Complain about a product or service

Aer Lingus

constance of carne, Ireland June 6, 2009

emirates flight EK03 was delayed leaving dubai international airport was leaving 30 minutes for me to get to my aer lingus flight at london heathrow, i made the connection however my baggage did not, at baggage claim in dublin airort i made Aer Lingus aware of the situation, i was given baggage file refrence number. i rang in the morning to check my bags progress ringing the number provided i was told by automated teller machine that it was still being traced, i was advised by the aer lingus employee at the desk on the 5.5.2009 at approx 9.40pm that if i had not heard by 1pm the next day i was to phone them, i did this and again my baggage was being traced,

i then rang emirates airline at london Heathrow and was told by the missing baggage department that my suitcase had been put on to flight EI157 departing from Heathrow at 11.15amto dublin however this was delayed and did not leave till 12.02 and was scheduled to land at dublin airport at 13.15pm which it did. i then rang the aer lingus baggage line and spoke to a man (with a foreign accent) at approx 3pm who told that he didnt know if it had been on this flight. he told me it had been delayed. i said that it had landed. i had checked on the internet. he then said it may be with customs. i asked him if he could check with customs and he said no he could not and that i should ring back at 5pm,

i was told on the friday night that it would be couried down to me in wexford when it had arrived in dublin at the aer lingus desk, i then asked if it was there would it be sent to me in wexford that evening. he said no that courier left at 1pm and wont go again till the next day, which contradicted the previous information given, i thanked him and ended the call. at 4.55pm i rang back and when i was eventually put through i was hung up on by some one and then when i rang again i was told that the office had now closed.

i urgently needed the bag as it contains a phone charger for an internet and computer like phone that i need for work and university, i spent a considerable amount of phone credit on these phone calls and was dealt with in a rude, impolite manner and given wrong information, they did not know what was happening or how to find out what was happening and was brushed off and told to ring back and when i did i was cut off and the office had closed at 5pm at the time i was told to call back at. i have a suspicion that i was told to ring back at 5pm when the office was closed so that hey would not have to deal with my enquirey.

eilern of down, United Kingdom May 7, 2009

see below a letter i wrote to all concerned AER LINGUS, BRITISH AIRWAYS, US AIRWAYS AND EDREAM since writing the letter BA US AIRWAYS AND E DREAMS all emailed saying it not their fault ... AER LINGUS ... of course have not replied but i have edvience that they are saying weather was the problem.... not true as there was no fog in heathrow at 12 noon ... please read letter....will never use AER LINGUS again....

Below I will give you a brief account of our two day trip to Philadelphia from Dublin, a short description of the week spent there and the return trip home. We depart enthusiastic and fully prepared for the World Irish Dance Championships which were to be held in the USA for the first time ever. Children had prepared and trained for over a year for this challenging competition and were ready to compete against children from all over the world. We, Parents and friends, had fund raised for the children’s travel expenses for over six months and were delighted to be able to fund all the children who qualified to compete. Hopes and dreams were soon to be shattered by the incompetence and mishandling of our flights.

Parents chose who they would book through and I decided I was getting the best deal from EDREAMS.COM. My first flight, EI164, was to leave Dublin at 12.10pm and my connecting flight, BA69, was to leave Heathrow at 1615. Other parents and children had left on the earlier flight had just left one and half hour of a stop over but we didn’t’t want to rush so we thought our longer stopover was a better idea, a stop over of nearly 3 hours, plenty of time you might think.

Hundreds of children were leaving Ireland, England, Scotland and Whales to travel to the worlds so when we arrived at the airport we were not surprised to find we knew many of the passengers on our flight. While booking in I received a rather disturbing call from a friend who was on the earlier flight, she was still sitting on the runway and was told they were not departing because of fog at Heathrow. She had asked to leave the flight but was refused. We were upset for her but were confident that our flight would be fine as we were not to leave until 12.10pm and we had that long stopover. Check in and ready to go we sat at our departure gate, when staff changed our gate three times we were starting to get worried as we are seasonal travellers and knew this was an indication that there was something wrong. I approached the Aer Lingus Rep and inquired what was the problem. This young lady was quite aggressive and told us she could do nothing about the fog in London, I then informed her my friend had landed in Heathrow and there was now no fog. Within moments of reseating myself the lady in question called the flight and we were boarded. On board we found that there were thirty one people from the Irish Dancing fraternity and we inform the air hostess of our need to be off loaded immediately when we landed as we had to make the connecting flight.

Landed in Heathrow in Terminal one we immediately set off running for terminal five, catching a subway along the way. We arrive, a band of women and children, racing to the security gate as we knew time was of the essence.

Along the way I text my friend, who as you may recall was on the earlier flight, to keep tabs on what was going on, she met us and ran along side us shouting there was no point in us running as they had already informed her they were not going to let us board as the people who had missed the earlier flight had been boarded onto our flight. We still were in time and we hit security, I believe, 10 minutes before the allotted time only to find we would not be let through. The reason we were given for this is our boarding cards were coming up ‘Red’. We demanded a BA rep and she in turn told security to check all our passes again, this took some time and when completed she then told us, ‘Well your late now anyway’.

We informed the BA rep that we knew people were sitting on our seats as we knew people on board but they told us to join a queue to lodge a complaint. We duly did as requested and stayed in that queue for nearly four hours, taking turns. The children were given water in that time and after demanding food we were given dinner coupons but told not to tell anyone else as no one else in the airport had got them, this was untrue as the party which had arrived earlier, of which my friend was a member, had also got coupons. All thirty one of us decided we would stay together as a group even though we were from different schools and competing against each other in the competition. At approx’ six o clock we decided half of us would go back to Aer Lingus and see would they help us and were delighted when they immediately began to try and find us alternative flights. All the times and details are recorded on my phone as I text family and friends as to what was going on and have kept these as a record of events.

The Aer Lingus rep was amazed to find that when she had 25 of us booked in that BA was now booking us on the same flight when they realised that Aer Lingus had taken the matter in hand. The two desks conferred with each other and it was decided that as Aer Lingus had the matter in hand they would complete the booking. We were to return to Shannon the next morning then onto Chicago and onward to Philadelphia. Handing out dinner tickets and accommodation vouchers and dispensed to a hotel for three hours, we had to be back at the airport at 4;30am.

In the clothing we had left home in and with some very tired and disgruntled children we arrive back at the airport, checking in we enquired if our baggage was on board and were assured it was. Onward to Shannon where we had to off load and we explained to staff what had happened to us. They were extremely courteous and offered us breakfast coupons and booked us on the flight to Chicago again assuring us our bags were on board. We at this time heard two Reps talking to each other and they said our baggage was in the basement, I now understand that this term is used when luggage is left behind or lost.

Tired and dirty we headed off to Chicago knowing we had to break up our party when we landed as they had booked us on various internal flights to Philly. On landing we were shock and horrified to find we had no luggage and my party had only 40mins to get to the next flight. Duty free which was bought on board the international flight was refused through security but we worked this out by putting it in hand luggage and booking in it at the check-in desk. To add to our misery and distress we were sent to the wrong terminal and nearly missed the flight and had to run to the next terminal and onward to the boarding gate. By this time my legs were swollen so badly my shoes would no longer fit and I had to run bare foot. I could hardly walk yet alone run. We had become that good at security we were through the queue in no time.

Landing in Philly we had to give full details of our lost baggage and did not arrive at our hotel, which we had now lost one full nights stay at, until 11.30pm. Our luggage was never fully returned to us and the pieces that were delivered were both looted and very badly damaged. We spoke to at least a dozen representatives’ USAIRWAYS, the company we reported our lost luggage too, and had so many diverse and conflicting reports of where our luggage was and what had happened that we began to record what each rep said so we could had a proof as to their incompetence in handling the matter.

Over the subsequent week we had to beg, borrow and buy clothing and more importantly costumes and shoes for our children to dance in. We used all our expenses money on goods that we had packed in our luggage that was now lost stolen or damaged. We had some very upset young people entering competitions, some of them the very next morning, where they should have been going in calm and confident.

To add to my problems I personally also broke my glasses and took a toothache and spent even more time getting both fixed.

As to our return trip, well that’s another tale, we decided that with all the confusion on our outbound flight we would ensure we check-in online 24 hours before hand only to find we could not all do so. On advice from hotel staff , who also tried to check-in for us, we arrived at the airport 4 hours early. We explained to the BA staff on the desk what had happened to us on our outward journey and begged them to guarantee we would all be on this flight as we really couldn’t take anymore. We overheard the staff discussing the fact that the flight was over booked and we began to panic but were relieved when the lady on the desk told us she would upgrade three of us to World Class therefore ensuring we were all on the said flight. We were delighted and relieved and observed the seats which she had just given up being snatched up by two other reps who had other passengers who had found themselves in the same situation as we had.

Boarding this flight we were exhausted after a long hectic week but I could not sleep as my legs which were still swollen from all the previous flights and had to ask the flight attendant for assistance. Landing in Heathrow and staying on ‘airside’ we set off for terminal one only to be amazed to find we had to go through security yet again. Two of our party had bought duty free and I declined to let them hand it over when it was refused through this check. I had just about enough by now and was near cracking. On inquiry security told us that if we run we could make check in at the Aer Lingus desk, I told one of the ladies with us to escort the children to the gate and myself and another passenger, Mrs Carson, headed off for the check in using our old trick of storing the goods in a piece of hand luggage which we now had to check in. Running through the airport like people possessed and with my legs killing me I fell along the way, we had our photo taken four times. On reaching the terminal we flew to the help desk and were told to go straight to check in one. Reaching this desk a rather rude young Aer Lingus rep told us we were too late and it was ‘web check’ in only. I was in tears by now, my legs were killing me, I had hurt both my knee and hand and really couldn’t take much more of this. I, as quickly as I could, told her what had happened to us and her only reply was, “Well I didn’t lose your bags”, and with that she turned away. I stood there in shock only to be approached by another Aer Lingus rep who had over heard our story thankfully and booked us in straight away. We then had to run to gate 83 and by the time we got there we were sore, hot, sweaty and exhausted only to find the rest of our party had not reached the gate. I was by now very distressed as my daughter was one of this party, they arrived just before the gate closed and told us that went they reached the Aer Lingus check on the other side they were told by a member of staff that they were too late for the gate and it had closed. He then went on to tell them that they would have to go on stand by and the lady in charge of the children refused outright relying to him what had happened to us. He, the rep, refused to even check if the gate was still open and it was when my daughter said, “But they check us in when we were in Philadelphia”, that he then decided to check his computer and said, “Oh yes that’s ok then, on you go”. Only that my daughter had asked him to check the boarding passes he would have made them miss that flight and go on standby. In closing I can only say that I have never been so badly deal with by anyone in my life and as a seasoned travellers we have never come across any airline which has handled matters in such callous, unfeeling manner before and between all the members of our party we have travelled with many different airlines. Since writing the above i have since found out that Aer Lingus should not have let us leave Dublin as they knew we would never catch the connecting flight but they have refused to answer my letters... they have no customer phone number or email address.... I wonder why????? and they just ignore your letters..... i am not letting this go i will continue the fight....

Kevin of Old Conna,Bray,Co.wicklow, FL April 20, 2009

On the 3rd April we set off from Dublin for our dream holiday to Florida, specifically Tampa where we would be meeting our in-laws from the U.K. We had booked with Aer Lingus about six months ago because we believed that our state airline would look after us the best. All was well until we landed at Boston where we were informed by an Aer Lingus supervisor by the name of A. OBrien that our connecting Jet Blue flight to Tampa had been cancelled. She was extremely dismissive, refused to acknowledge that Aer Lingus had any responsibility for us despite the fact that we had booked flights with Aer Lingus to Tampa. Her attitude was quite frankly bewildering and she obviously had no training, experience or sympathy dealing with distressed passengers.

There was another couple from Cork with three young children also involved who were very upset indeed. We were informed that Jet Blue had cancelled our flight because of weather and we would have to go into Boston and stay in Boston at our own expense for the night and then ring the airport in the morning to see about flights to Tampa. No guarantees of a flight! We could not believe her attitude, in turn,condescending, belligerent and rude. She then vanished for an hour after we asked her to find the operations manager. (This mans name apparently was Des Farren. He did not meet with us, I dont know why.) We got the impression that she hoped we would go away, and she left her ground staff alone to try and keep us calm! These girls were in fact pleasant although they could do nothing for us.

After an hour Ms. OBrien returned and surprisingly let it slip that the flight had actually bee cancelled twenty four hours earlier! We had not been informed in Dublin before we left although Im not sure what we could have done about it if we had known. We did not want to travel in to a strange city to find accommodation and no help was offered in finding such a place. I then asked if it would be possible to fly to Orlando (strange that the Air Lingus staff hadnt thought of this!) knowing it wasnt that far from Tampa and after several calls we were told this might be possible although this plane was likely to be delayed. It would be necessary to hire a car in Orlando to get to our eventual destination in Hudson.

When I rang Hertz they quoted be 175 dollars for one day and as I had no choice I accepted. Extraordinarily enough no other flights from Boston were cancelled but our flight to Tampa. When we went to check in for the Orlando flight at the Jet Blue desk we were informed that the Tampa flight had indeed been cancelled twenty four hours earlier because of bad weather in New York at that time and that was where the plane was coming from. Unbelievable! How did they know the weather would be so bad the next day and in fact we know for a fact that flights did get out of New York that day-3rd of April (our in laws flew out of New York.) Obviously there were other factors involved in this cancellation.

Of course our eventual flight to Orlando was delayed and we did not fly out of Boston until 21.30.(No refreshments offered despite the fact that we were in Boston Airport for 5 and half hours.) We didnt arrive at our eventual destination until 4 in the morning. We had been travelling for twenty four hours, an exhausting start to our dream holiday. Basically Air Lingus should pick up the cost of our car hire and I will enclose copies of receipts with the copies of the letter I will send to [them] by post. I am also sending copies of this letter to the C.A.A., my solicitor and The Irish Times. In these days of recession I cannot believe that an Airline could be so callous to the needs of their customers. Negative word of mouth is the very worst thing a company can afford in this day and age.

bad start to holiday and out of pocket for car hire

Stuart of London, OTHER April 2, 2009

We are flyin to Turkey from London in May. My Parents,brother,auntie and my parents friends have to fly to London from Dublin to meet us and catch our flight to Turkey. Our flight to Turkey is due to leave at 1710 and my parents group were due to land in Heathrow at 1325.

Today i received an email saying that their flight had been given a later time so they would now land at 1455.

I called Aer Lingus and explained that i had a take-off time of 1710 to make and explained the difficulty of making it across terminals for my elderly travel companions in a short time...if the flight is delayed or the plane is waiting to get a stand at the gate,then it will be very difficult to make the 1710 flight. Gavin from reservations was absolutely no help.He told me he could change to an earlier flight time but it would cost money.I asked him if it would be possible to put us an hour and a half earlier rather than later and he said it would cost money...i asked why it hadn`t cost money to have the flights put an hour and a half later and he told me that this was within their rights and i had agreed to a two hour change when booking my flights....IF I DON`T AGREE TO THIS I CAN NEVER FLY. When i asked for the complaints department he told me i couldn`t call them but only write or fax them.

Basically now if i want to be sure of making the 1710 flight to Turkey i will have to pay more money...if this is legal then i guess i am not surprised but i am writing to you because there is nothing else i can do

there may be no consequences or we may miss our flight to Turkey,possibly ruining our holiday as there are not frequent flights to Antalya from London

James of B'ham, AL March 24, 2009

My son was scheduled to fly to Dublin from Paris on 3/16/09. He arrived at Charles De Gaulle airport to find that he had forgotten his passport. He attempted to reschedule his flight for a later departure time, only to be told that it would be an additional 200 Euros to do so. He anticipated paying a fee to reschedule but this amount was almost as much as his entire round trip fare! He called me and I called Aer Lingus from my cell phone while sitting alongside an interstate highway. The CSR, whose name was Mary, was quite pleasant but was absolutely no help at all. She just continued to quote the rules and the contract. I eventually gave up and my son was unable to make his trip.

We lost the price of his tickets for the flights, his housing and other associated fees. We have really stretched oursleves to give him this opportunity and the arrogant attitude of the people at the Aer Lingus counter in Paris was shocking. My son made an error in forgetting his passport but their total lack of empathy and unwillingness to help at all was very disappointing. I have made a compaint to Aer Lingus through their customer service site but do not expect to even get a reply.

Robert of Colonia, NJ March 6, 2009

I have purchased tickets for travel to Europe on-line with AerLingus. Before the purchase I talked with sales people about pricing and availibility, and was assuered that the prices reflect seat availability for the travel dates requested. Today I looked on AerLingus web site and the price is almost 200 less per person for the same travel dates. It is the difference of 377 for myself, wife and a baby. The sales department doesn't even want to consider the price adjustment. I could understand 50~100 drop, but 377 is a lot of money for me. I am very upset by handling my rare case, especially that the price drop just happened within 2 week period.

In short, I just regred to take advice from aerlingus that prices reflect seat availability. I thinks this is a non sense, that rare cases like mine is not considered well.

Jim of Co Louth, OTHER January 26, 2009

My son travelled to Ireland fro UK on Saturday to attend a family event (Christening) he brought with him my other 2 grand children. This morning he arrived in good time to board his return flight with Aerlingus in the infamous area 14 (might as well call it Area 51) Carrying one tired and sleeping child and another in hand for the London Gatwick flight they were made to queue for 45 mins because of insufficient staff in attendance at check in. when he approached the desk as next in line he was told to go back as the petulant individual at check in 'was not ready for them'.

when he was eventually allowed to step forward he was told they were too late for the flight . 75 euro x 3 was demanded despite the fact the flight had not been called. Over the telephone (I am in Dundalk and booked and paid for the original tickets) I tried to pay using the original card to be told by an unhelpful aer lingus women she could not do it. 'and really should not have accepted the call to even talk with me', cutting me off in mid sentence. But not before she told me I must pay through a different office an a different telephone number - but it will not be open yet!

It costs sometimes a little bit more to fly with the UK and french based airlines but I do not believe the so called national carrier deserves my custom. I can and will spend my money elsewhere. Maybe this is not what Newstalk want to hear and my email is possibly heading for the trash but when will the 'ailing' part national body start to do the maths in a time of recession when the buyer reviews his choices, when will our native 'fatcats' who run the national joke with wings start to show concern for those feeding them. thanks for the time

My Son Anthony, Sophie and Steven are now booked on an 11 am flight to Gatwick and so my son and his 2 very tired children must hang around Dublin Airport till them. Tried to ring customer services at Aer lingus and Aer Rianta to get him some assistance but those numbers either don't exist and not allowed in to the hands of customers easily.

Euro 75 x 3 penalty and a 4 hour wait from early morning till 11 AM with 2 very tired little ones,

Eric of West Springfield, MA January 15, 2009

I write to you with great disappointment- I purchased airline tickets last week to fly with your airline on May 12, 2009; I originally purchased these tickets through Cheap Tickets.com. Today, January 15, 2009, I was looking on your website (aerlingus.com) and found the exact same flight for 306.14 cheaper. Cheap Tickets.com reports that at the time of my original purchase (01/05/2009), I purchased my tickets with Aerlingus at the cheapest sale price.

We are a single income family with (4) small children, I feel rather foolish and very disappointed in this airline, which I placed my trust. It is rather unfair and I am deeply saddened. I am a good, hardworking Christian man and I wouldnt have taken advantage of you.

Km of Minneapolis, MN December 20, 2008

I was flying Minneapolis-Glasgow.I had the misfortune of boarding Aer Lingus from Dublin to Glasgow. I was flying alone and I dont know anyone in this cold city. I was shocked to see that none of the passengers like me travelling from chicago had their baggages at Glasgow.

I had some very expensive gifts and all my warm clothes in my bags.I am now left in this city to fend for myself without any warm clothes .I dont have any other clothes to wear. CHEAP IS ALWAYS CHEAP. DONT FLY AER LINGUS AGAIN

Fiona of Cork Ireland, NY October 8, 2008

We were due to take off on flight ei110 from JFK to Shannon Ireland at 6:30 on the 15th september 2008.We boarded the plane and proceeded to take off. The plane could not take off as there was an engine problem. The plane was being looked at by an engineer and we taxied 3 hours on the runway, people were obviosly very worried at this time as we did not know what was going on. It was announced at aprox 10:45 that the flight was cancelled and we would not be returning to Ireland that night.

We got off the plane, and there was chaos, the first fifty people who checked in were put on an alternative flight, i could not understand how we didnt make the list as we checked in aprox 2:30. We were told that somebody would assit us and to wait downstairs, no body came near us, we had to look for an aer lingus rep who basically had no idea what was going on. We were then told that they they would put us up in a nearby hotel at aprox 11:00. We waited outside in the cold for about an hour for a bus that could only take fifteen people at a time. It was ridiculus.

At arriving at the hotel we were given food vouchers and a calling card . The food had been sitting there for most of the night and the calling cards did not work, also the hotel would not authorise a phone call home to explain our delay. Our room in the ramanda hotel was dirty, had bugs and was generally not fit to sleep in. We were appalled at this hotel.

Next morning we tried to find a rep to try and get home to be told she was still in bed she also stayed at the hotel. At 11:30, she finally got up and basically could nt give us any more information. when she finally called the airport she told us that we had a flight at 6:30 the next night. We had no money left and were just given food vouchers for the hotel lunch, the food was disgusting so we just went to the airport and sat and waited for our flight.

We were so upset by this whole incident from start to finish. I thought the whole holiday was ruined and a shambles. We had no money left we had to go back to work the next day and i was so exhausted, i also had to pay an extra day for my dog in kennels, my car cost extra money at the airport in shannon. My partner also missed aday of work which he was not be compensated for.