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Dear Tony - We should campaign, make noise and tell the whole world. At least we are making an effort and we have hope. Things will improve. Lets' be positive.
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72 comments:
Due to the overwhelming response, what are you going to do?
You should open a link so that AVIATION MINISTER, Mr PRAFUL PATEL and our Prime Minister, Dr Manmohan Singh, should be able to read and see what we have been going through for years.
There should be no screening of these comments at all.
TONY
Los Angeles
My wife and me travelled from Chicago to Mumbai in AI last year, our unanimous resolution was to never travel Air India ever. I am ashamed to say it is the national carrier. Unhelpful ground staff and extremely atrocious stewards/stewardesses sums it all up. Plane took off 1:30 min late, we had no food, food in plane was served about 3:00 hours after take off. When a senior passenger complained, the steward almost beat him up. We complained in Frankfurt about the steward, it had no effect because we saw the same purser on the way back - similar behaviour. I guess the AI management believes that they can take passengers for granted.
Less said, I will never travel by AI. I have travelled on KLM, Cathay, Lufthansa, American - never have I had the AI experience.
Pathetic, is the first word I can say about Air India's service. I had to tell my accounts dept. not to book with AI again. I was travelling back from Singapore to chennai, and it was an AI flight. I got urine smell from the seats or carpets (not sure), there were cockroaches running around. But worst of all the service. I asked this guy(airhost) for the Indian newspapers, and he answered in exactly what I call the government-servant-tone; "we dont supply those things here". Later in the journey, a passenger behind my seat got into an argument with the air-hostess who served dinner. She refused him an extra papadam (lousy). and he started yelling at the top of his voice, and the captain was called to cool things off; because for a silly papadam. From a politeness point of view, I would'nt even equate the service in AI the same as, say, satabdi express, because in the train, the service is polite. The above is not acceptable by any means in any flight. Atleast the AI staff could be more modern. The reason I am saying this, when I boarded the flight, I had this elder lady (air-hostess) aged around 55 greet me with "Namaste". Man, this is substandard. You are in the world of hospitality, and India having won the miss universe/world so many times, could have come up with a better person (aged younger) as a representative of the airline, not some old lady waiting to retire. Come on guys, give me a break; Its the last time I travelled thru AI. I travelled by Jet, and they are a wonderfull lot.
I travelled for the first time last december by air india and it was the worst experience ever. I was four months pregnant and needed water to stay hydrated. Due to security reasons water was not allowed thru security and one bottle that we bought outside was over quickly. AI hostesses gave me total of three small plastic cups of water in the entire flight inspite of telling them twice I was pregnant. Instead I got rude behaviour, and rolled eyes as though I was harrasing them. The food was horrible (one of the inducements to go on AI was supposedly good food). All other airlines I have travelled have way better food and service. My TV screen was not working, when I asked for extra pillow to support my lower back, I ws told there are none available. And obviously the flight was delayed by about 2 hrs.
On the return flight my husband was coming alone as I stayed back. His flight was delayed by about 7 hours and when I called AI call center they said it was delayed only 3 hours. He was sitting inside for 4 more hours without food or water. Since I knew of only 3 hour delay I was waiting for his call that he reached safely at about 8.30 pm US time. I called call center, they siad flight has landed. When I didnt get in touch with my husband for over three hours I panicked (All this stress when I was pregnant) I called the call center one more time they said flight has landed three hours ago. I started calling my friends in US. I called the call center again to get any info on what gate it parked, the third representative told me that flight has still not reached and is estimated to reach at about midnight. I was crying for an hour because of those stupid incompetent negligent arrogant fools.
In another recent incidence, when my mom came for my delivery this summer, we booked her on AI as the hostesses would be able to talk to her in hindi as her English was not very great. On her way back, her flight left at 3.30 in the morning instead of 9.00 pm and then stalled in paris as something was wrong with the plane. After keeping them on the airport for many hours they put them in the hotel at 1.30 at night, totally cancelled the flight and put them on next day's flight which also was two hours late. There was no breakfast provided. No information was being given by the call center employees when we were calling other than the standard line, there is no update. We had no idea what was happening. Finally next day morning we were told that they were in the hotel and when we called the hotel they said the passengers have left to take the next flight. It was one of the most ridiculous experiences ever. We will never ever ever fly airindia in our life and will strongly recommend all our friends not to do so as well.
11-20-2007
Aviation Minister Praful Patel's daughter takes Jet flight to London as AI 111 was delayed.
AI endorses only VIPs to go by other airlines. Very common in India. Who cares for general public if someone has to reach his/her destination. Majority of the passengers who travel by AIR have continuing plans.
I really doubt they care.After all the disease spreads from the top
I have personally flown Air-India 4 times in the last few months on long-haul (the non-stop from Mumbai to JFK) flights and my experience has been EXCELLENT. I was reticent to fly AI first, due to all the bad press, but decided to go ahead anyway as the non-stop was too tempting to pass up. I found that each time they were extremely efficient in completing boarding (each time it was before time out of the gate at both Mumbai & JFK - contrast this with the chaos i witnessed on night of October 20th when Continental was boarding their Mumbai-Newark flight), AI served excellent food & had more than enough stewardesses who were very helpful & polite.
As opposed to this, i have flown American flag carriers and although they are efficient by default, there is no warmth exuded by their staff which one finds in an AI flight. I know of Americans who specifically fly AI due to their delectable food.
I do not deny that there are others who have bad experiences with AI. I want you guys to recall the bad experiences that passengers of JetBlue had last winter at JFK and elsewhere, when they had to sit in a plan on the runway for more than 6 hours due to the pile up resulting from bad weather.
I also know of Northwest flights from Minneapolis to India getting delayed because the "pilot was stuck in a traffic jam."
Such things happen with all airlines. AI definitely needs to improve service AND their public perception. But lets keep some perspective.
I feel there is no point in writing about Public Accountability of Air India, because fundamentally it doesnot belong to the "Serivice Sector" but to the "Public Sector ( which means a govt company)". As all Govt companies are run by Bureacrats and with no intention to earn profits, they solely rely on subsidies by the tax payers and there is no urge to satisfy the customers or to get their continued support.
You might ask why not Public enterprises also be made accountable. This is not possible for the simple reason that such a concept doesnt exist in India, where the leaders are made accountable for their performance. We elect our leaders based on caste, religion and free gifts which they give and not by their performance. So dont waste time in discussing such issues.
Will you be also starting a campaign on the millions of Indians who suffer daily without drinking water, proper sanitation, food, education, shelter.....?
I think you guys have gone a shade too ivory. As NRIs you are quick to judge the demerits of this carrier and want us to think that the trouble is all in the sub-continent and the people. I travel BA as well as American carriers and I do not think the service aboard AI is any worse. Infact I was not given food once on a BA flight both in and out of India and hence I can say safely that its a problem with many airlines. I also happen to speak to a friend of mine who works as a a crew on AI planes. He reckons that the biggest problems that AI on-board staff face is the arrogance and the hygeine of their passengesr out of Heathrow who seem to think that living abroad gives them the right to treat the staff
as 'servants'.
I was also amused that someone had the temerity of commenting on a stewardess age on AI. Come on...how old was Gandhi when he took on the British and led the country to freedom. And this woman only had to fold her hand and say namaste. You want your harem in your style- hey get your own fleet I say...
Dear Mr Anonymous
(Comment added on November 21, 2007 11:07 AM )
You dont have to preach the partiotic lessons to NRI's, and how old was Gandhi when he led india to freedom. We ashare the same national price as you do !
By your comments, it once again proves that we Indians are not good at taking criticism.
1 out of 10 people can be wrong, but not 9 out of 10. You could understand if you had gone through the pain and agony of people travelling through AIR INDIA and getting landed onto "no man's land".
Leaving foreign airlines aside -- Jet airways is Indian airline too, with good service and helpful staff. How can you justify attitude of AIR INDIA staff towards elderly people or children ????
I see a lot of people taking a balanced stand on the issue by commenting on the equally inefficient American and British airline companies like AA and BA. That is not the point. Till when are we going to justify inefficiency by saying that others are also inefficient. The bottomline is that we want to be proud of our national carrier which runs on our taxpayers' money and the people of India who have taken to air travel like never before want an answer as to why inspite of thousands of crores spent on branding and rebranding and merging exercises, Air India is still considered with so much of disgust and spite as is quite evident in the comments. Also, I would request people not to start discussing other issue and compare other airlines as the point of the discussion is Air India and nothing else.
Was flying from Chicago to Delhi. Plane made a stop over at Heathrow but we were not assigned a terminal and the plane had to the cleaned while parked on the tarmac - this was ok as it keeps the cost low and also has a faster turnaround which results in shorter flight. What was not ok was the way passengers were treated when the plane was being cleaned. The crew didnot warn the passengers that they will not be allowed touse the restrooms when the plane was being cleaned. An old man was using the restroom and the aiirhostess started banging on the door asking him to open up - to the extent she threatened the man that she will force the door open if he didnot come out soon!!!
Another dissatisfied customer. We've vowed not to travel on Air India.
At every step of our 5 day journey to the United States there were tell tale signs that everything would go wrong from the beginning. My story goes like this:
1. On september 2, 2006 we checked-in from Bangalore to Newark, NJ. Flight was delayed in Bangalore by 4 hrs. Assured by AI that our connecting flight to Newark is not a problem.
2. Arrived in Mumbai where the AI folks were guiding us to a counter instead of guiding us towards the gate. The bad news was that the flight has already left. Monitors indicated that the flight is still being boarded!!!
3. Passengers took the staff to task. Shouting and screaming at them caused them to ask us to go thru security check. We finally made it to the gate. Phew....
4. The staff at the gate asked us if we were from Cochin. Since we were from Bangalore, they asked us to step aside. Bad news again...They were giving Cochin folks the seats that we had boarding passes for. It became clear that this was a case of BUMPING (double booking).
5. We were pointed back to the counter. Some more shouting and screaming. Around 100 people...can you imagine? AI just plainly refused to entertain. They were plainly helpless. Some where just happy that their shift was over.
6. AI promised us Hotel accomodations but wouldn't say when the flight would be. They also wanted us to identify our baggages to be held back. Since we had completed immigration, the other bad news is that our passports won't be returned.
7. So, here we are in Mumbai, without passports and flight take off in front of us without the original passengers. Next night, we received communication from the hotel staff that there was no flight to board us. Finally, after 2 nights, we were given the right to travel.
AI and it's practices are atrocious. Please do yourselves a favour and don't fly Air India.
This blog serves a useful purpose of informing the future AI traveler of pros and cons of flying AI. There are many, many airlines flying between USA and India. Last time I flew AI was 20 years ago.
The best thing for us consumers to do is to fly other airlines and fly AI if and only when AI is rated so high that you see magazine/newspaper articles about its excellent service. Caution --Do not hold your breadth for that day.
The people above who seem to have travelled 4 Excellent trips on AI in a month no less and those who compare the inefficient, pathetic flying blot on the national psyche of India called AI with the woes of JetBlue look like the AI staffers or their cronies for whom the airline is solely in service in the first place. Ordinary tax paying citizen of India who pays for their salaries be damned!
Firstly, I have travelled widely on a variety of airlines from many different countries, except the ones in Africa and Russia and I can say with absolute certainty that AI has the most lothesome, lethargic, unmotivated, inefficient staff compared to any airline I have flown so far. The JetBlue incident is peanuts compared to the disaster story of AI which seems more like a daily ritual. The isolated JetBlue incident (6hrs on tarmac) has created so much furore in US that the CEO has personally gone apologizing on almost every media outlet he can reach to those effected and the airline compensated the victims. Have we even heard a proper reason yet from even a mid-level officer on the current AI delays and absconding of staff without explanations, leave alone the head of AI or civil aviation minister apologizing? There is another govt. enquiry which will take another decade to perhaps figure out that AI is pathetic and incompetent with loathesome and useless thrash staff if Indians are lucky! Pathetic loser airline to say the least.
Hi there, I have listed all available contact information for Air India over on my blog. Hope this helps.
I travelled from Mumbai to London on 2nd of Sept 2007. My flight was delayed by 8hrs from Mumbai and they didnt even bother to apologise for the delay. After 3 hrs since we started from Mumbai, there was thick smoke smell inside the aircraft. The airhostress said that its normal and nothing to worry !! I would never recommend or tavel by Air India in future.
I was among a group of 10 passengers scheduled to fly from Lucknow to New Delhi on Nov. 13th, 2007 at 5:50 PM on flight 602. With a final destination of Atlanta GA via an Alitalia connection in Dehli. We arrived at the Lucknow airport at 3:45 PM and when we got to the ticket counter to get our boarding passes we were told that we had called in earlier and changed our flight to a 10:30 AM departure and we have missed our flight. The agent then went to the office and returned about 10 minutes later with a printout that showed somebody with the last name of Ghandi called the morning of the flight at 9:36 AM and changed the flight to 10:30 AM. We were told that there were no seats available for several days and we would not get a refund. We absolutely did not call and change our flight. This was a scam by the airline. They apparently gave our seats to somebody else and left us stranded. We could not find seats on any airlines or on the train and we were forced to take taxis from Lucknow to Delhi. The taxi trip took us 15 hours and we missed our connecting Alitalia flight as a result. We were then stranded in Delhi for 2 days waiting for seats on Alitalia.
The claims made by the Airline do not add up. They were rude, unhelpful and didn't care about our situation. Horrible airline at best.
AI = Air Imcompetence
AI = Air Imcompetence
I travelled on Air india on 2004. Worst flight and worst service. Here is my story.
In New york, first of all the Air India counter sucked. The boards which says Air india was not lighted and the space was over populated. Fine, we can live with it for a while..
THen from no where a weighing lady came.. She just picked up my bag and said it's overweight.. I asked her..how can she be so sure.. Is she a walking human weighing machine. I had to argue with her for quite some time..
After arriving in bangalore, my baggage was missing.. THen I got to know later that this is a common thing from quite some time. Almost two flights a week are missing baggages..
I went home without my baggage. I had to call almost everyday for a week. Then I had to come back to bangalore twice for this. FOr one time, AIR India officer was not available.. And for second time as a dvd player and home theater system got stuck with customs... I had to walk and back from Air port customs to MSIL office five times before I started yelling at Air india officer.. If you shout, immediately they start telling that they are the RESPECTED SERVANTS OF GOVT of INDIA and they are doing their job..
Crap.. 18 day vacation in india became a nightmare and a pain because of incompetency of Air India.. Never will fly again with this.. This year I am flying on Jet airways.. I always wanted to support indian airlines and now I have a chance..
Manju
Atlanta.
I have flown with AI on one LHR-DEL return trip this month and vowed never to fly with them again, due to the same reasons mentioned by the hundreds of people in this forum - interminable delays and inefficiency.
However, for the sake of fairness, I have to say that many Indian passengers are very rude towards the air crew and treat them as their servants.Someone in the posts above has complained about not getting an extra poppadum!! It is an airline, not your grandma's house , for God's sake!. No airline serves endless cups of tea and coffee as I have seen some passengers on AI demand. One passenger has complained about the stewardess not washing her baby's milk bottle! She is not your maid, madam! And you are, very rightly, not allowed to wash your bottles in the galley sink, but in the restroom. You should carry an extra bottle or two with you on a flight. The stewardesses are more than happy to fill them up with milk/ water when needed.
Dear Friends,
We must not restrict our experience from our Maharajah only we must use this forum to share the experience from Indian and Air India Express. On 16th November, 2007 there were a meeting of Indian Expatriates in Dubai to form a common platform to voice against ill treatment of our national airlines and ministry of aviation. The next day our airline officials were asking to journalists which are the organizations and individuals talk against them. Please understand the attitude of our Public Servants - as long as the government of India is the owner of these airlines- they are Public Servants. But if we the way they treat passengers we feel the public is their servant.
There will be one end, let us work together to end it.
These AI people are not going to listen or read.
They have been in the system too long.
ONLY SOME MIRACLES can help the travellers, especially from the top.
that is IMPROBABLE.
IN KEY KAANO MEIN JUNE TAK NAHIN RENGTI.
BEST THING IS TO AVOID AIR INDIA.
My went to India in Jan 2007 and while coming back her flight was having some technical problem and she was at the airport for 22 hours and no hotel accomadation was provided by the Air India.
when she came home in usa it was almost 55 hours.next time i will prefer another airline.
thanks.
ap
I see a lot of reaction on the poor service being given by AI. Wonder why people travel by AI in the first place??. Anyway for heavens sake please dont get into the "national carrier" thing. The national carrier had some meaning when there were no other indian owned airlines flying around. My recommendation in this age of globalization is take your business where you are treated like a king. At least that’s what thousands of business travelers’ like me do everyday in India..
Dear Anonymous(who said AI is excellent),
The statistics talks for itself. You are one the them who rated AI efficient and helpful. And so far you are outnumbered by a large margin.
So, you judge yourself once again and come to a conclusion... No one is crying foul here without a reason.
I have travelled twice on Air India and will never travel again unless I dont have option.
The flight service is worst. One small TV at the center. Headphone are like stethoscope, you can't hear anything. I requested Captain to increase the volume and he said its maximum.
Some lady asked for shawl and air-hostess replied "this is last shawl" what a answer !
On the other hand - a guy next to me bagged 4 pack of beer cans and was trying to get few more on my behalf. What a shame !
The same people when travel on international airlines they keep quite and eat whatever they get.
Moral of the story - travel by other airlines until you see some forum or blog urging to travel Air India because of it's efficient service.
Why NRI's show their patriotism only on cricket or on stupid reasons like this?,
If you dont like Air india, shift to some other airways, Who cares? (You became a NRI because you dint care about staying in india., isnt it?,)
I have travelled on numerours occasions on AirIndia and have a couple of observations. The Inflight service is not as bad as a lot of people are making it out to be. I have see more rude stewards and airhostess on flights like KLM and Lufthansa... The food is certainly at par with other airlines.. The hygiene factor though needs a lot of improvement to reach international standards. All said and done , its not the worst airline to fly with and lets not get carried away and start bashing everything that has "INDIA" in it. Lets be more practical and empathetic.
Ok some feedback. My father travelled AI111 from LHR to Amritsar on Nov 12th. Turned up early for an 08.45 departure... -well that was the theory. One look at the large queue snaking from the AI counters should have been a strong clue. The rumours doing the rounds in the queue were -aircraft gone tech or Flight Crew gone beyond FTL... ahh well we shall never know. Cue the AI customer care kicking into action. Once we got to a counter, he was checked in and handed a voucher for a hotel. Departure time was revised to 3.00pm(ish). So along with other pax they were left to find their own way to a bus stand to take a bus to a hotel. Now at this point it should be noted that there was a nice chap -part of groundstaff (not AI -I think) trying to be nice and helpful to some elderly pax who were obviously disorientated and worried. As for the AI staff -they were safely tucked behind their help counters...You have to ask -so you have elderly pax who can barely read or understand the language and you want them to go to find some remote bus stand -yeah right!!
Its been pointed out before -an ageing fleet is prone to technical problems. Also only having so many aircraft creates logistical problems should one go tech and a spare is required.
The thing is I have some very dear friends who are AI flight deck crew. They are very accomplished aviators and consumate professionals. Its just a real shame that parts of the organisation are letting the side down.
A great Service
You are doing a great service. There is no point in being nationalistic here. It is about improving a service that simply refuses to adopt basic standards of customer satisfaction. If we do not make noise and protest we are in fact subscribing to and supporting AI's incompetence. So keep it up your great effort.
Just saw this blog and I was reminded of my horrible experience with Air India. This was in Aug, 2001 and I was travelling from California, USA to Hyderabad, India via Singapore.
I had a 8 hr break in Singapore, so I took a visitor visa and came back to the check in counter 70 minutes before the departure. To my surprise there was not a single person at the counter. I checked with the staff of other airlines and they directed me to go the AI office in Singapore airport which I had to find out after a lot of running in the big Changi airport.
They again redirected me to the check-in counter and to my surprise there was a lady sitting in the counter now and shouting at me asking why I was late. My explanation fell into deaf ears. I was horrified of this experience and decided to never to fly AI again.
When I boarded the flight and the whole flight was smelling of urine.
(I found out that the toilet door was not closing at all).
I hope this blog will make people think and help them decide not to fly AI even once. I am not at all hoping this blog will improve the service in AI. The only thing which can work is making AI realise that it cannot run for long with people deciding not to fly and hopefully it will die a speedy death.
I am a frequest flyer on AI from Kuwait. AI makes the most money on the gulf sector with high priced tickets ( as the lowly paid expats have no other option). they treat you like diirt and the look they give you is "Why the hell have you chosen to fly AI again". TO get frequent flyer miles i need to send the registration form to some place in dubai (what a pain). AI exploits the GULF sector and its things come to the head, iam sure the dayis not far where passengers start turning violent.
i m a frequent traveller of AI. from kuwait to dubai and goa n vice versa. the service is poor. the air hostess are rude. once while travellin they served hot drink after meals.at present the flight to goa is cancelled hoping to cancel for good.at last the fares are higher side than air lanka and emirates.
Joseph Goa
I took a return flight to riyadh from mumbai for a business trip on air india, because i had a transit wait of about 8 hours on another flight!!!! Would you call that a mistake, it turned out to be a blunder.
Firstly when i reached mumbai, i did not have any information on the status of the flight. After waiting for about an hour on the AI counter for AI 821, they gave me lounge access and said, the flight is cancelled. I will have to fly to delhi and change the flight there. After about 4 hours of wait the flight finally took off and made us wait in delhi till evening, no information on whats happening. The lounge was crouded, outside i could see families in real mess with little children. It was a sight of railway station. People in queue for food given because of delay and rude staff. So this flight finally takes off and lands in Riyadh at about 11.30 in the night. Lousy ? The worst is on the return flight.
So after about 3 days of business in Riyadh i got to catch the return flight. This is supposed to be AI 826 at 12.10 in the afternoon. My travel agent informed me that this flight is postponed to midnight 12.30 AM, so its better i call up the air india office in riyadh and confirm. My associates in Riyadh told me they never pick up the phone. So i was very lucky that an air india person actually picked up the phone. He says to me that the flight is actually postponed to 3.30 AM in the morning, but you would have to come to airport and check in by 9.30 itself, the reason, because air india staff go home by 9.30 !!!! Can you imagine !!!! i asked for hotel reimbursement, he says they could maximum reimburse the taxi fare if i come by 9.30 PM in a rude tone and clicks the phone down. Anyway we didnt want to miss the flight as it was not cancelled and our tickets sold to someone else (we heard air india staff even do this !!). We checkout of our hotel and landed in Riyadh airport waiting for this flight which finally arrived at 6 AM and took us at 7 AM. We had to spend the entire night in the Riyadh airport , missed two important meetings in mumbai because of AIR INDIA. This sorry state of affairs, harrawing experiences of passengers reflects on the company, Mr Tulsidas and his management team. I will never travel AIR INDIA again!!
As you all know,its pretty common for indian airlines and air india to give away your reserved seats to a priveliged few...this is waht happened to me.....i was to flyfrom new delhi to london, i had confirmed reservations on A.I...but still, to be on the safe side, i told my uncle who was the head of FERA (foreign exchange dept) to have his secretary confirm my seat...which he did.....i went to the airport 3 hours in advance only to be told that my reservation was cancelled and the flight was full.....i was told to talk to the supervisor called sharma...when i went there, a lady from usa was screaming at him...i decided to listen to her.....seems like she was scheduled to catch an air india flight in the morning, but some of her relatives showed up and she went to him and asked him to be booked on a later flight...he changed her ticket for another flight which was to leave six hours later.....this afforded her an opportunity to relax with her friends and relatives for sometime...one hour before the flight, she went to the ticket counter only to realize that this later flight she was booked on was cancelled in the morning and Sharma never realized it or did not inform her.....next few flights were completly booked.....she was stuck for two days....poor Sharma was getting it left and right, bu the time she got through with him, he was a defeated man.....so now, it was my turn, i started hmaaering him, but before i could finish, he said, sir i have a major headache, I'll do what ever you want...i wanted a seat, he quickly assigned me one....i asked him, how were you able to give me a seat, he said he got rid of another confirmed passenger who had not yet checked in...he said his shift was up and he was going home, the new supervisor could deal with the bumped passenger...if these JACKASS employees of A.I have the authority of eliminating a reserved passenger, then what guarantee do you have you will be able fly back to your destination on time? TAKE A BOAT, WALK, HITCHIKE, BUT DONT FLY AIR INDIA....JAI HIND.
I've decided to never travel by Air India even for free. Last month I had a flight from Newark to Mumbai. At the check-in counter at Newrak the guy weighed my large suitcase and put it in, then after printing the security tag he asked me where's your bag and I said "you just weighed it and put it in". They looked around a little bit and said it was already sent to the baggage room. After waiting for about half an hour and insisting that I want them to bring it back and put the tag on, so that I can identify the bag. The lady in charge called the baggage room in front of me and said they have found the bag, it already has a security tag with my name on and made me believe that it was all fine, by mistake two tags were printed one was on the bag and other was here, she gave me the other half of the newly printed tag. I wish she hadn't lied to me at the check-in counter, upon arrival in Mumbai, to my horror the bag didn't arrive. The lost baggage system at the airport was so mismanaged that it took almost two hours for them to confirm that all the bags had been unloaded and another 2 hours to get the lost baggage report created, all this happening at 2 AM in the morning. It's been more than a month and they couldn't even trace the bag, now all they are going to pay is 20 USD per kg. for a 23 kg bag, which hardly covers up the value of items in there. I wish they could act more responsibly at the time of check-in and upon arival.
Not only this on my return journey, the flight was delayed 3 hours due to technical problems and after taking off and being in air for 2.5 hours, it was returned back to the source airport because of technical problem. After spending a couple of hours at the airport, the flight was rescheduled for 1:30 AM, and we were given hotel accomodation. Again this hotel was an hour away from the airport and service was really bad, had to share a room with another passenger, even making phone calls wasn't possible as they didn't have enough lines available. After around 40 hours travel I got to Newark.
Now getting someone to repond about my lost bag seems impossible as the telephone goes directly to voicemail and there's no response to e-mail.
I was going to Ahmadabad direct from LHR on Jan 2003 with my family on Air India. We were two adults, one senior citizen and two children age 5 years and 3 months respectively. On arrival at the LHR airport we found that the flights from East cost of US are not returning back due to snow thus there is a back log of PAX from US and UK. This was going on for past few days and AI Customer service did not inform us by phone or email that there are problems. We could not get on the booked flight. We were now 30 passengers. We were taken to a very bad hotel for overnight stay. The food was provided but as vegetarians we had no other choice but to eat what we can as most of it was non veg. Next day’s flight was for Delhi and it was possible to catch early morning IA flight from Delhi to Ahmadabad. The Air stewards were sympathetic to our plight but that was all. There general attitude was of Lazy constitution. The plane was dirty. Toilets were dirty etc. etc. The flight from LHR was late and we missed our connection in Delhi. We were again taken to a hotel in Delhi because the next IA flight was in the late evening. Eventually after 48 hours we reached out destination. During all this the LHR Air India customer service was ineffective in providing any answers. Most of the information was gathered by asking other PAX and listening to conversations between other PAX.
On the return journey, we had confirmed midnight flight from Ahmadabad to LHR via Delhi, the Air India Check-in staff was trying to offload us for some reason but I did not moved from the check in counter and waited demanding that I want to speak to superior. Eventually we got the boarding cards. By this time we were all very tired. At Delhi airport we had to go through security and check-in again and the AI staff told me that I do not have the valid boarding card thus I cannot get on the flight. He blamed me for the mistake the Ahmadabad ground staff made telling me that WHY did I not check the boarding cards. It is not his duty to check and I am responsible for checking that the boarding card is correct or not. I had five boarding cards and 4 were correct, only mine was not right. This must have been revenge from the AI Check-in at Ahmadabad. Eventually after lots of argument and blaming I got the correct boarding card. This should have been corrected as a matter of routing by the airline.
I travel all over with other airlines but never had this type of experience.
This is the last time I travelled AIR INDIA.
I BOYCOTT AIR INDIA UNTIL IT PUTS ITS HOUSE IN ORDER.
Usless!!! I had the worst possible experience in my life, travelling AI. I dont want to repeat the same stuff you all did, but still here is my story. Starting from Chicago, the crew(Both Land and Air) were so rude, they were treating us as though they were doing us a favour.
What hurt me the Most was they were Indians like Me. What impression would we be giving to people from other country. AI is supposed to be the pride of India, and is supposed to represent the Nation. I paid $ 2000+ to be tourtured by my own people. Thats crap man. They were behaving like some uneducated Idiots. Never in my life again will I travel AI. It is as currupt as our Politicians. I can never forget the Crew's rude and grouchy faces. Nothing worked in the plane, TV, AC nothing. and everything was stinking. Shit man, I want to ask them just one thing " Do you guys keep your home the same was, or treat you brother the way you treated me and the rest of the passengers??
I have made it a point never to use Air India or Indian Airlines, except before the days of liberalization when there was no choice. My memories have always been of rude, unkempt steward(esses) and creaky airplanes. One guy even kept pestering me to have dinner when all I wanted was some shut-eye on a red-eye flight!
The government should apologize and return Air-India to it's rightful owners - the Tatas.
I have never traveled by AI and it will be last option I would ever take based on experiences I heard from people around me. I always pay 100-200 dollars per ticket extra and book tickets on CO, NW, DL, etc. I have always been a satisfied customer on these flights, even in case of delays!
I live in the USA at a place from where an AI connection to India is almost always a bit cheaper. Many people of Indian origin in my vicinity book these cheaper tickets once and that is always the last time they do it. Everyone comes back frustrated and irritated and vows not to travel AI again. I believe there is a consistency in AI of not satisfying their customers. They make sure that once a person travels with AI, that person should never come back again.
7 Jan 2008, 0408 hrs IST,TNN
LUCKNOW: Mounting frustration and anger among the Haj pilgrims over 'inhumane' treatment meted out to them allegedly by Air- India management spilled over in form of outrage at Amausi airport.
On Sunday, one of the passengers from Kanpur allegedly thrashed a customs staff when he stopped them from proceeding towards the office cabin of the Air-India (manager) at the airport.
Airport authorities and local Sarojini Nagar police, however, denied reports of scuffle at the airport. But, they confirmed that unruly scenes were being reported from the airport owing to the chaos caused by a poor co-ordination between the Haj pilgrims and the airlines staff.
With allegations like unannounced hefty hike in charges for extra baggage, dumping the passengers at the airport in Jeddah for days at a stretch with no arrangements for lodging or food and frustratingly cold response of the airlines staff at the airports, the relatives of the Hajis who had come to receive the latter, lost their cool on Saturday when they found baggage of most of the passengers missing, partly or completely.
What added fuel to the fire was the apathetic response of the airlines staff which allegedly shrugged their responsibility with regards to the missing baggage.
The situation took a turn for the worse when some of the airlines staff allegedly shot back angrily at the passengers, threatening to close the counter.
When some of the passengers raised objections over their behaviour, one of the airlines staffer allegedly slapped one of them. This led to a scuffle before other Hajis intervened and pacified the pilgrims. Earlier, a large number of Hajis from the state had come back between December 26 and 29 without their luggage.
I had travelled twice from Heathrow to Kolkata in 2 years, and on the first occasion my baggage arrived late, and on the second occasion it was lost. This may have been deliberate as they had tried off-loading my family at London during connections, on both occasions.
There was no courtesy or apology from the AI ground staff at Kolkata Airport. They kept me waiting for over 2 hours before someone would issue the necessary paper-work. The lazy ground-staff were sitting around having cups of tea while I was the only one waiting for ages. The work culture at Kolkata Airport is not great at the best of times but after 12 hours of flying with family and children, one expects some courtesy and decency.
The staff should not forget that they are employed to help the passengers. The Air India does not exist solely to employ them or the aviation minister.
Raj.
Glasgow, UK.
I had travelled twice from Heathrow to Kolkata in 2 years, and on the first occasion my baggage arrived late, and on the second occasion it was lost. This may have been deliberate as they had tried off-loading my family at London during connections, on both occasions.
There was no courtesy or apology from the AI ground staff at Kolkata Airport. They kept me waiting for over 2 hours before someone would issue the necessary paper-work. The lazy ground-staff were sitting around having cups of tea while I was the only one waiting for ages. The work culture at Kolkata Airport is not great at the best of times but after 12 hours of flying with family and children, one expects some courtesy and decency.
The staff should not forget that they are employed to help the passengers. The Air India does not exist solely to employ them or the aviation minister.
Raj.
Glasgow, UK.
I have nottravelled by Air India since 1977. My wife was booked on a flight from Bombay to NY. At the airport she was told that she could not fly even though she had a confirmed ticket. Fortunately we knew some one in the airline and she got the boarding pass.
She then made the mistake of flying by that miserable airline again in the eighties one time. I warned her against it because I knew something would get screwed up. She flew by American from Dallas to NY and reached NTC around 4 pm. Her luggage never made it on AI flight. Later the trvel agent in Dallas told us that this was a routine problem. Staff is rude to women and passangers with children.
I have to say that Luftanza german staff is equally rude to Indian passangers. I used to fly Luftanza but stopped using them around 2000. We travel to India every year. We fly AA, Continental, Singapore and generally get decent service. Avoid all national airlines. Avoid Luftanza and AI. Their staff is always rude to Indians. I heard that Jet from Newark is good. Also avoid Kuwait air, again a government airline. They are abusive to Indians. For my money it is either AA, Continental, Singapore or Jet. May be Ameritz but never fly AI, Luftanza or Cathay Pacific. By in large theeir disdain for Indians is obvious.
As a passanger I never ask for anything but you can feel the dislike in their attitude.
I was scheduled to fly by AI flight from Sharjah last month, due to unavaidable circumstances, the flight got delayed and ultimately cancelled. for the whole night and the other day there was not proper arrangement for the passsegers at the airport. ultimately since i was on residence visa in Dubai, they left me out and booked for onther flight from Dubai. at the dubai checkin counter one of thier untrained staff plucked both the coupons and i lodged a complaint with AI at Mmbai and they asssured me that there will be no problems while returning back. When i reached Airport on later, it was a tootal horrible experience. rather than providing me an alternative, they just did not know what to do. ulltimately i decided to pay for the return ticket and still there were no properly trained staff to issue a ticket when the flight is closed. It was a total horror and i had to pay for the mistakes on AI's untrained staff.
We are travel agency located in USA. To protect our customers, we had intense fight with Air-India on Flight Schedule Change, just one matter took one and half month to resolve. We had to write all Air-India office in USA one-by-one and finally, when no one solved issue, we had to write to Air-India Mumbai Management, and then finally USA management staff wake-up to work on it...This was worst of worst experience and from that point, we decided not to sell Air-India tickets to customers, let Air-India give chance to think, why their sales has gone down. Let then think why other airlines occupancy is going and Air-India empty. Someday, if I become Air-India Manager in USA, then my first task will be to fire A to Z Air-India New York staff and higher new foreign staff who know value of customer service. Their first problem is, even they are on the desk, they do not pick-up the phone. In USA, New York office staff is worst. We have forwarded our www.airindia.ws domain to your website to support you. Mumbai Office Management is good. If anyone has complain about Air-India New York office, they must notify to Mumbai Management.
I am an aviation professional who would like you to read my blog on the appalling air safety standards in India.Together,as experts and passengers,we can create a huge impact by spreading awareness.Solets make a difference.Please do post your comments at :
http://indianairsafety.blogspot.com/
As long as sarkari officials and free loading employees of Air India travel Air India, as long as it has the assured gulf sector in place, there will be complacence and all this ranting and raving will have no effect.Remember, Tatas and Singapore Airlines were willing to run it and this plan was squelched by vested interests mainly because politicians did not want to lose this perk. A typical government owned monster - Air India - and all you can do is make your own decision in your best interests. Service is secondary when you consider safety and most passengers cannot feel assured that is is a safe airline. Punctuality is another vital factor where AI does not inspire confidence.
I made a big mistake of traveling by Air India (Los Angeles - Delhi) last December. I was pained by their inefficiency (flight cancellation after check-in and 12 hr uncertainty at LAX) and high-handed attitude.
I now tell all my Indian friends not to fly by AI.
I have used Air India several time over the past 28 yrs.. The good things first.. for the most part the food is good - better the NW/Lufthansa etc... and for the most part the on-board staff is ok.. as long as u don;t have any extra needs.
The ground staff goes without saying needs help. The worst was my last experience JUly 07 when I was sending off my family on Chicago-Mumbai flight the one that leaves at around 6 PM. The lady at the counter could not check in my 2 yr old son because the "system" couldn't recognize his US passport and status... the hero ground staff manager - "Imran" his name tag said was called. Look for this hero... did a lot of clicking and was convinced the passport had a problem and acted as he was doing us a favor trying to get us on board. But of course Imran thought he corrected a problem we had created Thats the attitude of ground staff in general.. watch out AIr India.. just a question of time before they you become ancient. Something tells me AIr India management will correct itself and get rid of people like Imran... for the better. I have faith
Hats off to the air staff. i think they try!!!
I have travelled most of times because of being patrotic being Indian and to support India.
I have noticed whites having preferential tratment to Asians.
Secondly the staff do not bother to answer to the call bells.
Thirdley have noticed them all sitting behind and ignoring passengers. Passengers to have to go to them all the time to be served for water etc.
Then instead of serving the passengers most of thing are taken by the staff for there own use.No wonder Air India is going down.
Then all of a sudden flights gets canceled or having extra stops without any apolligizing or extra services to compensate the extra time taken.Lots off people have made arrangements to be picked up or have business to attend.
It is only reson Air India has servived is due to lots of Indian people using them just for the sake of it is Indian aircraft and people are supporting India by doing that.
Now the competions is so much it is high time Indian government wake up and look into service,pilferring by staff of the products which are for the passengers etc.
This april I finally did the unthinkable,I decided to travel via air india from LAX to DELHI. I had a 1 year old baby and I thought may be the direct flight by Air India will be good for us...Alas, I was so wrong.
My trip started on saturday, 11 AM April 12th (Pacific time) and was supposed to reach Delhi by monday morning.
I had a connecting flight from Delhi to Ranchi the same day on 14th April and was supposed to reach Ranchi by 5 PM same day.
My whole vacation was for around a month and I was supposed to return back on 12th May..
On 12th of April, we reached LAX airport at 1 PM (flight was at 4PM). We waited in the line for an hour or so..and then finally someone from air India shows up and says "The flight has been delayed till tomorrow 8AM. We are trying to put all the passangers in some other airlines". ok..that's great. We waited for another 1 hour and then one more anouncement "No seats are available in any other airline. We will put you in near by hotel. We will arrange for the pickup and drop off".
We were almost realizing our mistake of having tried Air India..But then we thought anyway just for 14 hours...We waited for Air India bus to arrive, then someone mentioned there is no Air India bus but we will have to take the Hotel Complimentary bus service..Unfortunately, there was lot of rush and it took us 3 hours to hop on to the bus (with a crying baby and lots of luggage)..Anyway, we reached hotel and heaved a sigh of relief..Next morning just before going to airport, I decided to call Air India again...and to my horror they said "sir, the plane is delayed for another 12 hours. The flight will now start at 10 PM in the night". I immidiately decided to cancel my ticket and get into some other airline..Fortunately cathy pacific was available. I called up MakeMYTrip and asked them to cancel my ticket..The person on the other side rudely replied "Sir, we cannot cancel the ticket. We have not heard anything from Air India at this time. You will have to call Air India and cancel the ticket. Air India needs to send a response to us saying the flight has been cancelled. Once that happens, you will get your refund". I quickly asked and how much time do you think it will take to get my refund.."Sir around 1 month" prompt came the reply..Anyway, I was so desperate that I decided to call Air India for cancellation..
Air India representative..
"Sir, How can I help you"
Me -- I am in such and such flight which was cancelled and I want to cancel my ticket...
"Ok.." waits for one minute..and then replies "Sir, You have not bought the ticket from Air India and we cannot help you out".
I told him that I talked to MakeMyTrip and they asked me to call Air India..."Sir, we cannot help you. You will have to contact Air India regional office which will open only tomorrow at 9:00 AM.."
Wow..So I finally realized Air India and MakeMytrip will not let me cancel my ticket...So I finally decided to go by Air India in the night..praying that it does not get delayed again...Just before leaving for airport, I decided to call Air India..and my worst fear was true "Sir, the flight is still in Frankfurt and has not reached LAX. It is expected to now fly tomorrow morning at 10AM "..Here I was, in 1 month vacation and already wasted 2 days in the airport and also missed my connecting flight...
Anyway, finally, the flight did fly the next day at 10 AM..thank God I said to myself..On the airport, I showed my E-tickets (for the connecting flight) and told them since I have missed my connecting flight because of Air India, they should arrange for my connecting flight...The air India staff was very courteous and he said "No problem sir. All the arrangements have been made. Since this is an E-Ticket we cannot do this here.You need to reach Delhi and show this E-Ticket and you will get your connecting flight ticket from Delhi to Ranchi.." I finally was getting happy with the Air India service...I thought at least they care a little...I was going to be so wrong...read on..
We reached Delhi Tuesday (15th April) evening at 6PM..I went straight to Air India office and showed them my ticket and told them everything...It was a small office with around 20 (most of them young guys and girls) people having fun..one young guy was sitting on a small window and taking the request..He had absoulutely no idea what he needed to do..So he looks here and there and finally says he needs to check with his senior. Comes back in 20 mins..and says he need to fill a form which I need to show in another office nearby for the ticket..Ok Grrt..So he took another 30 minutes..filling the form and re-filling it...and then gives it to me..Time 7:30 PM...I went to this other office (Supposedely Indian Airlines domestic). It was again a small office with lots of people..One word to describe the office "CHAOS"...Anyway, I was not sure whom to talk to, So I got hold of one person and told him everything..Even before I finish, he quips "Sahab khana kha rahe hai. wait (Boss is having his dinner. wait)" So I waited for 20 more minutes..then boss comes out "Kya hai (What do you want )" he asks very rudely..I told him my story and showed him the form. He stares at the form and says "Kya haiyeh. Isse kuch nahi hoga..wapas jaha se lekar aaye ho wahi ja kar do..(What is this form? This is of no use. Go and give the form back to the office..)" He throws the form at me and goes away...My baby was tired and was now crying...(Time 8:00 PM)...
I then went back to the same office and got very angry at the guy sitting on the window...The guy says "I was not aware of this. Let me call my boss"..Boss comes after half an hour and says , your connecting flight was with Deccan Airlines. We can only issue ticket if it is from Air India..I told him I was promised a connecting flight back at LAX airport and I had missed my flight because of Air India..
He said "Sorry, I cannot help. We can put you in a hotel for today night and then you will have to call up Deccan and get new ticket"...(time 9:00 PM)..I finally was so pissed off with Air India..that I called a cab and took the nearest hotel...
Same night, I started calling all the airlines starting with Deccan first and to my bad luck, there was no tickets available for the next 2 days..We were almost in tears..4 days delayed (in a 30 days vacation)...
Finally, I reached home on thursday night...And I had to pay 3 times more then my initial connecting flight ticket...
Anyway, I thought my torture has ended..Boy I was so wrong...
Since I had reached home almost 4 days late, I decided to change my return date from 12th....Initially I was not sure whether to go on 17th or 18th..so I decided to change the tickets to open tickets..Little did I realize my torture was again about to start.
On 2nd May, I called Air India and asked them to change my tickets to open ticket..The guy said, it will cost me $125 per ticket and I said fine... I decided to call them once again just to confirm if my ticket was changed to open ticket and they said "yes sir, Your tickets are now open ticket"..Grrt, I heaved a sigh of relief..On 12th may we finally decided to finalize our tickets for 17th may and thats when the torture started again...
I called up Air India and told them that I have an open ticket and I want to confirm it for 17th may. The air India representative waits for a minute and says "Sir, this cannot be done" what, I asked him why..."Sir, connectivity is down..call in the morning"....I called up again in the morning...And the representative says "Sir, you have purchased your ticket from MakeMytrip. You need to call them for date change" ...I told her, I have changed it to open ticket by calling Air India and at that point they said nothing....and she replies "I cannot help you. We dont have the authority. You need to call makemytrip"..I decided to call Makemytrip...MakeMytrip representative "Sir, You have purchased ticket from MakeMytrip USA. You need to call them". Oh grrt. So now I have to make ISD call...Anyway, I decided to call MakeMyTrip, USA and I get the line in 5 minutes...The representative waits for a minute and says "Sir, this is a open ticket and you need to call Air India to confirm the ticket..." What ?? I was getting so pissed off..And decided to call Air India again..Another representative and I get the same answer "You need to call the Dealer from which you bought the ticket"...Wow..I called makemytrip USA again..and this time the person says "we will contact air India and we will inform you within 12 hours" It was already 13th night.
On 14th morning, I called up MakeMytrip again, and to my surprise the MakeMytrip representative had no idea what I was talking about...He said "Sir, I dont see any request has been made to Air India. I will put up the request for you. You will have to wait for another 12 hours..Our system still shows that you flew on 12th May". Finally, he said he has put the request for me.. 14th Night, I called up MakeMyTrip again, "Sir we have not heard from Air India till now. We will contact you as soon as we hear from them."
15th Morning, I called up MakeMyTrip again "Sir, we are sorry but since you changed your ticket dates directly from Air India, we cannot help you out. Please call up Air India and they will be able to help you"..One more day wasted and I was still without confirm ticket....I decided to give Air India another try..To my surprise Air India representative says "Yes Sir, we can help you out". She takes another minute or so and then tells me "The ticket has been confirmed for 17th May"
I was so happy but alas it was short lived...She continued "You need to come with your passport to Delhi office in another 6 hours or your ticket will be cancelled" What ??? I told her I am in Ranchi and there is no way I can reach Delhi office in 6 hours (Distance of more then 1000 KM)..but she repeated "Sir, I cannot help you. That's mandatory..".Finally I called up my brother in Delhi and asked him to visit the Delhi office. I sent him the xerox of my passport hoping that will do..My brother immidiately went there..and the girl on the counter said "Xerox copy is no good. You need to bring color copy of his passport". In one hour my brother took the coloured copy back...and the same girl replies "I am about to leave office. So you will have to wait for another person..My brother waits for another hour and then the new person calls him..He looks at the passport photo copy and says "What is this?? without passport, I cannot do anything"..My brother tells him, just now the other lady told us that this is ok..and he says rudely "No..dont waste my time..I cannot help...if the other lady told you so then wait for her to return tomorrow morning and get the work done"...My brother felt that he wanted some kind of bribe..but I asked him to return..I was getting so pissed off with the whole episode that I was thinking of taking another airline...One last time, I decided to call MakeMyTrip again..I told them you can charge whatever you want but get my tickets confirmed for 17th May...The moment they heard off money, MakeMyTrip representative was much more receptive..He said it will cost me $225 per ticket..I was desperate and I said that is fine...Finally on 16th morning, MakeMyTrip confirmed my ticket and I heaved a sigh of relief and we flew back on the 17th May...
In this whole episode, I had wasted 4 days due to delayed flight and another 4 days to get my ticket confirmed...
In the last 4 days, I was with either Air India folks or with MakeMyTrip..
Its a shame that an international airline like Air India operates like this..And its much more shameful that companies like makemytrip does not care about its customer once you have bought the tickets and paid your money...This trip has taught me 2 very important things..Stay away from Air India and never ever buy tickets from MakeMyTrip (or for that matters any company located in India)....
So finally, remember "Do not fly Air India and Do not make your trip thru MakeMyTrip"..Both sucks big time...
I am awake at 3:20 in the morning waiting to find out when my boyfriend is supposed to be arriving in the UK for NYC. He booked his flight from the US to London with AI. He was due to arrive this morning but his original flight was cancelled and he was out on the next one which has also been cancelled. He is now in line with hundreds of others to find out when he can leave, during which time half the AI staff went home so there is a skeleton staff at 22:20 in JFK dealing with the barrage. This is shocking and inexcusable. I am furious.
Just vote with your feet! There are plenty of choices out there. If you are worried about cost, you will be surprised that some of the alternatives are just as inexpensive. Personally, I prefer to pay as couple of hundred dollars more to avoid uncertainity and headaches.
The best thing that can happen to AI (or any business) is that customers stop patronizing itand then it goes bankrupt. Trust me, even government owned businesses will eventually die off or change if you stop spending money with them.
I had a worst experience of Air India which I was expecting. Because I already bad experience of service in 2005 on Mumbai-London flight and I was worried. I had to buy Air India as my trip was planned just 4 days before I could fly and it was cheapest option at that point.
It was Mumbai-Delhi-Frankfurt flight and I think same goes to Chicago. Mumbai to Frankfurt flight was fine. But the return flight was the full Air India drama :-)
This happened in Dec. 2007 in frankfurt. I checked in almost 4 hours before time and was the first person on checkin counter (fearing flight can be overbooked as X'mas was just 2 days later). Everything went well and we were waiting for flight to arrive from Chicago. It arrived in time and I was feeling good as I was excited to go back to India asap. Just 15 minutes before scheduled boarding time they announced that the flight will be delayed for an hour. This was around 11.30am in Frankfurt with temperature outside -5 degree C. Again in an hour they said flight will start at 3pm and they asked us to board the flight to have food. Again in 2 hours they said the engine of the flight is damaged and this flight cannot fly. Upon asking more they told that one of the engines had serious problem and was throwing some kind of metal particles in the whole journey from Chicago to Frankfurt. All other passengers horrified to learn that they were traveling in a damaged flight over the Atlantic !!!
They told that they are brining new engine from Hamburg and flight will leave around 11pm. (So we were already at the boarding gate for 12 hours.) In about half an hour they said that the flight is too old and engine is not available for this model of flight. So you have to goto the hotel. They put us in a hotel for 2 nights and all passengers had to scream and question again and again to poor AI office who was alone.
Next morning they put all business class passengers on another airline. There were couple who were traveling to India for their own wedding and worried that if they can reach India for wedding or to go straight to Swiss. for honeymoon :-)
One of the Gujarati family had only 5 days of holiday and they had already lost 2 days in the flight. So for them it was like 48 hours of holiday in India.
As others have already said we should all stop traveling by AI and let it go bankrupt.
I will not - never travel AI again as it was horrifying to learn that the damaged old plane was used in the long haul flight.
H S LELE
Pune. India
C frnds..
AI is an organisation which is age old, nd the staff includes those recruited way back in 70s. Even I knw wht u guys r talking abt.. Age old faces, luking arrogant, poor interiors..
So we are talking abt an oraganisation which is public sector, old staff nd airplanes.
I dont say tht, we shudn't compare AI with other Kingfisher or Jetairways. But when u compare, compare their new 777s with AI's new 777s. their new staff to our new staff (new chicks).
Our New 777s nd yet to come dreamliners 787s are brand new nd will meet standards.
Still i agree with u guys.. nd tht Pappad problem .. hahaha that airhostess might hv been a fool, completely failin in her duties..
But AI has already bought new fleet, more in coming... New batches of airhostess recruited, nd a full batch of young aspiring pilots..
Who ever walk away from us will one day come back to us. I'm sure...
But limitations are there. When our own Av minister has shares in other Airlines nd closely related to the rest, y shud he support a GOVT company??
My sister with her 2 year old kid was supposed to travel from Hyderabad to LAX via Frankfurt on AI. They told us that the flight is not available and asked us to visit their local office in HYD next day for rescheduling the journey. We went to the office, waited for about 4 hours and got the next available flights. When we went for check-in for this rescheduled flight they gave her boarding passes only till frankfurt and told her that Franfurt to LAX will be given at Franfurt. When she reached frankfurt they told her that her ticket is invalid and she must check out her bags in Franfurt and purchase new tickets. She did not have german visa and obviously stranded with a 2 year old kid. No AI offical cared.They did not even allow her a courtesy phone call to us (forget a hotel and other basic things). After 24 gruelling hours we managed to have her on the flight to LAX.All along she was at the AI counter. I know stuff happens but isnt hospitality is the basic expectation.
Here is another case. Today my sisters inlaws boarded a flight from LAX to hyderabad via Kuala lumpur and Mumbai. At Kuala Lumpur, they were not allowed to board the flight because AI in LAX failed to send a FIM or some such correspondance. They were ask to pay 3000$ for the tickets and boarding pass that they already have.They are now starnded in Kuala lumpur and when I called Air India they asked me to go to the kuala lumpur office. that essentially means that I need to take a flight from LAX to Kuala lumpur and go to their office to correct their mistake. Is this even practically possible. The call center employess act as if they do a remarkable favor to us. I just wish the ordeal for the old parents in laws end soon. After that neither me, nor anyone in my company , nor my friends will EVER travel by AI.Can someone please help me here, to get the poor people out of Kulalumpur to Hyderabad ?
My sister with her 2 year old kid was supposed to travel from Hyderabad to LAX via Frankfurt on AI. They told us that the flight is not available and asked us to visit their local office in HYD next day for rescheduling the journey. We went to the office, waited for about 4 hours and got the next available flights. When we went for check-in for this rescheduled flight they gave her boarding passes only till frankfurt and told her that Franfurt to LAX will be given at Franfurt. When she reached frankfurt they told her that her ticket is invalid and she must check out her bags in Franfurt and purchase new tickets. She did not have german visa and obviously stranded with a 2 year old kid. No AI offical cared.They did not even allow her a courtesy phone call to us (forget a hotel and other basic things). After 24 gruelling hours we managed to have her on the flight to LAX.All along she was at the AI counter. I know stuff happens but isnt hospitality is the basic expectation.
Here is another case. Today my sisters inlaws boarded a flight from LAX to hyderabad via Kuala lumpur and Mumbai. At Kuala Lumpur, they were not allowed to board the flight because AI in LAX failed to send a FIM or some such correspondance. They were ask to pay 3000$ for the tickets and boarding pass that they already have.They are now starnded in Kuala lumpur and when I called Air India they asked me to go to the kuala lumpur office. that essentially means that I need to take a flight from LAX to Kuala lumpur and go to their office to correct their mistake. Is this even practically possible. The call center employess act as if they do a remarkable favor to us. I just wish the ordeal for the old parents in laws end soon. After that neither me, nor anyone in my company , nor my friends will EVER travel by AI.Can someone please help me here, to get the poor people out of Kulalumpur to Hyderabad ?
Yes, Air India's Service is bad, food is bad, flight is bad, etc.
But remember they have carried laks of Indians from Kuwait to India during gulf war in 1991 without even looking whether the passenger has money or not. They have cancelled the flights of other sectors (where they get money) and used those flights to evacuate Indians from Kuwait.
Can we expect this from another Airlines??? Whether we like their service or not, we need to compromise on our comforts and keep Air India alive.
My sis-inlaw and her son both travelled Chicago Hyderabad.
Son on BA because he hated AI and the mom on AI. whoa for choices. BA left ON TIME.... AI left an hour late ....
Family here in india were cursing ..... KNOW WHAT
MOM landed an hour late on AI intact with baggage.
hahaha so much for BA ....son landed at Mumbai on time(wow) only problem his baggage didnt.
Took 5 days for BA to deliver the baggage.
So much for ontime / delayed flight gripes of all the above folks about AI
Its shameful to say this is about our national carrier, but its the most pathetic airline once could ever fly.......I would recomment all Indian nationals to rethink their decision about flying Air India. They dont deserve any bail outs.
I have flown Air India and I have flown almost every other major airline and I have never seen anything wrong with Air India. I think the problem is most loser NRIs here are the types that have been to 1 foreign country in their whole life and come to India every December to try and boast about being in "Foren".
I have been around the world...Asia..Europe... US and I would say Air India is one of my favourite airlines to travel in. It's the only airline that gives you a "home feeling" and serves actual food. I nearly felt like pulling someone's hair out when United started serving plain water...just plain water on a domestic US flight I was on few days back. US airways and North West Airlines (now dead) do not even have an in flight entertainment system on their long haul flights from US to Europe!!!!
Air France is another nightmare... we once sat on board for 30 minutes while stairs were brought for us to alight at CDG. Fly any other American airline and they will keep gouging you to pay up $5 or 4 euros for a pair of headphones! I hear that a major European carrier (Ryanair) is ordering planes with coin operated toilet doors! Ha!
Oh...and as for the age of flight attendants, it is not for me to comment. Their job is to attend to me, not have sex with me.
"NRIs" really need to get out more and see something of the world before they make their ridiculous comments.
Totally agree with everyone above -real dhabba on our country. Shame on Air India - good for nothing! having all buddhi abusive airhostesses who are racist and treat you very bad.
The only reason they survive is because they force all govt. employees to fly by AI - for instance if once doesnt have a direct pane from mumbai to Delhi , then they must fly via cochin or whatever sector but they must fly only AI.
Such a scam!!! Should be really ashamed of themselves !!!!
All's not well at Air India. The reasons can be summarised as follows:
1. Understand this company has not recruited new ground staff since 1992. It is common sense that the two constants in any airline are fresh blood and fresh airplanes. Though fresh airplanes gave come but fresh blood has not been forthcoming for many years. Hence the "new brooms sweep well" concept was lost long long time ago in AI.
2. Recruitments not happening, the processes in AI is not at all customer friendly. They somehow feel that all rules must be complicated enough to irritate their customers. Simplified processes is the order of the day and airlines all over the world are moving towards simplification of their rules.
3.AI staff does not know the meaning of industry bench marks. What is observed that every AI staff has their own way of performing their duties. Hence no standardisation as per industry norms.
4. The government is not dealing with AI is a firm manner. They have merged the airline but have kept the employees stranded in mid sea.The AI management and the government must decide on getting things right in the airline very very fast. So much so even the office timings of both the merged entities are not same. I've had the misfortune of coming to an AI office on a Sunday only to find that the IC side was open whereas the AI side was not.
Indian all over the world adopt to the rules of working very fast. AI staff are nothing but Indians. If Jet Airways can provide good service, so can AI. However, it is felt that the prerogative to change things fast lies with AI management with the able backing of the government.This must be done very fast. Not like it is being done now. Three years since the merger happened and they still do not have similar office timings!!!!
Its a great post, everyone can share their story may be some times its bad but I like this post for share our experience about Air India.
Great post, I am almost 100% in agreement with you
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