[phamilyman]

Just as a comparison - Malaysian cancelled their Sunday Delhi-KL flight due to a technical glitch. Here's what my colleague told me.
First there was a delay of 2.5 hours as they tried to recover the situation, ultimately canceling it as it needed parts + mechanics to be flown in the morning from KL. Then they accomodated ~15-20 onward passengers who had urgent needs (mostly folks with single day business meetings, who had to fly back asap).
After that it took ~5 staffers (MH+ground handler) all of 3 hours for all the formalities for the remaining ~250 odd people (including a quick meal), pack them into buses and send them to Radisson Blu Dwarka (business class pax went to Meredien), while some went home.

Net result - passengers only grumbled they could've had a better meal / hotel, no one felt shafted by the airline. It didn't make the news (another AI flight cancellation did!!).

Contrasting this with what AF did at their hub (where they are totally in control) - the difference is stark. And mind you, MH is no great shakes for service quality either!!

[k_ajay]

What Air France did can be called racist or differential treatment (depending on how one wants to term it) but I see from some comments that we're being racist towards our own people. That's far more concerning and troubling than what Air France is doing to us.

[roy_libran]

Originally Posted by k_ajay

but I see from some comments that we're being racist towards our own people

It takes a certain level of self-awareness, realization and courage to criticize one's self, or as in this case, criticizing ourselves as a people. That is hardly racist!
Air France's behavior certainly is!

[k_ajay]

Originally Posted by roy_libran

It takes a certain level of self-awareness, realization and courage to criticize one's self, or as in this case, criticizing ourselves as a people. That is hardly racist!
Air France's behavior certainly is!

Thank you for your comment. I'm well aware of the difference between self-awareness, capability to criticize oneself and being racist. If you noticed, I mentioned 'some' comments where clearly, the text shows that the comment is racist (someone can fly vs someone shouldn't fly and all that) and i'm not going to point them all out for avoiding a verbal war here and i've had enough of them already..

But feel free to ignore if you think no such post exists in this thread.

[roy_libran]

Originally Posted by k_ajay

But feel free to ignore if you think no such post exists in this thread.

Unfortunately some such posts do exist on this thread. :(
However, in my opinion, they take one away from the real subject of discussion here, and hence I'd choose not to give them much importance.
What is more important for me though, is that we display the ability to criticize ourselves. That is very good, a first step of sorts.


BTW - Has anyone recently flown Air France here? Is there any perceptible change in the attitudes and behavior of all customer facing staff after this very public dressing down?

[Jeroen]

Originally Posted by roy_libran

BTW - Has anyone recently flown Air France here? Is there any perceptible change in the attitudes and behavior of all customer facing staff after this very public dressing down?

There are various carrier I try to avoid at all cost, Air France being one of them. KLM is ok and in fact has improved over the last years as far as I can tell and I fly them at least 4-5 times a year internationally.

Whether AirFrance are racist or not, I won't comment, but as an airline they absolute, totally suck and I would strongly recommend to anybody to avoid them like the proverbial plague. There are worse airlines, but not by much.

Jeroen

[mobike008]

I had one experience with KLM way back in 2006 and do tend to agree that they are not a friendly airline but, didnt have a bad experience with them.

My mom used to fly with them once a year till about 2 years back they stopped the direct service from Hyd to USA and she always enjoyed their service but echoes my thoughts that they are not friendly but, just courteous and keep their distance. It could be their culture that they are firm, polite and curt which most of us indians can mistake as impolite or unfriendly.

I was flying Hyd-Amst-Bos. At Amsterdam, we changed over to their American counterpart (North West) and just before take-off to Boston, we had a bomb scare at Amsterdam airport. Their were airplane staff and security folks who came into the plane in hordes (mostly american) along with their sniffer dogs were downright rude. They singled out a black man and deplaned him by behaving really unpleasantly with him without even knowing if he was guilty of any misdemeanour.

Anyways, coming back to the attitude of the staff, An indian passeger sitting next to me was raising his arm and asking the steward " Coke, Coke" in quintessential indian style.

The male steward came towards him and said, you forgot to say "Please". "I will not give you a coke till you say it"

I thought that was rude. Well, the indian guy was not exactly right by not saying please but, american's attitude was plain hostile.

[Gansan]

So why not travel our national carrier wherever possible? Even if something happens one can have a cozy fight with the crew and feel comfortable!

Recently there was an issue on FB about announcements on our planes (in Internal routes) being made only in English and Hindi, and why not also in the regional language of the destination where it was going.

I once travelled from Tuticorin to Chennai by air. The cabin crew gave the safety instructions and life jacket demo in English and Hindi. I am sure half the crowd inside that plane never understood a word of it! Ridiculous!

[roy_libran]

Originally Posted by Gansan

So why not travel our national carrier wherever possible?

Totally FOR this idea if only the national carrier can fly their planes between two locations without panels and other bits falling off.

[mnrvokk]

Originally Posted by Gansan

So why not travel our national carrier wherever possible? Even if something happens one can have a cozy fight with the crew and feel comfortable!

Recently there was an issue on FB about announcements on our planes (in Internal routes) being made only in English and Hindi, and why not also in the regional language of the destination where it was going.

I once travelled from Tuticorin to Chennai by air. The cabin crew gave the safety instructions and life jacket demo in English and Hindi. I am sure half the crowd inside that plane never understood a word of it! Ridiculous!

Well the cozy attitudes of our national carrier is as bad or worse compared to the European air carriers. I actively try to avoid Air India as much as possible but when I cannot, I have always had bad experiences on each and every flight with them.

As far as the security announcements in regional languages go, I don't think it is feasible to have flight attendants provide the same in 3 languages in the time it takes the aircraft to taxi from the gate to the runway since most of our airports aren't crowded not to mention the cost the airlines have to incur in training, scheduling right people based on destinations and having to print these out in numerous languages.

There is a reason these instructions come with pictures!!

[Jeroen]

Originally Posted by mnrvokk

Well the cozy attitudes of our national carrier is as bad or worse compared to the European air carriers. I actively try to avoid Air India as much as possible but when I cannot, I have always had bad experiences on each and every flight with them.

!

I agree! No offense, but I have found them worse then AirFrance. In addition, there are a whole host of other concern on how Air India is run. I just dont consider them a professional run business in any parts of their operations.

http://www.deccanherald.com/content/...-its-like.html

[Chetan_Rao]

Air India beats most European 'snobbish' airlines hands down on all counts: bad service, discourteous staff, badly maintained planes, you name it.

Flew with them just once (multiple sectors), and they held up the plane an hour for a last-minute VIP (read freeloader politician) customer, and moved a few customers around to make space for his entourage. Politicians are probably the only satisfied Air India customers.

I wouldn't fly with them again if they offered a free ride.

[kvish]

Having flown 6-7 international carriers, Air France was by far the worse. Everything right from the airport to the flight and everything else was marred with issues. I would hesitate to fly them again.

PS: Flew Kingfisher to London during the good old days. Still stays in memory! By far best service!

[Raj1008]

I am just curious to know if an Indian origin person holding a European or American passport was there and if treated shoddy as well?

[Jeroen]

Originally Posted by Raj1008

I am just curious to know if an Indian origin person holding a European or American passport was there and if treated shoddy as well?

Would be interesting to hear in this particular case. As I stated earlier, my experience with AirFrance is they treat everybody equally shoddy, no matter who you are or what you look like.

Jeroen