"Utter Indifference" of Emirates in DXB
 

I've been getting phone calls from people stuck at DXB on route from Manchester to Colombo, with Emirates.

The cause of the initial 3.5 hour delay out of MAN was fog; not the airline's fault, as all know, and the missed connections was the result of that delay.

The problem is what happened next. There were somewhere around 45 - 60 passengers connecting to Colombo. They have been penned up for 6+++ hours airside at DXB, no information apart from a series of idiotic and failed promises of replacement aircraft today, tomorrow, whatever lie comes to mind. No refreshments, talk of a cheap hotel way out in the desert, but no more than talk, until seats can be found, yimkin 31st Dec, yimkin 2nd, yimkin 3rd January, who knows, who cares?

This kind of situation is the real test of an airline, and Emirates are failing spectacularly, once again. Even at their home base they appear to be incapable of organising reasonable care of stranded and distressed passengers, who evidently include babies and children.

Advice on who to contact that I can pass on would be invaluable; does anyone have any suggestions? Phone number of a senior customer service manager, lurking somewhere in a well-appointed office, maybe?

The comment that the thread title repeats is this; "What is so unbelievable is the utter indifference of all the staff who have so far deigned to appear at all to talk to us".

Being stuck in DXB airside is not the worst fate that can befall anyone - there are rest rooms, restaurants, bars, shops................ better there than being trucked to some 2 star place outside TBH

These things happen and pretty much all airlines are the same in my experience - they'll get rid of you as soon as they can but don't expect any SERVICE

Hi Harry, part of the problem was that they were penned in a transit area with few if any facilities.....

Dave, thanks but at the time the situation needed more than a message to Emirates support; it needed the intervention of a senior person with some nous and clout to get things done.

That happened, it seems, and most, perhaps all of the group are expected to be on their way, in Sha' Allah, at 2.30 am tomorrow, ie early Friday morning. So a good recovery, in the end, and credit where credit is due.

But the fact remains that when the delayed flight eventually landed at Dubai it came as a complete surprise to the ground staff that there would be 65 people on board who would miss their Colombo flight.

This knowledge was available from about 60 minutes after the STD of the flight from Manchester, ie about 10 hours before the aircraft landed in Dubai.

Dear God, we did one hell of a lot better than this back in the 1970s, in another Gulf airline, using the relatively primitive computer-based systems we had at that time and, of course the Telex. We could and did usually have alternative arrangements in place for everyone whose connections were missed by a delayed incoming flight from Europe or the Far East, by the time the delayed flight landed.

Why can't airlines like Emirates get this right, 40 years later? Why can't they even try? What the hell is wrong with the Management, apart from stultifying complacency? They either know what's going wrong, and don't give a toss, or they don't know in the first place because they don't bother to look. Either way, I would have them on the fist flight out with zero pay-off, if I owned Emirates.

old, not bold, I may be completely wrong, but 40 years ago many airlines had their own motivated ground staff and a Station Manager. These days most airlines are at the mercy of a handling agency who basically don't care a toss as to what happens further down the line!

I had an excellent experience from another UAE based airline when it all went wrong in Manila. Fed and watered in departure lounge before flight was cancelled then off to an excellent hotel for 36 hours. Updated regularly for when flight was to depart and fed / watered etc. I was economy class only and have continued to use the same airline on this route.

The mark of a good airline is not always how well it gets you from A to B but how they react when it goes wrong especially when not at home base.

Perhaps a good old fashioned phone call to Emirates Support would have helped. Living in the modern computer based 21st Century people still have trouble communicating these days.

Hotel Tango, you are more or less right; at many line stations with most airlines there would have been at least a Station and/or District Manager, in one guise or another. But, except at their home base, most airlines purchased their ground handling from another airline (especially if pooled) or an agent.

But that's by the by; what counts is the airline's determination, or lack of it, to ensure that their customers get the best possible service, which means, in the case of delayed flights and missed connections, starting work on alternatives as soon as it becomes obvious that the problem is going to happen, not just doing SFA and reacting pathetically badly when confronted with a large group of tired, unhappy and distressed passengers becoming, understandably, increasingly irate at the connection airport. Who does this depends on how the airline runs things, but what the airline cannot escape is total responsibiity for making sure they or their contractors do it and do it well. Some manage this, as Paulc reminds us.

As for the case that triggered this thread, let us remember that this was Emirates/DNATA in action at their own home base! Thus no other parties involved. If they screw up so badly there, it takes little imagination to foresee how badly they will screw up when their passengers are in the hands of an agent where there is no Emirates representation.

Let's also remember that the agent's eagerness to go the extra mile might be tempered by Emirates'/DNATA's payment policy (yes, bitter experience!) to delay payments for months, then argue the toss on spurious grounds as a delaying tactic, and finally do nothing in the hope that the payee will give up. Perhaps their accountant trained with Ryanair.

It's why I asked if anyone could supply the number of a Customer Service manager. No-one did, perhaps because it's a closely guarded secret. You would need to believe in fairies to believe that simply calling Emirates Support call-centre, from a pen in DXB airside transit area, if you can find it's UAE number (wi-fi was allegedly not working properly), to ask for decent service now would achieve anything. (It's quite indicative that of the 4 topics they list for telephone support, each one is about something Emirates want to sell to you!)

Over the years I've missed connections in DXB on 2 occasions due to late arrivals. On both occasions Emirates couldn't get the passengers to hotels quick enough - reasonable hotels, 10 mins from the airport, all pretty decent really... In both cases I was delayed around 12-14 hrs.

Maybe times they are a-changing.

Why would calling a Senior manager do any good?

They know about the issue, they deal with misconnections on a daily basis for all sorts of the reasons. They will be in an office trying to work out how best to get 100s of people on thier way on what is still part of the busiest 2 weeks of the year for air travel and will then feed that information down to the front line agents. Just because a senior manager isn't there in the front line doesn't mean they aren't trying to fix the problem. I never gave out the numbers to such departments when I was on the front line. The last thing those people need is passengers harassing them when they are trying to shut out all external distractions and focus on rerouting 100s of people onto flights with no seats. It might not be the best experience, but someone will be working on these things and when such large numbers of people are involved patience, even several hours of it, is all that is needed. You can't just click your fingers and expect to get people moving when there has been massive disruption.

Sooner or later, when things are not being done as they should be done, it is pointless to speak to anyone except the organ-grinder. It does senior managers no harm whatsoever to talk to angry passengers after a system failure which could have been avoided by better management.

I repeat; the problem in DXB that I posted about was Emirates miserable failure to recognise and deal with the problem in good time, ie when it become known that the departure from Manchester would be so delayed that connections would be missed.

On my workstation in the UAE in 1976 I could call up on our relatively primitive CRS a list of all connecting passengers aboard an incoming flight and their next/ultimate destinations, and start the ball rolling to arrange alternative flights, hotels, transport etc before a delayed service landed. Here we are, 40 years later, and Emirates still have to learn how to do that. Call me unimpressed.

I'd like to see airlines rated on their record of dealing with problems of this nature. This is the airline industry and sh*t does happen from time to time. I recall, some years ago, travelling SIN-ZRH on SQ. which returned to SIN after shiputting down an engine somewhere over India. On arrival in SIN every passenger was given a letter that apologised for the delay and detailed the alternative arrangements that had been made on that passengers behalf. Some were rebooked onto a replacement flight, some on other flights (SQ and OAL), some with connecting flights etc.

Of course they did have a few hours to orchestrate this, but in my mind this is the gold standard. Spare no expense. Get the passengers to their destinations ASAP without any hassle. And this type of treatment should happen at every station, not just home base.

Edited to add: Seems as Airline Senior Executives are exempt from disruption. https://www.theguardian.com/business...t-not-for-long Interesting comment from QF spokesman that it is normal to cascade an irops problem through successive flights. While I suspect this was just a lie to justify bumping a First Class Passenger to keep the CEO happy, I certainly hope it isn't true.

At the airline I worked with many years ago there was a standing order that passengers took priority over all employees, particularly the CEO. In one case The CEO was behind the counter helping passengers reroute, not hiding in the lounge.

This isn't 1976. Yes, there are more flights, but there are also more people to move around and that is exacerbated at this time of year.

Having worked on the front line for several years in times of mass disruption, in this decade, during times of bad weather and various other reasons, I can assure you it's not easy to just accommodate 60 odd passengers be it at the airlines home base or an outstation. Those 60 odd passengers also seem to think they are the only people affected when in reality they are but a drop in the ocean. Of course EK knew they would misconnect but if there was physically no other flights to put them on or no hotels available then what can they do? The MAN flight was not the only affected flight, LON had fog that day, that's 6 loads of A380s with potentially disrupted passengers and that's before you even think about the LGW flights. Then you have other stations around the world feeding people into DXB many of which may be sending people late too. If you delay flights out of DXB to reasonably accommodate late inbound passengers then you also annoy a plane load of other passengers, many of whom may also have onward connections out of the next destination which EK would then be responsible for. You need to have a bit more of a sense of reality here. I fully sympathise with the passengers, but if there is nothing that can be done quickly then they also need to understand that. I sympathise more with the staff in the firing line though as it seems so many, even those in the industry are so quick to brand them as useless, hiding information or being deliberately difficult.

the normal problem with ANY transport disruption is the lack of information

The best I've seen in the last few years was last year when Eurostar had a person under a train at 11:00. By 11:30 they'd got a load of people out of their offices in St Pancras in yellow jackets, armed with I-pads roaming the station area.

They were actively approaching the punters, telling them it would be at least a 2 hour delay, telling where they could leave their luggage and passing out hot line numbers and the web address to rebook. The hot line worked brilliantly and when we got back at around 18:00 they were managing queues, helping people get their new tickets and passing out water etc.

All it takes is some planning some training AND THE RIGHT ATTITUDE

@edi_local
Tell the passengers what the current situation is? Arrange for food/refreshments to be available? In this case it appears, as far too often happens, there was a distinct lack of communication and advance planning. Whilst passengers will obviously not be happy at least they will have an initial briefing telling them the bad news and be told when the next update is likely to take place.


You make a good point about the amount of disrupted passengers funnelling into DXB but that's why Emirates should already have previously prepared a draft plan to deal with this type of problem. London airports suffering from bad weather during winter is not exactly unknown after all!

Just like Great Western railways you mean?

Every time they have "a person under" there is a total lack of info - all they need to say is "at least 2 hours delay" and we can all b***** off to Waterloo and use the slow line to Reading but do they do do it? Hell no........

The challenge here is that often the information being sought simply doesn't exist, or is changing.

You are sitting at a fog encrusted airport and your inbound aircraft has joined the queue to land. Fog worsens and a diversion is necessary. What was an known hour or two delay has become an indeterminate delay depending on the situation. Will the aircraft be able to refuel and continue? Will passengers be bused from/to the diverted airport. Are buses available, are bus drivers available? How the hell does the gate agent know the definitive answers before the people in the back room know them?

The necessity of having the lowest possible costs (and the highest executive bonuses) means that own or contracted staff simply do not exist to deal with the problems. Automation can help, but you always are going to need feet on the ground to deal properly. Better contingency planning, better simulations, better training and the recognition that customer satisfaction is more important than bonuses are all required.

Since that ain't gonna happen all of us SLF have to realise that the days of the airline getting you to your destination, at all costs, are gone forever.

Yes, but arguably with the exception of C or F class pax. I have had a number of good experiences with delayed and cancelled flights, but in all cases I was in C Class. Generally speaking the Y class pax are way further down the priority list.

I guess you get what you paid for!

recently I had to call Emirates to change something -

"you'll be lucky" was the general response of those working beside me in the office

Of course it was picked up on the second ring and fixed in 5 minutes...

Business Class has its advantages for sure.................

Oh dear, how depressing, I detect the authentic voice of today's industry; the words "they need to understand that" say it all.

Trust me, Edi Local, they do understand that. What they don't understand is how, with something like 8 hours notice that there would be a need to deal with the connecting passengers, Emirates spent about 8 hours doing precisely nothing to prepare for the arrival in DXB of 60 or so delayed passengers on the ex MAN flight, as well as, of course, delayed passengers on other flights as well. All the hotel, transfer and onward flight arrangements that were made eventually about 6 hours after their arrival could and should have been made before they landed. No-one on this thread mentioned "useless", "hiding information" or "deliberately difficult", as far as I know. It is a corporate failure on the part of Emirates (in this case) to foresee that such problems will occur, to have a well-developed plan to deal with it, and to train their staff to do it, not just a minor lapse by some staff.

It is blindingly obvious that this corporate failure results from a corporate lack of will.

The complete lack of any meaningful communication between ground staff and this group of 60 passengers is a symptom of the same corporate failure to make staff understand that in such circumstances the priority is to tell people what's happening, what you are doing, when things will happen, etc etc. If you have no information to pass on, then passengers must be told that.

Because corporate failure in one area of an airline usually extends to corporate failure in other areas where operational safety can be compromised, I have for many years maintained a position that there are no circumstances whatsoever in which I would buy a ticket on Emirates, and I think I'll stick to that.