On the return leg of a trip overseas flying with Swiss Air I had to change at Zurich. However my incoming flight was delayed due to strong winds closing one of the runways at Zurich. I therefore missed my connection (just) - unfortunate, but I accept it happens
.
The transfer desk at Zurich searched and found an alternative flight to my home airport (BHX) via Brussels which would get me home about 3.5 hours later than I was originally due. However I noticed when the transfer desk printed my new boarding cards that the leg from had me booked in econom despite the fact that the original ticket (which I had paid for myself) had me booked in business class. When I pointed this out to the person on the transfer desk she apologised and rebooked that leg as Business
. She said she thought the leg from Brussels to BHX "would be fine" as the ticket said "B flex" (which I took to mean "Business flexible" ) and I was seated in row 3.
After a quick dash through Zurich airport (with very slow security scanning) I just made my rebooked flight.
At Brussels airport I had almost two hours to kill so I went to the Buussels Airline Business lounge (Brussels to BHX was with them) only to be refused admission because my "B flex" is not business class after all. So despite having paid for business class I was now going to be travelling economy, no lounge access and arriving home 3.5 hours late
. Don't transfer desk staff know what they are booking you into?? I am sure they wouldn't accidentally upgrade some-one without realising it!
To be honest the Brussels flight to BHX was actually very quiet and quite pleasant!
And to top it all off when I got to BHX I found out that my suitcase was apparently still in Zurich
.
I then looked an the Swiss.com site this morning to express my opinion about being downgraded without this being mentioned to me or any compensation being offered and lo-and-behold I can't find any way to make my complaint!!
I travel on UK trains quite a lot, and while they do have their problems, there are a couple of things that airlines could learn in the field of customer service:
1) It is relatively easy to make complaints about poor service, the train managers are usually willing to give out forms and websites usually point you in the direction of electronic forms for complaints; and
2) If trains are delayed by more than an hour (varies slightly from one train company to another) you are
entitled to compensation. The trainmanagers or website usually point you quite easily in the direction of making a claim.
The train companies see complaints as a way of identifying problems that customers have, so that these problems can be addresses and service improved. Why can't airlines be more like that??
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