We recently travelled with Viking airlines from Manchester to Sharm el Sheikh. We had never heard of them and preumed they were just a low cost airline. I have to say we were less than impressed with them our return flight was delayed7 hours and the service was terrible.
When we arrived at the airport to return home to Manchester we saw our flight was delayed on the screens. There was very little information given to us, no rep or explanation of why there was a delay. There was also a Viking flight to Gatwick which was delayed. We were told to wait in the reception area and were not able to check our cases in for 3 hours due to the delay. This was frustrating as there were two flight loads of people waiting already and more arriving with not enough space for everyone. Nobody explained why there was a delay and at 11.00pm when our flight was due to leave it became clear that it was not our flight which was delayed but Gatwicks flight as there was a problem with the plane and it had not yet left Gatwick.
The most infuriating aspect of this ordeal was when we were told that Viking were changing the flights allowing the passengers going to Gatwick to take our plane which left us delayed for 7 hours and waiting for the next plane for 9 hours!. I thought this was completely out of order and disgusting that as a company Viking decided to swap flights messing about with peoples plans, purely to suit there own company needs. We were told by a member of airport staff that the company is based at Gatwick and it is harder to obtain airspace so this was the reason for the changes made. This is unacceptable and does not represent an airline that puts it's customers first. When we did finally board our flight we were unhappy with the lack of apologies from the staff and pilot for the extreme unnecessary delays. There was no complimetary drink or apologies! The pilot tried to insult the passengers by blaming the problems on 'bad weather conditions' i mean really it was 28c in England we may have been abroad we were not on the moon! This just added insult to injury and his attempt to cover up a technical problem with the plane only made people more angry. During the flight we reported to a member of staff that we were cold twice. The member of staff stated that she had informed the pilot who controls the air conditioning. The temperature remained the same throughout the flight. The staff came round with blankets charging £6.50 but these had run out by the time they got half way up the plane. When we finally arrived at Manchester we were delayed a further 30 minutes due to a problem with the steps? i mean come on how many planes land everyday and they cant attach the steps to a plane? We had family members waiting for us who had not been informed of the flight changes online only by our communication. The car parking costs were £7.50, but this was not the problem what was so herrendous was the sheer lack of consideration to the passengers and commincation to keep us up to date or truthfully informed of the delays. What made it worse was that we were delayed on the outbound flight for 1 hour due to missing our airspace, this appeared to be just due to bad time management as we boarded the plane late. I would definitley not travel with Viking again and will make sure my friends Know not to either, its just a shame because we had a good holiday but felt this spoilt the end of it really. The trip was very frustrating and tiring and a disapointing end to an otherwise enjoyable holiday!
