I had never been disappointed with Etihad Airways in the past– at least not in the 2x (or is it 3x) that I’ve taken the airline to Europe. This trip however was a complete disappointment and will perhaps be a reason why I’d not prioritize Etihad when I plan for my family’s European vacation with CV Travel. CV Travel always recommends Emirates but unfortunately Emirates didn’t have the right schedule for our planned arrival for this trip 🙁
My family who has always been my most generous sponsor for our Easter travels has once again booked me on a business class seat for our European trip– because if it were up to me, I’d book me in coach to save money ;D. Anyway so I was looking forward to this trip because it had been quite a busy week and the only time I will sleep is on the plane. My brother’s seat was behind me and he told me his seat wasn’t working. I knew he was way more tired than I was, so I gave him my seat, knowing he needs the sleep more than I. Besides I know if I am real sleepy, I will just conk out 🙂 I wasn’t so sleepy yet so I thought I’d give up my seat and just watch a few videos first and toy around with his chair’s settings. The flight attendant though had apologized for the seat problem and unfortunately they couldn’t do anything as the flight was really full. I decided I’ll try my luck and play with the chair in hopes whatever was stuck there would break free and get the chair to work again.
But this was not to be. I was on seat 10H and for the longest time, the chair just wouldn’t budge. It was not even reclining. At all. Normally I wouldn’t have bothered complaining anymore but my brother paid for a business class seat and I felt it was unfair that he paid for a seat that did not work– it was an 8 hour trip.
Needless to say, I had a hard time sleeping (try sleeping completely upright for 8 hours– even the economy class seats would recline!). When we landed in Abu Dhabi, I complained to the business class lounge desk and was asked to go online to their comment form where there’s a specific question about onboard seat comfort! I wouldn’t have any of it, (and yes I was still calm by the way) so I asked to speak to a supervisor about it. I would have at least appreciated if someone talked to us about it, about what they can do. My brother was very disappointed and he felt sorry that I stayed in his defective chair, but here’s the more important thing for me– he was the one who paid for my seat so I should give up mine for his broken one. And I want compensation back for him since it really doesn’t feel right to have paid that much for a seat that didn’t work.
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| Great legroom but the chair did not even recline |
I am not a very whiny person, but I ended up having complaints at Etihad. They couldn’t do a thing about the seat– they couldn’t move me anywhere because the flight was just too full. But I thought they’d at least get details of my brother for the seat problem and inform my brother that they’d get back to him about the problem as soon as they can. But no numbers were exchanged, no email addresses.
The supervisor from the business class lounge came and I told her of the problem. This time she made note of my email address and promised to get back to me on the matter as soon as possible, at the same time profusely apologizing for what had happened (really, it’s not any one person’s fault for the seat not to function). So that was the first leg of my trip.
And then came time for us to take our 2nd leg of the flight– from Abu Dhabi to Milan. I got to my chair, sat down, and guess what?!?!! The chair was WET!
I was disgusted. I did not even want to know what got the chair wet. The purser came over to see the chair, touched the wet spot, and smelled her hand after. She tells me initially that the chair did not feel wet. Then she said after a second touch that the wet spot did not smell “strange” anyway. I on the other hand, told her in a nice way *while fighting the urge to freak out– hello, air rage… wait, we were still on the ground… ground rage haha* that whatever that liquid is, I really don’t want to know and don’t care. Bottom line, I don’t want to sit on it for another 7 hour trip. Alas, business class was again, full. But the First Class section was not. I told her of the previous incident, about how I had no sleep at all in a business class seat that did not recline, and now I have to sit in a wet seat! *shudders*.
The purser though slightly apologetic, did not really seem to find any issue with the wet seat and just had the flight attendant put a blanket over it. *Sigh*, this got more frustrating. Again, I doubt they’d have any onboard authority to upgrade anyone (I could be wrong here), but knowing what I had just gone through, as a purser I’d probably have offered some other kind of compensation for what had happened. It was the flight attendant named Adrienne who was actually more sympathetic and more apologetic, coming to check in on me often.
So that’s my Etihad experience this time. Since I had already turned over all my contact details, I am just waiting for their response on how they will compensate us for the amount that was paid for business class seats. Bottom line, we are all so disappointed with Etihad Airways and I hope there is still a way for them to redeem themselves. I have over 50,000 airline miles with them to date and would hate not to use them again. But if they had won the airline excellence award in 2009, perhaps they should perform service checks on all their airlines to make sure they won’t be letting other passengers who pay premium prices for premium quality chairs to suffer the same experience I did.
I guess I should still be thankful we all got to Milan in one piece *bumpy ride too eeps!* 🙂 I am currently in Montecatini for an overnight stay, and will blog again in a bit— this time about something more pleasant– about FOOD 🙂
x
TheBagHag