Air India cabin crew complain that airline’s new policy on shared hotel rooms will impact their rest requirements

Air India’s recent announcement that most of its cabin crew must share hotel rooms during layovers has sparked concern over their need for rest and privacy, especially during long-haul flights. In a mail to its cabin crew on Tuesday, the airline informed them of some key policy changes regarding layover entitlements, leisure travel, and gratuity, among others. It informed them that while Air India crew were earlier entitled to a single room during layovers, “cabin crew” and “cabin seniors” will now be assigned rooms on twin-sharing basis; only senior cabin crew such as “cabin managers” and “cabin executives” will be allotted single rooms. The policy will be effective from December 1, 2024 for all airlines in the Air India Group, which also include Vistara, Air India Express, and AIX Connect. The new norms have been announced as Air India is merging with Vistara, where cabin crew were already required to share hotel rooms. It is learnt that several employees have shot off a mail to Air India CEO Campbell Wilson and its Chief Human Resource Officer Ravindra Kumar, objecting to the revised norms. Their letters underline that such a policy is detrimental to rest requirements and could impact their health as well as performance.<br/>