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Letter to Gulf Air

03 Jan 2010 13:27 krr Dear Sir or Madam

Re: Complaint about Gulf Air - abysmal customer service

I am writing to inform you of our extreme dissatisfaction and disappointment with Gulf air and our travel Sunjet Travels (UK). Together you have managed to ruin our travel experience to our holiday destination in Mumbai. My mother purchased two return tickets with Gulf Air (London Heathrow – Mumbai) through the travel agent following a positive recommendation from the agent regarding your high standard of service. I attach the original flight confirmation details for your convenience. You will note that on this schedule there was to be a scheduled stop in Bahrain airport for approximately 4 hours during the outbound journey and a stop of approximately one hour on the return journey.

Some days before we were due to travel we learned from the company that the outbound journey would involve an extended stop of seven hours instead. While this was disappointing, we accepted the news accordingly. However, on the day of departure (9-7-08) and one hour before leaving for Heathrow we were contacted by Sunjet Travels to inform us of further disappointing news. You will see from the attached amended schedule, that due to a cancelled flight by Gulf Air, we would have to cut our holiday short and travel one day earlier at the ridiculous time of 7am from Mumbai (not including the reporting time at check at Mumbai international airport some four hours earlier). In addition to this inconvenience we were to be subjected to an extended 6 hour transit time in Bahrain also.

In Mumbai we went to the trouble of travelling to your office and spoke with a member of Gulf Air staff who arranged and confirmed a different connecting flight on 25th July leaving from Bahrain at 10.00am instead so that we would not have such an extended transit time. We were utterly dismayed that on the day the flight that was supposed to leave from Mumbai at 7.35am left at 9.00am instead so we missed the connecting flight from Bahrain and had to wait for the next flight – some six hours later.

Furthermore I think that the treatment we received at the hands of your customer service personnel has been totally substandard. We complained to our travel agent when she informed of the last minute change in our flight schedule (specifically the extended transit time in the inbound journey), and she promptly absolved herself of any responsibility by saying that all airline schedule changes were the responsibility of the airline and she was not in a position to help us at all. Admittedly she did not even advise us regarding contacting the Gulf Air office in Mumbai to request changing flights closer to the time of our return.

We were fed a similar story when we approached your “customer service” representative Ms Shamim Hussain at Heathrow. When we explained our situation she defensively passed the buck and advised us to “tell off” our travel agent. At no time was there any gesture of understanding or appreciation of our intense frustration. When we approached the Gulf Air desk in Bahrain during our first miserable transit, the lady at the desk appeared amused with our situation and after barking in loud Arabic to her neighbouring colleague told my mother that she should not be greedy for compensation despite any mention of the word. She however gave us a voucher for a free meal to be taken at the Sky restaurant. We received a similar gesture on our return journey when the flight was delayed and had to wait for a further extended transit in Bahrain. Just for your information: the food in the Sky restaurant served in these situations is presumably as a gesture of goodwill for inconvenienced customers. I have never had such awfully prepared and horrible food in all of my life and was like being slapped hard in the face for choosing to fly with Gulf. I thought this was a one off but the same was true of the ‘chicken’ dish served up on the return journey. Additionally my mother told the staff at this particular restaurant that she was vegetarian and was annoyed to be served sausages and eggs during the first meal and chicken curry on the second meal. The standards of your staff and customer service in Bahrain are truly incomprehensible.

Additionally my mother had requested a vegetarian meal through the travel agent and Gulf Air staff at Heathrow check in informed her that this was not he case but that she would rectify the matter. Needless to say that on the flight my mother had to expliain the situation again and was told that the vegetarian meals had finished. In flight staff were rude and unaccommodating and made us feel like nuisances, patronising us when they managed to bring a small plate of vegetarian food one hour after other fliers had eaten.

With regards to the changes in our flight schedules, i.e. the extended transit times, I can appreciate that occasionally certain unforeseeable changes to unavoidable. However, I think its is extremely poor that after we had paid money in good faith for selected flights with your company that we should have been so inconvenience; with both journeys. These journeys lengthened our travelling times uncomfortably – affecting the quality of our holiday eventually - and inconvenienced our relatives who had to make special trips to collect us at the different times.

Flying with Gulf Air has been like a punishment and I fail to see how you have any customers at all. Be assured that other customers we encountered on our transit stays had similar feelings but perhaps do not have the inclination to complain formally. I work in a very busy and demanding job but love to travel frequently and take my holiday time and comfort very seriously. Frankly speaking, I have never experienced this level of abysmal service with any other airline. Please forward this email and attachments to your President or feedback services as you see fit. I await your response.