Sir,
I was a patron of Singapore Airlines and had flown your airline before the horrifying incident happened to me on the 11th and 12th of February 2015 at the Mumbai Airport. My name is Amit Anand Bivalkar and me and my colleague Mr. Ganeshprasad Pradhan were booked on to the Sq423 flight A380 from Mumbai to Singapore on the 11th of February 2015. As usual we had a hassle free check-in of our bags and after immigration we came to the gate at 10.30 pm for boarding where we were told that there is a technical snag and the flight will be taking off after two hours at 1.30 am on 12th February. Snags do occur and we were fine with the delay till then. At 12.30 am when we were at the gate again the staff that too of Cambata Aviation and nobody from Singapore Airlines were trying to save their faces and saying that the flight might depart at 3.30 am.
This definitely came as a shocker as we were going to miss the onward connection to Adelaide from Singapore and then missing on the Hotel booking in Hilton Adelaide and a function which we were supposed to attend on the 12th night in Adelaide. Nothing moved till 2.30 am where people had lost patience as no Hotel arrangements were made and there was no guarantee as to on which flights will we be accommodated. After lots of persuasion we were forced checked out of SQ423 and forced checked in on to the morning 11.35 flight to Singapore without a guarantee of flight connection to Adelaide.
On asking the guy there said you can book any onward connections and we will refund you the amount as there were no seats on the flights from Singapore in to Australia, this was after a discussion of the guy on the counter with you. Hence we booked a Emirates flight at 2.30 am IST in the morning from Singapore to Sydney and Sydney to Adelaide at a whopping cost of Rs 70000/- per head . As if this was not enough , we were asked to move to the immigration for cancellation of the stamps and again go the belts to collect our luggage. This was at 5.00 am in the morning. We were then all directed out of airport and only those who had tickets could enter the airport again.
On 12th February in the morning Cambatta Aviation people opened the counters at 8 am and there was one duty manager of Singapore Airlines. I was standing in the queue for 1.5 hours requesting for a onward connection from Singapore to Adelaide. Your reservation counters open at 8.30 and at 10 am the guy at the counter says that I can get a onward connection , post which I had to cancel my emirates booking which cost a cancellation fee of Rs 17000- per head. This has caused a lot of physical and mental stress to me. I am attaching all the relevant documents to this email and I request you to please arrange a payment of 10000 dollars for the financial loss and the mental stress and trauma caused by your airline. As much I appreciate these are occupational hazards and black swan events I would still be very hesitant to recommend your airline to any of my friends or acquaintances for the terrible manner in which the whole situation was handled at the Mumbai Airport.
As if all this was not enough the pain continued on our return journey, we were on a flight from Melbourne to Mumbai on the 23rd of February and the Entertainment system was not working in the whole flight which was 7 hours and 40 minutes and further to that the onward connection to Mumbai, that A 380 also was cancelled and had a different aircraft in it’s place.
This is a copy of the mail which i have marked to the DM in Mumbai . David Lau. I wish to escalate this and expect a reply on this.
*Article first appeared on https://www.facebook.com/singaporeair/posts/10153150474158679