A class action lawsuit is demanding Mexican discount airline Interjet be made to pay customers to whom it has refused refunds for cancelled flights.
On March 8, attorneys from the firm of Edelson P.C., of Chicago, filed suit in Cook County Circuit Court against ABC Aerolineas S.A. DE C.V. Inc., which does business as Interjet.
The lawsuit was filed on behalf of named plaintiff, Illinois resident Deidra Suber, and perhaps thousands of others, who may have been refused refunds worth hundreds of dollars after Interjet cancelled their flights, despite an alleged guarantee in their passenger contract to refund “the unused portion of the passenger’s tickets” should “the passenger decline” Interjet’s proposed alternative flights following a cancellation because of “a schedule irregularity, not within the Carrier’s control.”
Mexico-based Interjet has flown out of Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport since 2016, now offering daily flights to Mexico City and Guadalajara, Mexico.
According to an estimate in the complaint, as many as 218,000 people have flown on Interjet flights from Chicago to Mexico City.
Since its arrival in the U.S., Interjet has marketed itself as a discount carrier offering the comforts of standard air travel, including more leg room in the seating rows and free beverages and snacks during the flight, plus free checked bags.
However, after quick growth, published reports indicate the airline has hit turbulence.
And in the new lawsuit, the plaintiffs assert the airlines’ refusal to honor customers’ refund requests is one of the reasons for the trouble.
The lawsuit points to numerous bad reviews of Interjet posted on sites such as TripAdvisor and Yelp, which center on that alleged refusal.
In her case, Suber said she had purchased tickets in the fall of 2018 to fly to Mexico City for a friend’s wedding in January 2019.
However, the afternoon before her flight was to leaver, Suber said she received an email from Interjet cancelling her flight and rescheduling her to fly on Feb. 4, which would be after the wedding to which she was travelling and after her originally scheduled return flight.
When she contacted Interjet, she said the airline told her it does not issue refunds “when an flight is cancelled due to the weather.”
Suber and her husband allegedly continued to speak with different Interjet agents, and were consistently refused refunds.
Ultimately, Suber said she and her husband were “forced to purchase a costly last-minute flight on another carrier” to make it to the wedding.
Two weeks later, they said Interjet again refused their request for a refund. The lawsuit said Suber then “submitted the unused portion of her ticket to (Interjet) within 30 days” of her scheduled flight, “and demanded a full monetary refund.”
The lawsuit asks the court to expand the action to include potentially thousands of others who purchased Interjet tickets, but who were denied refunds after their flights were cancelled.
Plaintiffs are represented by attorneys Benjamin H. Richman, Jay Edelson and Sydney Janzen, of the Edelson firm.