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Bad Customer Service Experience: Am I in the Wrong?

Bad Customer Service Experience: Am I in the Wrong?

Old Feb 1, 2018, 7:35 pm
  #91  
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Originally Posted by Xlr
All they had to do was rebook OP on the next flight and call it a day. Instead, they had to argue and waste everyone's time.

I don't know if this the culture in the company, or if these rebooking agents have specific incentives (how would they be measured in situations like this?), or something else, but I've had to deal with this thing once and it was a terribly stressful experience when jetlagged.

I hope they didn't cancel your return flight lol.
Bingo!

This is exactly what it comes down to, and empowering front line employees to be able to make those decisions. I am not sure if it a cultural thing, or a corporate cultural thing. In any event its a terrible habit.

The fact also that the reservations agent who was going to rebook me cant even make a call to one of their partners, and made me use my personal cellphone also says a lot about the company. How does an enormous airline at their own hub have no way for employees to contact their very own partners? Its almost laughable.

It was a one way, and apparently since its AS issued, they can do whatever they want to the ticket. Having it issued, and purchased with Alaska was actually my saving grace.

Also knowing for next time that I should just call AS to begin with is a good lesson to be had. Because even though EK can obviously put me on their own metal its a game with them of absolute correctness, and as in this time there is no time to play blame game.

Last edited by ASismyfav; Feb 1, 2018 at 7:44 pm
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Old Feb 1, 2018, 8:31 pm
  #92  
 
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Originally Posted by kb9522
Whether or not it was EK's fault is the only thing that matters here.
WRONG! Fault doesn't have to be in EK's court for them to be responsible for re-accomodation.

Originally Posted by kb9522
And do you know that not all pssengers made it? Or are you blindly speculating because you want the airline to be wrong as badly as OP does?
I, for certain, know that not all passengers made it. OP was a passenger and he didn't make it.

Originally Posted by kb9522
Those cases are not even remotely similar to this one.
The cases don't need to be similar. You made the blanket statement in regards to EK:

Originally Posted by kb9522
Something completely outside of their control happened. They are simply not responsible.
The cases I pointed out show that EK certainly is responsible in many cases where things are completely outside of their control. Why don't you point out in the COC where it shows EK only has a responsibility to delivery their customers to the tarmac, it is a reasonable expectation that the transportation from JFK to DXB ins't complete until the passenger is delivered to the terminal.

Originally Posted by kb9522
Ten people made the connection just fine, that OP found himself in a circumstance where he did not was entirely his own doing. And before you go ballastic, note that I said OP finding himself in the circumstance was his own doing - not the circumstance itself.
And if he got on the F bus and that was the bus that got stuck from the accident, but the J bus made it just fine, what then? EK would have told him that many others made the connection just fine and he is a no-show. Same difference.

Originally Posted by kb9522
Bottom line, OP made a series of poor choices. He should accept responsibility for his actions and move on having learned a corresponding series of good lessons.
Absolutely disagree. OP made a series of choices that randomly led to this outcome. None of them poor. Had he been seated in J the outcome would have been exactly the same without making any of the "poor" decisions you claim he made.

Last edited by whimike; Feb 1, 2018 at 8:38 pm
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Old Feb 1, 2018, 11:20 pm
  #93  
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Originally Posted by kb9522

Bottom line, OP made a series of poor choices. He should accept responsibility for his actions and move on having learned a corresponding series of good lessons.
OP made a valid booking which EK were prepared to sell be it for cash or miles.
OP done something at the end of a long flight that thousands of people do all over the world every day by going to the toilet.
OP got on the first available bus to take him to the terminal - no one on this forum can disprove the OPs claim of no signage.
OP got stuck on his bus for 40 minutes due to an airside RTC through no fault of his own or the bus driver. Dubai airport police were controlling this.
OP did not see a gate for his connecting flight on the IFE before landing therefore had to find out on arrival the terminal. The IFE does not always display connecting flight information. I have had that on a couple of flights.

Where OP did go wrong was expecting to be put on the next flight when discovering he had missed his original flight. Most of us are aware that if the airline is going to be liable then it will generally be the next available flight with seats available.

There were risk factors due to tight but perfectly legal connection and in an ideal world, every airport would have enough contact gates where passengers can disembark directly into the terminal but we do not live in an ideal world so EK do the best they can with connecting passengers if they have to use an off terminal parking stand which can lead to a tight but legal connection even tighter when things go smoothly. There is no way of telling if this is going to happen when tickets are purchased.

With regards to the other 10, DXB has a labrynth of airside roads. Whos to say that the buses leaving after the one the OP was on were not warned of the RTC and therefore took a different route to the terminal getting those 10 there in time?

So with that, I disagree that the bottom line was that OP made poor choices. More a victim of an unfortunate incident outwith the OPs control.

I will reiterate again that we are only hearing one side of the story and unless someone else comes onto the forum to either corroborate or denounce the OPs claims through fact, then it should be taken at face value without apportioning blame immediately on the OP from the word go.

Poor choices - No. A risk the OP was willing to take through the willingness of EK to sell the ticket - something he felt confident enough with, as do thousands of other travellers every day.

And once again I will point out that this is a generally friendly forum that could be doing without the sniping, apportioning blame from the off set and forensic dissection of posts to find the least bit of fault and continuous repetition of that point (in contravention of Flyertalk Rule 12.3-Disruptive or Repetitive Posting).

Any one one of us found to be in a similar situation could find emotions running high and posts may not be as clear as they could be.

But one thing I will agree on is that OP should move on from this and await any reply from EK Customer Services.

Peace & Love

S
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Old Feb 2, 2018, 9:18 am
  #94  
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I just want to post that Im not mad. I dont have high blood pressure. I dont wish Emirates any harm.

But I would like to attempt to change the way EK does business, highlight certain problems, and this attitude from DXB EK airport service agents and supervisors of apathy. No customer should ever be treated the way I was. And I dont say that in an angry, vindictive way.
I shall await the customer Service response from EK and well see.
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Old Feb 2, 2018, 11:37 am
  #95  
 
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Originally Posted by ASismyfav
I just want to post that Im not mad. I dont have high blood pressure. I dont wish Emirates any harm.

But I would like to attempt to change the way EK does business, highlight certain problems, and this attitude from DXB EK airport service agents and supervisors of apathy. No customer should ever be treated the way I was. And I dont say that in an angry, vindictive way.
I shall await the customer Service response from EK and well see.
And please let us know the outcome of this (or not) !
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Old Feb 2, 2018, 4:37 pm
  #96  
 
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Usually, EK handles very well short connections or missed connections.
But, the involuntary no-show on a reward ticket is probably not in the manual, and EK customer care at DXB is not good in general. They go by the book and sometimes they don't even respect the law.
That's the way it is, and I don't expect it to change.
OP can write to DOT if he wants. Good for us all here if it leads to some improvements.


Now, concerning the many passionate exchanges here.
As OP's title is a question "am I in the wrong ?", he has to accept No but also Yes. As we don't have all the facts, answers can only be partial and subjective.
I guess that there were some emotional reactions due to OP's racial prejudice, and maybe, some sensed that this bias may have influenced his talk and worsened EK supervisors' poor performance.
Nobody can tell for sure. Unfortunately, NatGeo cameras were not there to record the moment.


Anyway, this raises questions :
> F bus leaves without verifying that all F pax have boarded the bus ?!? I remember that last time (last month), EK staff was verifying. It doesn't take long to count up to 14 ...
> A traffic accident can block a bus filled with pax for 40 minutes ?!? EK doesn't have alternate routes or replacement buses ?!? Does EK accept that these poor fellows miss their connections ?!?




Just my two-fils.
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Old Feb 2, 2018, 5:53 pm
  #97  
 
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Originally Posted by ASismyfav
I just want to post that I’m not mad. I don’t have high blood pressure. I don’t wish Emirates any harm.

But I would like to attempt to change the way EK does business, highlight certain problems, and this attitude from DXB EK airport service agents and supervisors of apathy. No customer should ever be treated the way I was. And I don’t say that in an angry, vindictive way.
I shall await the customer Service response from EK and we’ll see.


Unfortunately, I think it will take a long time, if ever, for anything to change. The abysmal customer service, following rules to the exact T without any ability to make a sensible varying decision, is not an EK issue alone, it is pervasive throughout the entire region (at least for airlines). I love flying the ME3 in the air, I dread having to deal with ANY issues on the ground. It really seems as if the airlines see their workers as pawns that lack the capability of making sensible decisions, they don't give them any ability do to anything other than follow very specific instructions/rules without even the slightest variation. I recall the one time I got EK to bend their rules, it took me going about 5 levels up the chain of command to an Emirati manager and took nearly 10 days.

As much as we all like to hate on the US carriers (and for many good reasons), their employees being empowered to make sensible decisions is something I no longer take for granted. If we could combine this with the quality of the EK product, it would be an amazing airline.
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Old Feb 2, 2018, 7:04 pm
  #98  
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Originally Posted by whimike


Unfortunately, I think it will take a long time, if ever, for anything to change. The abysmal customer service, following rules to the exact T without any ability to make a sensible varying decision, is not an EK issue alone, it is pervasive throughout the entire region (at least for airlines).
Conversely, I would view consistently applying policy according to the rules is pretty much the definition od good service

I class inconsistent approaches to be really bad and simply favour those that play agent roulette and keep whining until they get an agent that will ignore policies/rules
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Old Feb 3, 2018, 9:32 am
  #99  
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Originally Posted by Dave Noble
Conversely, I would view consistently applying policy according to the rules is pretty much the definition od good service

I class inconsistent approaches to be really bad and simply favour those that play agent roulette and keep whining until they get an agent that will ignore policies/rules
Yes, but airline travel, and getting people from terminal to terminal, and plane to plane is not something that can be consistent. Accidents occur, diversions happen, incidents beyond anyones control happen. Life is complicated.

Thats why front line employees need leeway to make sensible decisions for passengers based on facts and unplanned misconnections, or incidents cannot be something you apply consistency to.

I would urge people on here who think EK ground staff do a good job when things go wrong on the ground (like in my case) to read From Worst to First by Gordon Bethune. EK upper management would do themselves a lot of good by reading it, implementing it, and giving a copy out to everyone of their ground staff members.
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Old Feb 3, 2018, 11:28 am
  #100  
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Originally Posted by ASismyfav


Yes, but airline travel, and getting people from terminal to terminal, and plane to plane is not something that can be “consistent.” Accidents occur, diversions happen, incidents beyond anyone’s control happen. Life is complicated.

That’s why front line employees need leeway to make sensible decisions for passengers based on facts and unplanned misconnections, or incidents cannot be something you apply “consistency” to.

I would urge people on here who think EK ground staff do a good job when things go wrong on the ground (like in my case) to read “From Worst to First” by Gordon Bethune. EK upper management would do themselves a lot of good by reading it, implementing it, and giving a copy out to everyone of their ground staff members.
Of course there can be consistncy and there should be consistency.

If event A is something for which compensation is determined not to be payable, then all agentd should decline to give compensation
If event B is something for which compensation of a particular levl should be paid, then that is what should be paid

With a consistent approach, all get treated equally, not based on luck of agent connected to or by whining hard enough to as many agents as possible

You missed the flight and when it was found that you booked through an agent, you were quite correctly referred back to the agent. If you had booked with Emirates, then Emirate's ticketing staff would have dealt with it
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Old Feb 5, 2018, 5:48 am
  #101  
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Originally Posted by Dave Noble
Of course there can be consistncy and there should be consistency.

If event A is something for which compensation is determined not to be payable, then all agentd should decline to give compensation
If event B is something for which compensation of a particular levl should be paid, then that is what should be paid.

With a consistent approach, all get treated equally, not based on luck of agent connected to or by whining hard enough to as many agents as possible

You missed the flight and when it was found that you booked through an agent, you were quite correctly referred back to the agent. If you had booked with Emirates, then Emirate's ticketing staff would have dealt with it
First off I did not miss the flight. I had DXB-MEL with a misconnect, and they refused to put me on the hour later flights of DXB-MEL or DXB-AKL-MEL. Im not god, and I cannot control accidents, unfortunately. I would not be getting something Im not entitled to. I held a valid ticket for travel on this route. The ticket remained valid, despite EK supervisors making a decision solely based on money, and not Customer Service.

Second off I was not found that l booked through an agent, and were quite correctly referred back to the agent. immediately who I booked with. Immediately? No. Had that happened I could have gotten Alaska to get me on those flights. I learned an important lesson. Your statement is absurd. Did you totally miss the part where the supervisor kept me there screaming and arguing with me while all the flights I couldve gotten on left? Id at least of had some respect for Emirates if they said we cant (dont want to) help you call Alaska from the beginning. But it was more important for EK supervisor to yell and argue with me.

The supervisor argued with me until all flights possible had taken off . So there was nothing immediate about any of this.
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Old Feb 5, 2018, 5:51 am
  #102  
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Originally Posted by whimike


Unfortunately, I think it will take a long time, if ever, for anything to change. The abysmal customer service, following rules to the exact T without any ability to make a sensible varying decision, is not an EK issue alone, it is pervasive throughout the entire region (at least for airlines). I love flying the ME3 in the air, I dread having to deal with ANY issues on the ground. It really seems as if the airlines see their workers as pawns that lack the capability of making sensible decisions, they don't give them any ability do to anything other than follow very specific instructions/rules without even the slightest variation. I recall the one time I got EK to bend their rules, it took me going about 5 levels up the chain of command to an Emirati manager and took nearly 10 days.

As much as we all like to hate on the US carriers (and for many good reasons), their employees being empowered to make sensible decisions is something I no longer take for granted. If we could combine this with the quality of the EK product, it would be an amazing airline.
Why are airport ground staff so rigid and unaccomadating in ME3?
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Old Feb 5, 2018, 6:07 am
  #103  
 
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Originally Posted by ASismyfav
Why are airport ground staff so rigid and unaccomadating in ME3?
A possible theory is that in places where corruption is rife, strict rules need to be put in place to try and prevent abuse - this is not just a Middle East issue.

Some would encourage them to change, but would we also want them to adopt all the western practices that annoy us in our home countries? Sometimes you've got to take the "bad" with the "good".
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Old Feb 5, 2018, 6:44 am
  #104  
 
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Originally Posted by whimike
Unfortunately, I think it will take a long time, if ever, for anything to change. The abysmal customer service, following rules to the exact T without any ability to make a sensible varying decision, is not an EK issue alone, it is pervasive throughout the entire region (at least for airlines). I love flying the ME3 in the air, I dread having to deal with ANY issues on the ground.
Originally Posted by ASismyfav
Why are airport ground staff so rigid and unaccomadating in ME3?
I was not going to reply in this thread, but what you're saying here is of course utter BS. There are also stories about EK (or in general ME3 for that matter) ground staff that are going above and beyond call of duty to help people out and just because you had a bad experience once or twice doesn't mean the "ground staff in ME3 are rigid and unaccommodating" or that there is a "pervasive issue throughout the entire region (for airlines)". I don't think there is any evidence (other than anecdotal) to support the claim that ME3 staff are somehow more rigid and unaccommodating then anywhere else in the world, but if someone can point me to a report/hard evidence I'm happy to change my mind.
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Old Feb 5, 2018, 7:31 am
  #105  
 
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I think this horse is dead.
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