Update: 06/27/2009 I told my whole story to our friend Marcus at KLM and he escalated the letter to someone else. Let’s see what happens. Nothing happened. What a surprise, no one from KLM bothered to reply back.
Update again: While I think KLM is stupid beyond belief, I still need to fly them. They’re my gateway airline into continental Europe and into the US and Asia. I just hope they are not always this stupid. And as I am a loyal fool to Delta… I have to stick with KLM. Well maybe I can do Air France too.
I have to rant because at this point there is no where else to go. I hope that some idiot from KLM public relations or customer service sees this post and understands how angry I am.
A lot of readers here also travel so post your stories about KLM, NWA (Northwest Airlines), SAS, or anyone else that gave you terrible service.
I flew from Stockholm to India this past month with KLM and NWA. Unfortunately for Stockholm, there are not very appealing airline options to fly into continental europe and continue to Asia. There’s SAS (THE worst airline since you have to pay for water), KLM, and Air France. My post is about the dismal service, communicate, and receive any recourse for stupid service.
So, the list of complaints:
1) Arlanda Stockholm Airport; check in with KLM. I check in with KLM, only to find out my hand luggage bag is 1/4 inch (about 1/2 centimeter) TOO big to take on board. I’m sorry the wheel was sticking out of that straight-jacket baggage checker! Now, the agent at the KLM counter is on my case to lighten out my bag. I pull out as much as possible, laptop, blanket, snacks, etc. and throw the bag on the belt.
The suitcase and this “hand bag” now weigh 23kg; of course she has to lecture me and tell me I have to pay for the overweight. After a few minutes of begging she lets me go with those 3kgs for free. OMG!
Then, the KLM counter lady gives me a lecture that I have no right to stand in the First Class/Business Class/ Elite Plus line. Wait! I am in Delta Elite Plus member and your overheard counter image has the Skyteam logo. You don’t specify that is for KLM only. But I am wrong, Delta Platinum is in fact not part of the Skyteam like that. Great, so the Skyteam alliance is useless then.
2) Get on the plane to go from ARN-AMS. Flight is delayed. 20 minutes. 30 minutes. 40 minutes. 1 hour. Yay! We take off over an hour late. Arrive in AMS a little bit before 9AM.
3) Make it onto the NWA airlines bound to BOM. Door closes. Wait, we’re not moving; no pushback. We sit. Sit some more. 20 minutes pass. Captain gets on the intercom that we have auxiliary power switch problems so we have to hang tight. Yep, another hour goes by before we leave the gate.
4) Arrive at the Mumbai Airport. My name, along with a dozen others are called on the loudspeaker. Not a good sign. There’s no sign of our baggage. I file PIR (Property Irregularity Report) with KLM. KLM gives me a crappy 25 Euro discount on the flight I purchase. Yippee! After filing lots of paperwork, dealing with Indian customs to have my bags cleared by the airline, I head home.
5) Two days later and some shopping to run around for underwear and tops and bottoms, I get my bags. But, but, the front pouch of my handbag is empty. Did someone steal stuff? Where are my personal business cards? Where is my ipod? Where is my headphone? And the little junk in the front pouch? Gone. All gone.
I file a complaint with the KLM office in Mumbai. They give me a case number that I can use to file the stolen items when I return back to my country of residency, Sweden. Fine. I wait.
6) Get back to Sweden. The useless counter in baggage claim that supports KLM and all those airlines with baggage issues, is well, useless. I get a phone number to call in Sweden, but as usual in a socialist country, no one works on the weekend.
7) Sunday, I email KLM directly (only took a couple weeks since their website is the most horribly built thing since msn.com) with all the details of the baggage situation, case number, etc.
Monday, a response. At least someone is fast to read and respond. Thank god.
Here is the letter from KLM Customer Service:
Thank you for your e-mail dated 3 May 2009 regarding your recent journey with KLM and Northwest Airlines. KLM takes precautions to make sure that passenger baggage is loaded and off-loaded with the greatest care. We regret that even with these precautions some items were missing from your luggage. Please accept our most sincere apologies for any inconvenience or distress this irregularity in our service may have caused you.
In instances such as these, we would recommend passengers to submit a claim to their travel insurance for consideration since the liability of airlines is limited. This letter may be used as proof for your insurance company that you reported the loss at our company.
Should you not have claimed on your own insurance and wish instead to claim directly on KLM, then you are more than entitled to do so, although KLM’s liability, like that of all other signatory
airlines, is limited to terms set out in the Montreal Convention. Unfortunately we cannot offer you any compensation for the missing i-pod as according to our Conditions of Contract, we do not accept liability for pilferage of money, jewellery, electronic and photographic equipment, precious metals or other valuables. For the latter we refer you to the General Conditions of Carriage article 8.6.d, based upon the Montreal Conventions.To enable us to handle the remainder of your claim promptly and efficiently, we kindly request you to provide us with the following:
*Specification and/or receipts of the missing cards and the first needs items purchsed.
*Bank information [more details he writes]
Once again, we would like to offer our apologies for any inconvenience or distress the missing items from your luggage may have caused you.
Yours sincerely,
Marcus Johnstone-McKinney
KLM/NWA Customer Care North Europe
P.O. Box 69370
1060CK Amsterdam
The Netherlands
Tel: 08 587 99 747
Fax: +31 20 588 8250
Ohh, why thank you but I highly doubt you give a rat’s ass.
Please accept our most sincere apologies for any inconvenience or distress this irregularity in our service may have caused you.
There’s the legal bullshit we are all waiting for:
Unfortunately we cannot offer you any compensation for the missing i-pod as according to our Conditions of Contract
So why the hell do I have case number for stolen items I cannot claim? I don’t know. And why didn’t anyone at the Mumbai KLM Customer Service office tell me that electronic goods will not be covered? Lack of communication.
Where do I go from here? Not sure. Having lost more than 2500SEK due to stolen items, spent over 1000SEK having to buy new clothes, and had the lack of service from KLM, I don’t know. Why should I care about poor little airlines’ problems with fuel issues if they have no responsibility to give customer service and to not rip people off? Why do you airlines think customers hate you because you charge us for ever extra pound on board, or make us buy water, snacks and pillows on flights? Are we just cattle?
Thank you KLM for making me have the worst trip ever. And it is nice to know that Delta Platinum Elite Plus fliers can be treated like shit by the airlines in their own Skyteam network.
I have created a post just for KLM Baggage Information. Please also check it out if you have questions about filing baggage complaints or the paperwork required to file a complaint.
oh dear, sorry to hear about your i-pod! there’s certainly a LACK OF COMMUNICATION in klm. as my mom is a flight attendant at indonesia’s national airline, i’m entitled to interline staff ticket which is much cheaper than regular fare. i know that there’s this flight ban thing from EU to indonesian airlines but it doesn’t affect the interline agreement. but yeah, one stupid klm staff said so & i ended up going back to indo last summer paying full fare ticket! i complained about this & they could only say, “please accept our most sincere apologies.” what a shame esp. because i’m partly dutch, too!
Most of the issues you have mentioned occurs with all airlines. I travel quite a bit and have pretty much taken all the US airlines, and everyone of them is equally bad compared to the Asian and European carriers. But I agree, some Airlines take it one step further to piss you off!
The case of stolen items from luggage happens quite frequently even at most major airports in the US. In fact I saw a recent report where a few personal were caught stealing at LAX. So its hard to say where your iPod went missing, whether in AMS or BOM. In any case, Sorry for the loss. Now you need to get a good Mobile Phone which can work as your ipod and camera.
Cheers/
Came across your page a few days ago and found it really interesting, especially because I have a Swedish boyfriend (I’m Canadian).
Hmm, sorry to hear about your ipod… But I would have to say despite their horrible service, they’re right about the missing ipod – an expensive lesson learned, never check in anything of value… (For the reason Delhiite indicated above – can’t pin the blame on any one company.)
I’m surprised their reimbursement for delayed luggage is so low – when I flew Air Canada to Japan I was reimbursed 10,000 Yen (more than $100). It barely covered buying extra socks, undies, and toiletries. Now I always pack an extra pair of undies and socks and travel toiletries on my carry on. The joys of flying.
Talk about bad customer service with airlines…… mine was Continental Airlines…. This happened in early June of 2007.
Oooh, I will NEVER forget.
We flew from Houston to Newark Airport (NY). (From there, we would catch a plane to Frankfurt, Germany.) Normally, this first flight takes about 4 hours. They overbooked the flight and paid people to take the second flight to Newark (I wish I had!!). Well, due to “bad weather conditions”, which do happen, we had to land somewhere else 3 times before flying back to Newark everytime to see if the bad weather had passed. It took 12 (yes, TWELVE) hours before we finally got there.
Of course, by then we had missed the connecting flight. Moreover, the people that took the second flight to Newark somehow got there and caught their connection…
We got to Newark right after 10 pm, I believe. (It’s been 2 years, excuse my blurry memory) We had our 5 week-old newborn with us to see his grandparents for the first time. We stood in line at the Continental service desk for about 45 minutes, then their crew closed the desk for the night. Yep, they did not even stay open for us after what we’d been through. They said we would need to wait to get rebooked until the next day. WHA…?!!!!
It’s true. We were all advised to retrieve our luggage (which was not easily found and distributed by them) and come back in the morning. At about 1 AM we finally found a person from Continental that had meal tickets (which only McDonald’s was still open that late) and he said their (free) hotel (which they use for these kinds of things) was booked out and we were out of luck getting in. We could drive into town and pay for our own hotel and try to get reimbursed later on, if we wanted to. (Just in case there is any question, we did not have that kind of extra money at that point.) DOUBEL WHA…?!!!!
So, we were stranded at the airport with our 5 week-old among billions of germs with no place to go or nowhere to sleep. I just wanted to cry!! My pants had been peed and pooped on, Liam had run out of diapers, and our luggage was not there yet either. A Continental employee told us they had booked a flight for us going to Amsterdam the next afternoon (which was the later flight, I suppose they did not care about our small baby being at the airport even longer) which would then go to Frankfurt after a 5 1/2 hour-layover. We finally got our luggage. The airport was far from everything, so we paid a taxi $60 to find us a drugstore selling some diapers. We went to Continental’s hotel (as adviced, to “camp out” and hope for someone to leave in the morning so we could get their room). It eventually happened. That afternoon, we finally made it onto our connection flight to Amsterdam. Luckily, we had arranged for my parents to come pick us all up in Amsterdam, as it was faster to drive there and pick us up than to wait for the layover and to then pick us up from Frankfurt. Before we left Newark, I had made sure to let Continental know of our plans and to make sure our luggage was not being sent all the way to Frankfurt.
When we got to Amsterdam, our luggage was not on the conveyor belt. We stood in line to make sure it was NOT being sent to Frankfurt. They said okay, checked the computer and said it was not on the list to be sent to Frankfurt, but that it was obviously lost. We had to file a report and go on our way.
No, it does not end here. We got home (well, to my parents’ house in Germany, I mean) and I called the airline the next day. The luggage was sure to be sent that day (so I was told in Amsterdam). Now, Continental said they were not responsible. Another airline that would transport it to our nearest airport (once it was FOUND) would handle it. I called them. No, it wasn’t them either. I called Amsterdam AND Frankfurt airport. Nope, none of them knew. After about 30 phone calls I finally found someone helpful (a US customer rep for Continental) who said the luggage was located in (you guessed it) Frankfurt and would be flown to Duesseldorf Aiport (closest by the house) where a truck driver would pick it up and deliver it within the next 24 hours. We were allowed a $50 spending limit for clothing (which buys you a pair of jeans in Germany) for the two adult tickets. Oh, great! Plus, it was the weekend, and all stores are pretty much closed then. So we went and got some cheap stuff at the local grocery store. Overall, it took 4 days to get our luggage.
When we returned back to Houston, I was sure to write a complaint letter. The results: Two $50 coupons to get off our next tickets with Continental (which I will obviously never use to fly again) and about $100 reimbursement for clothing.
This was the single, most terrible, outrageous customer service experience of my life. Not the bad weather, we understand that happens. But how the airline responded was incredibly unsatisfactory.
I’m fairly sure that this story would be of interest to the good people who read this site:
http://www.flyertalk.com/
There’s a great thread right here:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/travelbuzz/646769-ultimate-baggage-lost-delayed-stolen-damaged-thread.html
It’s interesting how the alliances Star, One World, Sky Team seem to fail when it comes to their most important passengers – I would raise all kinds of hell with Delta as they are surely paying quite a bit to have their Platinum members treated differently than this by the other carriers in Sky Team.
@Sarah – That is absolutely horrible. I would consider filing a Better Business Bureau complaint about the airline experience. You make a compelling case for both negligence and customer service failure. But yes, definitely file a complaint with BBB.
@Simmi – I know! What’s with this airline fail? I caused enough rukus for this incident but at some point you get so tired of it. I have to say though, Delta has for the most part, solved all my issues and given me compensation for problems.
I love however that KLM does NOT compensate for customer service programs? Plays right into the European sterotype that Europeans suck at service.
Oh! Also, I have included some important if you need information about baggage issues.
[...] receiving many visitors about KLM’s customer service problems regarding baggage, here is a run down of what to do if your bags are stolen or delayed as well as [...]
I am a frequent flyer with Lufthansa and made the mistake flying with KLM. I never do that again!
Before flying:
Called Customer Service for a simple question. Nobody knew. Was told to call Reservations instead of being re-directed. Called Reservations. They answered, but the answer turned out to be completely wrong when I arrived at the airport. (Good I trusted my intuition and did not rely on the answer.)
At airport:
Arrived at gate 30 minutes before departure, they rushed me to board like a shepard gathering the cattle. I asked 1 minute to go to toilet. They said no. Flight departed before schedule.
On board:
Long line to toilet. Then turbulence and all had to be seated. Food served was poor, but ok.
Transfer:
5 minutes to get off, find gate, and start boarding. Ran through the terminal and arrived at gate on time, just to find the flight delayed and a long line of frustrated passengers. Just before boarding, KLM changed my seat with the excuse to put a family together. (On board, there was no family on my seat, but a fat woman.)
Airport AMS:
Poorly planned and no electric plug for laptops. Some gates are downstairs, while the main walking corridor is upstairs. Really stupid design.
On board:
Food even worse than previous flight. One flight attendent even spent majority of her time chatting with some KLM-colleagues who were travelling private in business class. That is very unprofessional.
Landing:
The flight arrived earlier than sceduled and lost a frequent flyer for good.
Hej!!!
I’m lost in Stockholm (since 2006) too :) Last Xmas, we went back home to Spain and guess what? KLM also lost our luggage. I was wondering whether you got any money back, because we have already sent our complaints and tickets to customer.care.nordic@klm.com without having gotten any answer so far.
You got my email in there and I’d appreciate some answer!!!
Take care and a thick coat
Clau
Booked e-tickets to Capetown. Accepted. At the luggage check-in counter in Amsterdam, the lady refused to allow us on board, because we were returning after 3 mo nths and did not have visa. Had to rebook our return flight just before departure by paying each 100 euro.
In Cape Town we received visa for three months and were told to go to the Immigration Office if we would like to extend our stay. Even if we had arrived with a ticket extending 3 months, we would be allowed to enter.
KLM accepted us first and at the last moment refused us on board, asking 100 euro per person. We are unable to find a customer email or even a telephone number to make complains and ask for a reembursement. Can anyone help with an emial-address?
Absolutely distasteful of the KLM to let customers down.