afhstingray

once on a flight MAN-DXB-SIN i was late...arrived 20 mins before plane was due to depart,because to problems with my train journey from hull, check in had already closed, but i had already checked in online so they said it was alright, they whisked my bags away and slapped a fast track sticker on my boarding pass and i made the flight. i was travelling in economy.

and twice before i've completely missed the flight, but they just put me on the next one, no charges or anything. I dont know if they have become more strict since.

oh, and in october, i had an emergency and had to get on the next available flight to KUL, i showed up at gatwick 30 mins before departure time and they sold me a ticket on the spot for that flight, even though check-in had technically closed. I was panicking but the agent was taking his own sweet time to print out the ticket and taking my card payment :|

again, they let me use fast track so i'd be on board in time

NA-Flyer

+1

mrtdxb

Emerson Lake and Palmer's classic song "Lucky Man" has you down to a tee!

tezzer

EK at manchester are excellent, they have done me, and members of my family travelling on my miles a whole load of favours, that they didn't have to !

CalFlyer

I think most of you are too harsh on the OP. If there is still a check-in line, I expect an airline to check in a passenger even if he is "late" (assuming that we are talking about the 60-min-before-departure deadline). I regularly arrive only 55 mins before departure in Dubai, and i have never been denied my BP.

Charging USD 400 for rebooking the outbound and NOT making sure that the return flight is rebooked is clearly the airline's fault. Most occasional travellers do not even know about the cancellation rule.

Dave Noble

Indeed; and costs incurred due to it are a reason for having travel insurance

Certain parts of the rambling seem strange

If booked on separate flights, why expect that staff in Tehran would put both passengers on the same flight. If wanting to make the voluntary change to be on the same flight, then would expect the passenger to pay for any calls needed. This sounds like an expense incurred of the OP's own making. If not prepared to travel separately , then why have the US reservations office do so

I only see one mistake in all of this in that the rebooking was not actioned correctly; the $400 change fee sounds like it was correct and the call from Tehran airport was a choice.

Dave Noble

I would not class that as a reasonable expectation. Asking if they can check the passenger in is fine, but not reasonable to expect that they will do so

YuropFlyer

I recently had some kind of "similar" (but in my case much more fortunate) situation. BKK-DXB-ZRH (return flight), the segment BKK-DXB got cancelled after they plane had an issue (we were in the plane, waiting for 2 hours till they cancelled it eventually, the treatment on the ground was very bad but never mind, that's not the issue here)

I got rebooked on the next flight, and due to 8 hours transit in DXB I still made the connection as the next flight left only 6 hours after the original schedule. I never had such a tight connection with a long connection baggage tag for sure

Anyway, the miles for the flights never posted, even though the system knew I had them booked/flown/whatever (I could claim missing miles, they showed up but never got credited)

Called EK 2 weeks after the flights, the callcenter guy told me that I've never flown the DXB-ZRH leg. Emmmm, what? Seems that because somehow their system got crazy after cancelling the original BKK-DXB flight they never automatically realised to "protect" the second leg. I could board the flight regularely anyway, so the system itself didn't cancelled it, they just said I've never flown the segment (For whatever reasons, they thought I was still hanging around in DXB for 2 weeks.. probably they would have called immigration soon )

So, from my experience, it seems EK does have some issues with their system regarding re-booking of pax due to "different" situations. Which is what most say about EK, great in the air, crap on the ground in case anything goes wrong.

afhstingray

yes, very lucky indeed. especially since one of the two flights i missed, the guy at the counter in MAN said "the next available flight is in 4 weeks time"

i was like

then he said "what passport do you have?"

me: "Malaysian"

EK: "well manchester-dubai is fine, you can standby in dubai if you like"
@:-)@:-)@:-)@:-) "i'll take it"

thankfully, some flights were delayed and some poor folks missed their connection, and i managed to get on the next flight from DXB to SIN. What a relief. No need to camp out (at that time i was a poor student and missed silver, so no lounge )


i wonder if service in manchester is better because it looks like the main emirates office in the uk?

GigoloArt

Not so long ago, I overslept and missed my first flight ever in my life. It was from DXB to a European destination. I was late, and this was totally my fault. I cannot blame it on traffic, car break down, iphone alarm glitch or whatever.

As this was the morning flight, there was a 2nd flight in the afternoon. I approached the supervisor (T3) and told her about the situation. I knew that there was a 150 EUR penalty for no-show/ changing flights.

End of story, she took great care of me, explained me that the 2nd flight was overbooked but I was on waitlist. Once the checkin closed, she called me over and confirmed my Y seat. I didn't have to pay the penalty and I was upgraded to J too.

What I want to say is that it also goes back to how you approach another human being. I knew I was wrong and I admitted it and I kindly asked whether she was able to help me.

afhstingray

yes, mutual respect is something i am a firm believer in. and like they say, if you sh*t on the way up the ladder, you'll get sh*t on yourself if you ever go down the ladder....

one of the reasons when i interview new employees for my company i always watch closely how they treat receptionists, waitresses, etc.

pennywern

I can't agree more. Be nice to the people who control your fate. Be understanding of the pressure and rules they work under, and you'll be surprised again and again how far people will go for you.

People are often telling me I'm "lucky" because I get upgraded a lot and always seem to squeak by even when I'm late for a flight. Luck has nothing to do with it. I have worked service jobs in the past and I know exactly what it's like to have customers screaming at you. So I try to be the person who injects some calm and maybe a smile into their day; it works wonders, and it makes me less stressed out as well.

GigoloArt

Yup, you put my words in colors. Any customer deserves the service she paid for and counterparts on the corp side will act upon the "rules". However, us getting people intrinsically running the extra mile for you, is the difference.

Culture Guru

Interesting first (and only post) on FT.

if OP wanted some guidance from FT, he would have followed up his post. I see that fo the past 5 days since OP posted he/she never followed it up!

DYKWIA

I was going to reply with OPW as soon as I read the post, but then remembered my New Years Resolution was to be nicer to people.