Etihad occasionally wet-leases aircraft and crews from shops such as Wamos and Hi Fly, which significantly downgrades the flying experience, especially for those in business.
The latest route switch that has resulted to a downgrade to Hi Fly has affected passengers on one of Abu Dhabi – Jakarta rotations, and we covered this earlier this week (read more here) with a note that Etihad has previously had a travel waiver in place for these “downgrade”.
You can access Etihad here, and the Jakarta waiver here.
Here’s the travel waiver that Etihad has now issued:
Waiver for guest impacted by aircraft change on Jakarta (CGK) route
Etihad Airways offers the following options for Business class guests impacted by aircraft change on Jakarta (CGK) route for flights EY472 & EY473, between 25Oct26 and 27Mar27 (both dates inclusive).
Conditions:
Tickets purchased on/before 15-Oct-2026 Applicable for tickets issued in business class only Economy guests – changes/refund as per fare rules
Changes:
Rebooking is permitted to/from Jakarta (CGK) on another EY operated flight departing +/- 5 days of original flight. Rebook in the same or lowest available RBD in the same cabin Fare difference applies (if any) No change fee No Show fee waived All tickets to be reissued by 20-Nov-2026
Refund:
Refund permitted as per fare rules. Exception applies to POS US and Italy as per standard schedule change policy
The PNR must be updated with the remark ” CW012-2026 Aircraft Change”.
There appears to be a special carve-out for tickets issued with the US and Italy POS (point-of-sale) that may offer flexibility for a refund if the operating airline changes under Etihad’s rules above.
Business class passengers can switch to another Etihad flight (they now operate two daily, and the second is actually by Etihad) within 5 days before or after the ticketed flight.
They don’t allow switching to another nearby destination, as they did when they downgraded the Lisbon route.
Unfortunately, there is no rebooking waiver for those flying in economy, where the product is affected but not as significantly as in business.
Conclusion
I don’t quite understand why Etihad tries to hide this waiver and didn’t include it in the emails it sent to affected passengers.
They must have hoped that uninformed passengers would accept this downgrade without any recourse, which is not ok.
I am glad, however, that they allow business class passengers to switch their flight to the product they actually purchased,
Just remember that you need to have the ticket reissued no later than November 20.