Tigerair permanently pulls out of flying to Bali

Tigerair, the low-cost subsidiary of Virgin Australia, has permanently ceased flying to the Indonesian island of Bali after failing to come to terms with the country’s AOC129 requirements relating to scheduled flights.
Problems began on January 12, when approximately 700 passengers were affected after the Indonesian government claimed the carrier did not have permission to operate scheduled flights to the island and only had permission for chartered ones.
At that time, Tigerair unsuccessfully sought permission from the Indonesian government to continue with flights during a period of grace while a workaround solution was found to what the carrier referred to as “new requirements”, indicating that it would need at least six months to implement them as it was compromising the airline’s ability to offer low-cost airfares.
The Indonesian government responded by indicating that none of the requirements were new, making it clear that Tigerair had permission to operate “charter flights”, not “regularly scheduled conventional flights”
“However, we found out that Tigerair had sold regularly scheduled conventional flight tickets from and to Bali,” Bambang Ervan, a transport ministry spokesman said at the time, adding that: “They have broken AOC129 requirements. Yes we have given them a notification this week that they have broken the requirements. But this doesn’t mean that these are new requirements, otherwise all other airlines would have been impacted.”
Latest developments confirm that final approval for the carrier’s flights has not been forthcoming and it will no longer include Bali on its routes. However, Virgin Australia will still continue to fly to the island. Tigerair’s domestic flight schedule has not been affected.