Air Asia's cheap airfare comes with a price...

in the form of frustration and anger as a result of flight delay, costs of communication with airline, extra taxi fares, and to rub salt into injury, mention of an earlier delayed time to give the impression to other readers that the delay was reasonable, but more like avoiding compensation!

I believe those involved in public relations have been through courses teaching them how to deal with irate customers. Examples I would imagine are:
ignore them initially, if possible;
reply, but side-step the issue, if possible;
reply by softening their own faults, like an earlier time in the case of a long delay, to give the impression that they had not been that bad.

The following is an email from a dissatisfied Air Asia customer who got more annoyed as a result of their mention of an earlier time than the actual delayed time. Is this the way to handle such complaints? The airline had even avoided compensation in the form of E-Gift Voucher under their On Time Guarantee, by mentioning the shorter time of delay! How cheap can they be? Never crossed their mind that a satisfied customer could bring more business by word of mouth? Similarly, a dissatisfied customer could damage its reputation by spreading their rotten corporate culture. I believe Air Asia has got too arrogant with their success thus far, thinking bad publicity would never hurt them. Here goes the exchange of emails:

Is it possible to create a bigger fuss? I'm not reading well enough, but I quite clearly said that my flight was originally scheduled for 13.30pm and I waited till 18:45pm

Am I not reading correctly?

From: maa_otg@airasia.com
Date: Mon, 8 Nov 2010 19:09:08 +0800

Dear xxx,

Thank you for writing in to us.

Please be informed that AirAsia’s On Time Guarantee is subject to the following conditions:

a) Your flight is delayed by more than 2 hours from the scheduled time of flight departure.Scheduled time of flight departure means either:

i) the time printed on your itinerary; or
ii) any new scheduled flight departure time which we have advised you not less than 24 hours from the original scheduled time of flight departure on the flight itinerary.

b) The delay is caused by AirAsia but is not due to circumstances beyond our control such as bad weather, air traffic control, airport closure, strikes or acts of God.

c) For all flight commencing 16th June, 2008.

d) That you have checked-in and carried on with your journey despite the delay.

Therefore, we are sorry to inform you that you are not eligible for our E-Gift Voucher because, the delay for your flight was less than two(2) hours.

We hope we have provided a satisfactory explanation to your inquiry and we apologise for any inconvenience caused. We look forward to continue serve you better in future.

Thank you.
Best regards,
Suri
OTG Team


Dear xxx,

Greetings from Air Asia.

Pertaining to your request, please be advised that your case is being looked into and we're in the midst of resolving it. We will revert to you with an update soonest possible.

We do apologise for the inconvenience caused and thank you for choosing AirAsia.


Thank you.
Best regards,
Suri
OTG Team

SystemFeedbackID: 33943
First Name: xxx
Last Name: xxx
Personal E-mail: xxx
Mobile Phone: xxx
Home Phone: xxx
Booking No.: P97H5Q
Carrier Code: AK
Flight No.: 750
Flight Date: 21 Oct 2010
Flight Time: 18:45:00

I would like to make an official complaint. My original schedule from KUL to BKK was on 21 Oct 2010, 13.30pm. As usual, I did the online check in, reached the airport at 12pm to meet up with friends who came from Ipoh. 12.30pm - was told that we had to re-check in, as some of them just found out moments earlier and had done so.

Here comes the complaints:
1. I was told my flight was cancelled.
2. I re-checked my online details and my details are up to date, yet there was no sms to update unlike previous flight delays I received while in BKK February 2008.
3. All my friends who were 10 minutes earlier managed to change to 15:30pm flight.
4. I got changed to 1845pm.
5. My girlfriend called premium line, cost 1.95/minute - roughly 11 minutes, RM20 but there was no conclusion only to send an email and the person didn't give their name.
6. It was only after making a comment on the AirAsia facebook website did she receive a note to make the complain here.
7. I complained to manager but manager on duty didn't give any indication of compensation only compensation for seat booking (pre-booked).
8. I was told that if I write in I should be able to claim some form of compensation.
9. I had to fork out extra taxi fares because of being split from my friends.
10. Eventually on my friends' 15:30pm flight there were empty seats. I noticed at the departure lounge there were giving last call and explained my situation to them, but they just responded the flight was full.



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