[Resolved]  Indigo Airlines — the worst customer care

Good morning,

We are contacting you because we would like to let you know something that happened to us in Delhi's airport the last 3rd of March. We believe that it is important that you know this information and that you help us to avoid this kind of situations to possible future passengers.

We went to do the check in for our flight 6E1701 departing from Delhi the 4th of March at 01h50 with Indigo Airlines. The counters opened the 3rd of March at 21h30 and by that time we were the first people on the queue to do the check in. We were four friends traveling all together but we had bought the tickets in separate sets of two so when we got to the counter we requested the agent to be placed all together, and moreover because it was very early and it seemed easy to achieve that. The truth is that from the beginning the agent was very unpleasant with us but he said that he would do it, we think that it could be because he did not seem to understand or either speak English correctly, which is quite serious speaking about someone who is dealing with international passengers (on that flight we went to Doha) and furthermore with the overall good level of that language in India.

Even though in the first point of their terms and conditions it can be read the next: “Passengers are requested to carry Power banks/Portable Mobiles Chargers in their hand baggage. They are not allowed to be carried inside checked luggage”, the agent told us that this kind of items could not be in our hand baggage so the option he offered us was to check in our luggage with our power banks inside as our friends and us travelled with power banks. We would like to point out that we have travelled in our trips throughout India (Madrid-Delhi and Delhi-Varanasi) with these power banks in our hand baggage without any problem. Once the luggage problem was “solved” checking in our backpacks as Mr. Vishnu requested us to do, we asked him if finally all o[censored]s could be placed all together in the same row or ones in front of the others but as close as possible and he answered us in a pretty choleric tone that we should clarify what we wanted before doing wrong requests so I answered him that we were just asking for the same thing as at the beginning but that maybe it could have been a misunderstanding. Mr. Vishnu seemed very annoyed with my response and he was trying to teach us in a pissed rising tone that our first request was not the same as the one we had done later very impolitely and inappropriately. As we were seeing that this agent was losing control, my partner asked for his manager but then I told him that he was being rude to us as you cannot have this behavior dealing with people and I know what I'm talking about because I have always worked in Tourism and that experience was the worst customer care that I have seen in all my entire life with much difference and without any logical explanation.

After that mishap he wanted to check the credit cards with which we had bought the tickets and he asked us for one ending in 5058 so when we saw that we didn't have any credit card with those numbers we asked him to double check the information but he was very confident asserting that the number was correct so he told us to go to his co-worker’s counter to be able to verify all our details. When we went with the other agent he asked us for a credit card ending in 0018, which is mine, so currently we still don’t know how Mr. Vishnu was asking for a wrong numbering credit card but we suspect that he went to shuffle our backpacks because as soon as we went with his co-worker he disappeared from his counter and another girl took his place. We did not see Mr. Vishnu anymore during the check in process and because of that and his behavior we think he could be some kind of manager within the airline. We ended the check in with his colleague and after the incident we saw in our boarding passes (also attached in this email) that we were placed in adjacent rows but each couple in the extreme sides of the plane so they finally ignored our request. As the flight was in almost 4 hours we went to have dinner and to have some refreshments so at 01h15, when we went to our gate, Mr. Vishnu showed up asking for Mr. Boris Callejas, who is my partner. As it is normal, we asked him what was happening and we informed him that we could lose our flights as our plane was going to depart in half an hour. He told us that he could not explain anything to us and that just my boyfriend alone could go with him and that the rest o[censored]s should go on board. My partner went with him and the other three o[censored]s were paralised and shocked in the middle of the aisle and after some minutes I decided to go look for my boyfriend and I told our friends to take the flight because at that point it seemed that Mr. Vishnu was determined to make us miss the flight or at least he wanted to make us have the hardest possible time.

While I was walking in the direction I had seen Boris and Mr. Vishnu leaving some minutes earlier, I saw them walking my direction, they were looking into Boris' passport and also his boarding pass as Mr. Vishnu hadn’t asked for these documents when he came looking for Boris. The truth is that this man looked very stressed and we still do not know why because, as I was saying, he seemed totally determined to offer us the worst customer care since we met in his counter. I asked him again to let me go with my partner because we were traveling together and we shared our luggage and if he lost the flight I’d prefer to lose it with him and later be able to search another option to continue our trip; furthermore, my boyfriend has a lower level of English than me and I was worried that with all together he could be more uncomfortable with the situation. Mr. Vishnu, in a total cholera state, told me that they were going to a restricted area and that I was not allowed to go, he seized also the opportunity to blame me for calling him rude and he clarified that I was nobody to tell him how to do his job (nobody did). I answered him that I had called him rude for a good reason because we were receiving a very bad deal from his side and that we did not understand his position as nobody told him how to do his job but, on the contrary, we were using our right as passengers to do a request kindly and politely as we did twice to see afterwards that both agents had ignored it. Between snorts and intelligible phrases, he told me to go on board because he went with Boris to “solve” the backpack problem but as I was very worried about what could happen I followed them on the distance to the entrance of a corridor and I waited for a prudential time to see how this incident was going to continue. During this lapse of time in which Mr. Vishnu and Boris were alone, the worker still repeating to my partner that I had called him rude and that I could not tell him how to do his job, he was also specially interested in letting Boris know how hard the jail penalties in his country for introducing illegal luggage in the airport are. They were in an underground floor when Boris was told to open a suitcase that was not ours (It seemed perfect to scare Boris a little bit more after the prison and illegal items comments) so he declined to do it because of that reason and after that they apologized for it and they finally brought his backpack, which was all messy (Why not if, legal or not, the truth is that they always do that, also with the hand baggage as they open and touch everything without asking) and they requested Boris to take out the bank power from his bag (thank you again, Mr. Vishnu, for making us check our luggage with the power bank inside). The security worker that had our external battery on her hands apologized explaining Boris that this sometimes happens (maybe Mr. Vishnu has something to do), so Boris requested her to break our item in front of him and when she was on the point of proceeding, Mr. Vishnu stopped her and they both had a little discussion in hindi. As far as we know that employer kept our new power bank ready to be used for the first time because later he came with us to the boarding gate and he had it in his hand yet and he had been walking around all the airport with it.

Seeing that Boris was taking quite long I decided to go into the corridor where I had seen them enter and I think that any other normal person would have done the same in my position. I do not know which rules they have in India's airports or either if they apply it but the truth is that we have heard some breath-taking stories from friends and acquaintances and when I saw the minutes passing without knowing what was happening I went to find my partner. At the end of the aisle I found a door with a code and also a security worker controlling who was entering and leaving the area so I explained him our situation and that I needed to know something about my partner and without any opposition he used his walkie-talkie and let me enter into a room with a lift that went to the underground room in which Boris was (the ease with which I could access to this restricted area gives us the idea that maybe it was not a problem to go together and it was something else that Mr. Vishnu wanted to add to make the situation even more intense). I took the elevator and when the doors were opened in the -1 floor I bumped into my boyfriend and Mr. Vishnu, so when I saw that Boris was fine I jumped on Boris' arms nervously and I burst into tears. Suddenly, being our friends asking for us in the boarding counter and the hostess contacting Mr. Vishnu by phone claiming our assistance, and me in front of them having found my partner despite his denials, we do not know why, that man that seemed to wish us the worst from the beginning started a race around all the airport for us not to lose our flight. With all the staff and passengers’ eyes on us and on what was happening he requested me to be relaxed (¿?) and he stressed that he could not allow us to miss the flight (what an irony) so he stopped a buggy for us while he was running next to us, it seemed, in an intention for everyone to see how well he was doing his job and how much he was helping us catch the flight. I would like to point out once again that his bad pronunciation and the improper use of English that he has was making the whole situation even more difficult and uncomfortable for us as we could not understand what he wanted us to do the most of the time.

With that account of our experience we would like to avoid these kind of situations for future travelers in India (specifically in Delhi's airport with Indigo airline and even more if the agent is called Vishnu) or at least we would like to expound what happened to us because we would like other passengers to know that these kind o[censored]npleasant incidents can happen and it is better to be prepared (I will be in charge to contact the airline directly and to explain our experience in all the passenger forums that I can). We believe that having an agent in an international department with an improper English is a very serious problem (and moreover being able to relocate him in domestic flights where for sure he would have the opportunity to develop his job without so many misunderstandings), the fact that he told us to check in our backpacks with the power banks inside when we could travel with them in our hand baggage without problem seems unbelievable and done by bad faith and, furthermore, because our friends still had their battery as well as the other passengers to whom we asked if they had their batteries checked in or in cabin. We think that someone who is dealing with people necessarily has to be polite and kind and must accept a constructive feedback without taking it as a personal offense. Naturally, all the poor treatment by his side and threatening a passenger with prison just for having an external battery in the bag seems a practical joke and, moreover, if you are going to show the passenger right after this a luggage that is not of his own. It was an experience that has to be avoided with any other passenger because if he just wanted that item it was very easy to save on bad time saying directly to us that it was needed that we threw it away, for instance. Also, we would like to emphasize on the maliciousness of that agent who, from the beginning, wanted to annoy us in any way possible and that had disappeared after meeting us to appear almost 4 hours later having rummaged all our luggage (yes, my backpack obviously was also all messy). What's more, the fact that he denied to break something ours should not be allowed because it also seemed that he was laughing on our faces with our battery in his hand (at least he should have stored it in a place for it); it gives a lot to think about. Please help us to prevent more incidents like that.

We are looking forward to hearing from you soon.

Thank you very much in advance.

Best regards,

Anaïs Alcázar