CASA to decide on Tiger in two days

SYDNEY (AAP) - The air safety regulator will decide in the next two days if it will seek to extend Tiger Airways' grounding, allowing passengers to know if they can fly with the airline next week.
All of Tiger's domestic flights are suspended until early Saturday with the Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA) yet to decide if it will go to the Federal Court to extend the initial grounding period.
CASA spokesman Peter Gibson said the regulator would likely make a decision on Wednesday or Thursday.
"As soon as we've made a decision we'll let the travelling public know so they have some certainty about what's happening next week," Mr Gibson said.
He said the decision about an extension would depend on the progress of discussions with Tiger and CASA's investigations into two June incidents where pilots flew too low into Melbourne airports, including one last Thursday night.
"Certainly our intent is to give people as much notice as possible but when that will exactly be is very hard to determine at this stage."
CASA, which had issued Tiger Airways Australia with a show cause notice in March over pilot proficiency and aircraft maintenance issues, grounded the airline for a week from 11pm (AEST) last Friday, citing a serious and imminent risk to air safety.
Any extension beyond the initial five working days requires Federal Court approval.
Tiger is still able to sell tickets for next week but the nation's consumer regulators are demanding the airline provide better information for passengers.
Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) chairman Graeme Samuel said Tiger was allowed to keep selling tickets so long as it had reasonable grounds for believing it would be able to provide the flights.
"If CASA does give them a pretty clear indication that they're not going to be able to take off then I think they've got a real issue then as to whether they should be still selling tickets," Mr Samuel said.
He said ACCC's current issue was that Tiger should be warning customers that there is some question mark as to whether it will be flying and that it is dependent on CASA approval.
Tiger has said affected passengers will be refunded automatically as soon as possible but Mr Samuel said customers were being told it would take four weeks and in the meantime the airline was holding those funds in a float.
"There may well be very good administrative reasons why they cannot possibly give refunds in less than four weeks but customers shouldn't be expecting to have their money held in a float for that period of time.
"If it's possible for refunds to occur earlier then so they should."
State and federal consumer protection regulators on Tuesday were working on a coordinated approach to determine what arrangements Tiger had in place for affected passengers.
NSW Fair Trading Minister Anthony Roberts said the issue of advance ticket sales had been raised with Tiger.
"Regulators have asked Tiger Airways to today provide advice on arrangements for refunds, including timing, as well as information about customer notification on cancelled flights," Mr Roberts said.