05-18-2007, 06:17 AM
Javed sb,
My Dad has had similar customer loyalty with the national carrier and well all things national, he has been an expatriate for some 30 years and we always flew home in PIA, despite the fact that our tickets were company paid. Ofcourse things have gone from bad to worst over the years and the biggest hurdle is ofcourse 'reservation' and the need of some sort of 'a sifarish' to get yourselves a seat in, despite aircrafts operating on partial occupancy !
As an adult I have avoided the national career when I can and gone with Emirates, Eitihad, British Airways even Easy Jet.. I would definately want the money I pay to give me the utlity its meant to be and not the other way around. I see this as being a smart customer, because if we continue to patronise for shoddy service that is what we'll get as a consumer. Consumer awareness is some thing completely missing. A number of such instance and experiences have completely left me shocked.
Last December I was in Etihad airways reservation office in Lahore and went in simply to 'confirm my reservation' (a thing that is done on line or on the phone in most of the civilised world). I was greated by some two dozen would be passangers in the small offices and a lot chaos going on, 15 minutes later it dawned upon me that a 'ticket' was needed to get to one of the two customer services rep,.. who you would not believe I had to argue for 10 minutes to get one out (in where again the same number had been issued to three people), because of my shouting at the staff (and they shouting back at me) 10 other people realised that they required tickets as well, but believe you me not one of them seconded me in my greviences against the staff and all of them took on their tickets like sheeps being herded! Ofcourse I got my seats done after having threatened the staff that I would report to their corporate offices in Abu Dhabi and giving them another 15 minutes of lecture on customer services ethics and what their job was.
I say we will keep getting shoddy services and customs until we as consumers speak up for ourselves and demand that we get our money's worth. Things will only change then, in today's world the likes of PIA have to grow out of their deoformed middle ages plethora of an existence. Its the day and age of Open skies and Global service providers
My Dad has had similar customer loyalty with the national carrier and well all things national, he has been an expatriate for some 30 years and we always flew home in PIA, despite the fact that our tickets were company paid. Ofcourse things have gone from bad to worst over the years and the biggest hurdle is ofcourse 'reservation' and the need of some sort of 'a sifarish' to get yourselves a seat in, despite aircrafts operating on partial occupancy !
As an adult I have avoided the national career when I can and gone with Emirates, Eitihad, British Airways even Easy Jet.. I would definately want the money I pay to give me the utlity its meant to be and not the other way around. I see this as being a smart customer, because if we continue to patronise for shoddy service that is what we'll get as a consumer. Consumer awareness is some thing completely missing. A number of such instance and experiences have completely left me shocked.
Last December I was in Etihad airways reservation office in Lahore and went in simply to 'confirm my reservation' (a thing that is done on line or on the phone in most of the civilised world). I was greated by some two dozen would be passangers in the small offices and a lot chaos going on, 15 minutes later it dawned upon me that a 'ticket' was needed to get to one of the two customer services rep,.. who you would not believe I had to argue for 10 minutes to get one out (in where again the same number had been issued to three people), because of my shouting at the staff (and they shouting back at me) 10 other people realised that they required tickets as well, but believe you me not one of them seconded me in my greviences against the staff and all of them took on their tickets like sheeps being herded! Ofcourse I got my seats done after having threatened the staff that I would report to their corporate offices in Abu Dhabi and giving them another 15 minutes of lecture on customer services ethics and what their job was.
I say we will keep getting shoddy services and customs until we as consumers speak up for ourselves and demand that we get our money's worth. Things will only change then, in today's world the likes of PIA have to grow out of their deoformed middle ages plethora of an existence. Its the day and age of Open skies and Global service providers
