Passenger inconvenience again, this time it’s Etihad

Mumbai: In another case of passenger inconvenience, an old couple who flew from New York to Mumbai via Abu Dhabi on Etihad Airways have complained to the airline that they were forced to spend almost 14 hours at New York’s John F Kennedy (JFK) airport without any help from the airline’s ground staff.
The incident follows two earlier instances this month wherein two different sets of passengers alleged Air France of racial bias. While this incident was apparently not a case of racial bias, the elderly couple — C V Rajagopalan (64) and his wife — were also forced to spend unnecessary hours at a foreign airport. The reason attributed was rescheduling of the flight, about which they was not informed. While Rajagopalan is diabetic, his wife suffers from hypertension.
According to Rajagopalan, they had flown in from Raleigh early on May 18 to reach the New York airport on time to catch a Etihad flight to India, departing at 10.50 am. They left their residence at 3 am, but once they reached New York airport they got to know that this flight had been rescheduled to 10.50 pm. “We had to wait for nearly 14 hours at New York airport. Both of us are senior citizens and we had to wait without any proper food as both of us are vegetarians,” Rajagopalan said.
“It is very surprising that such a reputed airline made no efforts to inform them of the change in schedules despite giving all the contact numbers and e-mail address to them. Also then, what is the use of giving phone numbers and contact addresses,” said Venkatesh Srinivasan, their son-in-law.
31/05/09 Shashank Shekhar/Indian Express

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Categories: Foreign May 2009