Following a few questions from the ‘agents,’ victim Mahashweta Pal grew suspicious and called the official helpline number of the airlines to inform them about the narrow escape from the fraud.
Pal, the social media manager at Inquest, was taken aback when, on January 1, she received a call from an alleged Indigo agent informing her that her tickets had been cancelled. Pal had purchased a round-trip ticket to Kolkata on Indigo.
"The caller then proceeded to offer two options: immediate rebooking at the same fare or a refund of the original booking amount (Rs 15,600) within 24 hours[…]This purported cancellation was presented as a fact, with no prior notification or explanation provided. The caller told me he could send me a link for repayment on WhatsApp," Pal said.
Pal discovered that her tickets had been cancelled, but that a third party had handled it, after hanging up the phone and dialling Indigo's official hotline number.
She informed that the Indigo ‘agents’ informed her of the cancellation of her tickers and that there was nothing they could do except initiate a “partial refund of the cancelled tickets and I received around Rs 8,000."
However, when Pal asked some follow-up questions, the bogus agents informed them that someone had altered the information on their website. The customer support agent admitted that there were errors in the cancellation information; her phone number and email address did not match what she had entered. This disparity implied that her booking was maliciously altered and that there was illegal access to her account. Even though they acknowledged that there was a problem, they did not provide a fix or the remaining portion of my money.
Following a week of Pal pursuing the case and eventually taking the case to social media, she finally started getting calls from the airlines for assistance.
"The customer care executive was kind enough to share the information about the scammers. The email ID they used was maheshmeena00417@gmail.com and the number to which the OTP was sent was 9257384638. And the IP address was 157.38.67.21," Pal shared.
The airline took further measures to "ensure the security" of Pal's booking when she purchased the flight tickets once again. "We have temporarily blocked any modifications or web check-in of your booking. If you have any further requirements or need to make changes, we kindly request you to contact our IndiGo contact centre for assistance," Indigo stated.
Moreover, on Tuesday, Pal was contacted by another executive informing her that her previous booking, which had been fraudulently cancelled, had been fully refunded.