer in order to get a normalized view of the
services and are often mine field to navigate as customers are very aggressive during
citing complains on this forum.

Fix the Problem:

The primary concern for customers is the delay in flight timings and delay in overall travel
time. Indigo made small change in their flight times by adding up to half hour to make sure
that all the flights arrive before time or worst case on time.This is of the key strategies
implemented to avoid problems before arising. Many other problems which arise through

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complaints are handled with gusto by replying to customer immediately and giving them
frequent updates about the problem.

Another way to avoid confrontation on social media is using a toll-free number where the
direction of conversation can be controlled as it is a two-way communication, while on social
media the conversation is open for discussion and it keeps on going. Indigo is implemented
that as well.

Conclusion:

 Indigo Airlines has given high importance to service recovery.

 Indigo’s primary concern is fixing the problem as it has taken many proactive steps which
were pioneering in its market.

 While “fixing the customer” part of service recovery still needs improvement in certain
areas.

 It has strong presence across all social platforms which is very good and has quick
turnaround time as well.

 The customers have received personalized messages in many cases but also complain about
generic responses to certain set of questions.

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