V-Flyer

Hello all

So after quite a disapointing flight to Miami in June, we had a terrible flight back from San Francisco. Both in Upper.

While the clubhouses were good, seat OK (they are defiantly looking, and feeling, tired) and even the food was alright, it all fell down when it came to the Cabin Crew and the ground staff at SFO. It's not just a case of one person finding something rude, someone else finding friendly, a certain word starting with F was said, and it wasn't by us!

Now we are back home, we have written a letter and emailed it to VS, but have not received the normal auto-confirmation. If you look at the website, there are no listed email addresses, and no longer do they provide a phone number for customer relations. We gave up waiting in a queue on the phone earlier and choosing the "all other enquires" option.

Our latest experience has really put us off giving VS more money and are considering our options (after spending our miles most likely). I really can't see what Virgin can say that would make us feel better about this situation, but you never know. I guess they may have the opportunity to redeem themselves if we do spend our miles for a few more flights but there is a very bitter taste left currently.

Not much to reply to here but just wanted to share my feelings so far.

Agree Virgin's CS is bad, you can talk to someone but it is a long wait and response is not that great

With a Virgin holidays trip coming up soon, I'm getting very worried about what seems to be an ever increasing number of complaints about poor service and attitude of Virgin cabin crew. Do Virgin management monitor forums like this? If so, are they doing anything about it, as good customer service is surely essential to Virgin's success as a top airline.

I think comments about poor CC are rare, in my experience I've been lucky to have had excellent crew, consistently. There are other frustrating aspects of VS's service, for example I don't contact customer services but that does seem slow and boilerplate heavy.

Very disappointing Hamster.

I've had very good experiences onboard, there has always been the odd crew member here or there,but on the whole I've found VS crew to be far friendlier and helpful than other airlines.

My major gripe with VS is their CS Management at Crawley - in the past there was always an excuse for their excessive call wait times, crap email response times (7 days recently for a general enquiry) and their complaint turnaround - but what is the excuse now? There is no longer a backlog from the ash cloud or weather, so I question why there hasn't been more investment in such a vital aspect of their business.

For me, the grass is no greener - especially with BA. I will continue to remain loyal to VS whilst the onboard experience meets my expectations.

Hamster -- sorry to hear this.

Could you let us know a bit more about what happened?

hunterdwmgzt wrote:With a Virgin holidays trip coming up soon, I'm getting very worried about what seems to be an ever increasing number of complaints about poor service and attitude of Virgin cabin crew.

Although it does seem like that sometimes, particularly when looking at specific issues such as raised by the OP, I would avoid getting too worked up about it in advance of your trip. I don't want to make light of people's bad experiences, but having hung around here for a few years it seems to me that these things go in waves.

Have a look at

the-toolbox/flyer-ratings

to see the trend in opinions gathered from Trip Reports.

pjh wrote:

hunterdwmgzt wrote:With a Virgin holidays trip coming up soon, I'm getting very worried about what seems to be an ever increasing number of complaints about poor service and attitude of Virgin cabin crew.

Although it does seem like that sometimes, particularly when looking at specific issues such as raised by the OP, I would avoid getting too worked up about it in advance of your trip. I don't want to make light of people's bad experiences, but having hung around here for a few years it seems to me that these things go in waves.

Have a look at

the-toolbox/flyer-ratings

to see the trend in opinions gathered from Trip Reports.

I agree, and while it is obvious Hamster has had a disappointing experience, it is very rare that the crew tend to be the reason. Throughout all the issues Virgin have had over the recent years the one thing that has usually been the shining light helping to keep the VS brand alive has been the CC.

Hopefully this is a one off (can it be a one off it it happened on two different flights ?| :w ) ) and not a new trend or issue.

hunterdwmgzt wrote:With a Virgin holidays trip coming up soon, I'm getting very worried about what seems to be an ever increasing number of complaints about poor service and attitude of Virgin cabin crew. Do Virgin management monitor forums like this? If so, are they doing anything about it, as good customer service is surely essential to Virgin's success as a top airline.

I wouldn't worry, I have taken many trips and most have been fine. Also on these flights we felt that everyone else received a better service.

Neil wrote:Hopefully this is a one off (can it be a one off it it happened on two different flights ?| :w ) ) and not a new trend or issue.

Well if it was just the Miami flight I wouldn't be quite so annoyed. But as in the past I have questioned Virgin over why I seemed to get singled out for meal changes despite my FC status, and that I felt I was being picked for my age, these latest experiences again seem heavily based towards our relative young age.

Got through to someone at VS today to ask about the emails, they didn't know why we didn't get an auto response and couldn't see our email in either of the inboxes we sent to. She gave us her email address to send to, but again we don't think that has gone through as she hasn't replied like she said she would when she got it... ?|

It will most likely be back to good old Special Delivery.

hunterdwmgzt wrote:With a Virgin holidays trip coming up soon, I'm getting very worried about what seems to be an ever increasing number of complaints about poor service and attitude of Virgin cabin crew. Do Virgin management monitor forums like this? If so, are they doing anything about it, as good customer service is surely essential to Virgin's success as a top airline.

Do bear in mind that V-Flyers are not typical passengers - many are very frequent fliers and are therefore more interested than most in the fine details of the running of the airline, so are more likely to comment on its weaknesses - and strengths.

If you read the Flyertalk forums you'll find similar comments about virtually every airline. I suspect the vast majority of VS passengers are perfectly satisfied but where there are issues - and every business has its issues - they tend to get flagged up here and end up conveying a distorted impression of the overall picture.

VS may not be perfect but it's better than many.

So just a little update as Virgin now see the matter closed.

As I said in my original post that both my flights to and from SFO in June were bad on-board service wise, my main points being;

All other Gold’s in the A-zone on outbound and inbound were spoken to individually by the FSM but I was left out and not a word about loyalty was mentioned. I really do believe that this is down to my relatively young age and I have had these thoughts in the past when being asked to change meal options.

At the SFO check in I was told I could only take 3 bags, when it was pointed out I was gold she said “Who gold card holder? He (pointed) no gold card holder!”, my FC number was on my ticket and when I produced my gold card she didn’t say a word and processed the 4th bag.

Kept being referred to as “Lads” and at one point “Boys” on the return, we do not look like a couple of “lads”!

But the major point was that on the return sector my partner was told that there was not enough of his meal option and would he have something else, he was the first to be asked so FC status was totally ignored (we could clearly see the manifest, as you can on all flights, only about 2 or 3 other gold’s and a few silvers, plenty of reds), but when he stated that there was nothing else on the menu that he would want to eat the CC got up turned around and said “For f**k’s sake!”. We both heard this so it wasn’t the case of one of us mishearing something. We decided not to take it up with the FSM as they had already ignored us, and the rest of the crew weren’t that polite so probably wasn’t running things very well.

So, on our arrival home we sent an email off regarding the above points.

The first reply started off by apologising for the delay in replying (took 5 weeks) and explained that due to the “serious nature” of the letter they had to investigate it fully. Then it waffled on about how long each of the crew have been working for VS blah blah blah. It went on to say “I note you mention you retrieved some company documentation with regard to passenger details”, obviously talking about the manifest that we clearly stated in our email, was stuck up to the wall by the galley. Goes on to deny that the FSM spoke individually to any of the passengers (I thought that was a strange thing to add?). Further down, the crew are spoken about again and how it “would never be their intention to be discourteous”. Finished with the normal thank you for your feedback drivel.

Right, in my book, you are discourteous for not holding the door open for someone, not saying please and thank you etc, minor things, maybe they can get away with saying that being called “lads” etc is discourteous. But, when walking away from a customer and saying “For f**k’s sake” is NOT discourteous, it’s rude and insulting. And how can a complaint of a “serious nature” be fobbed off by saying the crew didn’t mean to be discourteous?

We felt we had to reply to the letter stating clearly that we still weren’t happy and what we wanted, was for an apology for the crew member swearing at my partner, and we did.

Got a reply a couple weeks later, really didn’t say a lot, was a printed letter with big font to fill the page. The only main thing it said was that she couldn’t disclose the results of any investigations and if any disciplinary action came of them. We had not asked for anything of the sort! We had simply asked for an apology for the swearing. This was the last straw; we booked our next trips on BA (F). We also decided, so Virgin could improve, to send one final letter saying how disappointed we were that they couldn’t say “sorry”, that we had booked with BA, and sent a copy of the itineraries. We thought that would be the end of it and didn’t really expect a reply, maybe a reply in the style of Greg saying that it is disappointing but hope we give them a chance in the near future etc etc. But today I got a phone call from someone in the CR team, and she said, “I can’t see what your problem is”, I tried to explain again that swearing is not discourteous, but she insisted otherwise and refused to directly say sorry for the swearing claiming that everything was covered by the discourtesy comment. I asked her to phone my partner as I was getting nowhere with her, but she said the same things to him, but did add that it was “unfortunate that we had decided to fly BA instead”.


Sorry this is has been so long, I didn’t expect it to be when I started typing, but having a bit of a rant does help. I’m not expecting sympathy; not sure I would get any anyway, but thought I would follow up on my first post.


Looking forward to going BA F

That doesn't sound good Hamster. Doesn't seem the right approach. Why couldn't VS just apologise for the incident? v(

TBH I get some interesting looks with a AU card because of my age. Usually when checking in at T3 and being directed to the Economy Check In!

Would be interesting to see a Trip Report in F! Have a good time when you go and look forward to that trip report y)

:0 If a crewmember said that, it is truly shocking.

Are you dealing with head office, or the normal complaints people?

Out of interest, how old are you (roughly) -- just to get a sense of perspective on the age issue.

Your best ultimate recourse is to withdraw your custom from VS, so I think that by booking BA you have done a sensible thing (and First beats UC).

EDIT: PS I agree it is very irritating when your status is questioned based on appearance. This has happened to me.

Blimy Hamster, sounds shit... excuse my language people..

I have only ever seen need to complain to VS CS team once, and like yourself I just vented on the phone to one of their supervisors.. diff I suppose is that he apologised and gave me some miles to get rid of me... mental note if your mileage balance is a little low. ):

If I were you I would have called the crew member to account there and then, a simple excuse me, raise eyebrow and make it clear you heard what they said... shame and embarrassment usually does the rest. 8D

I too am a young(ish) AU so I know what you mean about that look of; really he is AU... ok then. Usually I welcome a bit of playful banter and have yet to meet a VS staffer that steps over that line into discourtesy, perhaps I have been lucky. It really does depend on what you are expecting. All a bit of fun in my book, and usually leads to conversations about how you travel so much, where do you find time, job etc..

I shall be travelling through SFO next month so not to worry will give your best to the check in staff.. ): ):

It is a shame that VS have lost your custom from here on out.. You did give them ample opportunity to make things right by you, but tbh unless someone else steps forward they may have no proof against said CC if he denies saying the swear word. In that instance there is very little they could have done unfortunately.

Thanks for keeping us in the loop. Look forward to reading the TR from the BA First flight... assuming you will be hanging around v-flyer that is, maybe give VS a chance to redeem one day ? lol. Maybe not ..

at240 wrote::0 If a crewmember said that, it is truly shocking.

Are you dealing with head office, or the normal complaints people?

Out of interest, how old are you (roughly) -- just to get a sense of perspective on the age issue.

Your best ultimate recourse is to withdraw your custom from VS, so I think that by booking BA you have done a sensible thing (and First beats UC).

EDIT: PS I agree it is very irritating when your status is questioned based on appearance. This has happened to me.

Emails have been with the executive office

The woman who called said she was the Customer Relations Manager, or something similar.

I'm 21.

It is a shame that I will now avoid VS, but their product is nothing compared to what it was, and customer service is shocking recently. I'm not saying that BA is perfect, but VS have gone down hill, and from talking to friends, BA has really upped it's game customer service wise.

joeyc wrote:I have only ever seen need to complain to VS CS team once, and like yourself I just vented on the phone to one of their supervisors.. diff I suppose is that he apologised and gave me some miles to get rid of me... mental note if your mileage balance is a little low. ):

If I were you I would have called the crew member to account there and then, a simple excuse me, raise eyebrow and make it clear you heard what they said... shame and embarrassment usually does the rest. 8D

I too am a young(ish) AU so I know what you mean about that look of; really he is AU... ok then. Usually I welcome a bit of playful banter and have yet to meet a VS staffer that steps over that line into discourtesy, perhaps I have been lucky. It really does depend on what you are expecting. All a bit of fun in my book, and usually leads to conversations about how you travel so much, where do you find time, job etc..

I shall be travelling through SFO next month so not to worry will give your best to the check in staff.. ): ):

It is a shame that VS have lost your custom from here on out.. You did give them ample opportunity to make things right by you, but tbh unless someone else steps forward they may have no proof against said CC if he denies saying the swear word. In that instance there is very little they could have done unfortunately.

Thanks for keeping us in the loop. Look forward to reading the TR from the BA First flight... assuming you will be hanging around v-flyer that is, maybe give VS a chance to redeem one day ? lol. Maybe not ..

I did get a few points.
Yes we should of said something there and then, if it was on the ground I’m sure something would of been said, but stuck on a flight with 9/10 hours left with everyone watching/listening if it becomes a bit of a scene puts you off. Plus you really don't expect it so it is a bit of a shock and you don’t react very quickly.
I will still be around here on V-Flyer (sorry ). I am sure I will post a TR in January.
I don’t quite know what to do with my points now... Partner airlines seem the best bet while I’m still upset about it all.

Once again it's the point about not being so much about the initial mistake/issue, but how they respond to it. I've worked in customer services roles in my distant past (sadly I don't come into the 'young' AU category), and several times I've apologised to customers that have felt wronged in some way, in the interests of diplomacy and good relations; and regardless of whether or not I had proof of what they were saying.

It's really not that hard is it, or perhaps somoeone thought you were teeing up for a legal claim of some sort (verbal assault??).

I suppose a letter to SRB might still be an option if you've not already given up the will to fight. But then the fact that they didn't even lob a bunch of miles in your direction (i.e. the 'stock answer') suggests that someone really might have it in for you!

The other thing that bugs me about this is that - you're 21 and an AU. Isn't that exactly the sort of high value/high potential customer that VS should be bending over backwards to keep and develop?

Hamster wrote:I'm 21.

I am not far ahead of you on the age front (turning 25 in two days ).. I also had an AU card at 21 - you do get a few looks of curiosity but I would just say take it in your stride and play along with the banter that comes along.

ratechaser is right though, from a business standpoint get them whilst their young.. ):

Hamster wrote:I don’t quite know what to do with my points now... Partner airlines seem the best bet while I’m still upset about it all.

Give it a bit of time, VS customer service may very well improve. Points can be transferred over to hotel partner programs too so if you really are done with VS I would say have a look into that.

Cheers y)

ratechaser wrote:But then the fact that they didn't even lob a bunch of miles in your direction (i.e. the 'stock answer') suggests that someone really might have it in for you!

I did get some points

Hamster wrote:So just a little update as Virgin now see the matter closed.

As I said in my original post that both my flights to and from SFO in June were bad on-board service wise, my main points being;

All other Gold’s in the A-zone on outbound and inbound were spoken to individually by the FSM but I was left out and not a word about loyalty was mentioned. I really do believe that this is down to my relatively young age and I have had these thoughts in the past when being asked to change meal options.

At the SFO check in I was told I could only take 3 bags, when it was pointed out I was gold she said “Who gold card holder? He (pointed) no gold card holder!”, my FC number was on my ticket and when I produced my gold card she didn’t say a word and processed the 4th bag.

Kept being referred to as “Lads” and at one point “Boys” on the return, we do not look like a couple of “lads”!

But the major point was that on the return sector my partner was told that there was not enough of his meal option and would he have something else, he was the first to be asked so FC status was totally ignored (we could clearly see the manifest, as you can on all flights, only about 2 or 3 other gold’s and a few silvers, plenty of reds), but when he stated that there was nothing else on the menu that he would want to eat the CC got up turned around and said “For f**k’s sake!”. We both heard this so it wasn’t the case of one of us mishearing something. We decided not to take it up with the FSM as they had already ignored us, and the rest of the crew weren’t that polite so probably wasn’t running things very well.

So, on our arrival home we sent an email off regarding the above points.

The first reply started off by apologising for the delay in replying (took 5 weeks) and explained that due to the “serious nature” of the letter they had to investigate it fully. Then it waffled on about how long each of the crew have been working for VS blah blah blah. It went on to say “I note you mention you retrieved some company documentation with regard to passenger details”, obviously talking about the manifest that we clearly stated in our email, was stuck up to the wall by the galley. Goes on to deny that the FSM spoke individually to any of the passengers (I thought that was a strange thing to add?). Further down, the crew are spoken about again and how it “would never be their intention to be discourteous”. Finished with the normal thank you for your feedback drivel.

Right, in my book, you are discourteous for not holding the door open for someone, not saying please and thank you etc, minor things, maybe they can get away with saying that being called “lads” etc is discourteous. But, when walking away from a customer and saying “For f**k’s sake” is NOT discourteous, it’s rude and insulting. And how can a complaint of a “serious nature” be fobbed off by saying the crew didn’t mean to be discourteous?

We felt we had to reply to the letter stating clearly that we still weren’t happy and what we wanted, was for an apology for the crew member swearing at my partner, and we did.

Got a reply a couple weeks later, really didn’t say a lot, was a printed letter with big font to fill the page. The only main thing it said was that she couldn’t disclose the results of any investigations and if any disciplinary action came of them. We had not asked for anything of the sort! We had simply asked for an apology for the swearing. This was the last straw; we booked our next trips on BA (F). We also decided, so Virgin could improve, to send one final letter saying how disappointed we were that they couldn’t say “sorry”, that we had booked with BA, and sent a copy of the itineraries. We thought that would be the end of it and didn’t really expect a reply, maybe a reply in the style of Greg saying that it is disappointing but hope we give them a chance in the near future etc etc. But today I got a phone call from someone in the CR team, and she said, “I can’t see what your problem is”, I tried to explain again that swearing is not discourteous, but she insisted otherwise and refused to directly say sorry for the swearing claiming that everything was covered by the discourtesy comment. I asked her to phone my partner as I was getting nowhere with her, but she said the same things to him, but did add that it was “unfortunate that we had decided to fly BA instead”.


Sorry this is has been so long, I didn’t expect it to be when I started typing, but having a bit of a rant does help. I’m not expecting sympathy; not sure I would get any anyway, but thought I would follow up on my first post.


Looking forward to going BA F

I'm not excusing it, but it is somewhat of a cultural thing to refer to your age group as Lads and I guess we're all different but I wouldn't be offended by it.

Hamster, very disappointing indeed.

Sounds like the CC was having a bad day, but that is in no way a justification for the use of foul language in front of a customer. I totally agree with the way you have handled this matter and would have expected VS to at the very least offer an apology and say sorry, It costs nothing!

You mentioned that the lady who called was a manager, well saying she couldn't see what the problem was comes across as unprofessional in my book. I know it's the CC's word against yours, but regardless of what occurred, in the interests of good customer relations, an apology should have been offered at the very least.

I'm a manager ( albeit within Finance) and its one of the first things I do if I have to respond to a letter / call regarding a lack of professional service.( luckily it happens very rarely).

I do feel for you and it's unfortunate that VS couldn't resolve this to avoid losing a valued customer.

simonallardice wrote:I'm not excusing it, but it is somewhat of a cultural thing to refer to your age group as Lads and I guess we're all different but I wouldn't be offended by it.

I do undertand what you mean, and I guess Lads doesn't offend me, more annoys me. But I still dont think you should call 2 people in Upper Class Lads. It might be ok in PE and Y, and possibly for a big group of young men in Upper.

simonallardice wrote:I'm not excusing it, but it is somewhat of a cultural thing to refer to your age group as Lads and I guess we're all different but I wouldn't be offended by it.

I'm of the same opinion.

And the point of being sworn at: Unprofessional - definitely. Discourteous - possibly. Worth dragging out a complaint about - probably not. Granted, people take things differently and what wouldn't bother me might be a big deal for somebody else. At the end of the day theres bigger issues in the world than a four letter word that slipped out when it shouldn't!

Were all different though and things that really bug me might not bother other people.

at240 wrote::0 If a crewmember said that, it is truly shocking.

...

Your best ultimate recourse is to withdraw your custom from VS, so I think that by booking BA you have done a sensible thing (and First beats UC).

+1, enjoy First. BAEC Gold won't take long with frequent flights in F.

Use up the VS miles and move on - they obviously don't want/need your custom...!

jwhite9185 wrote: At the end of the day theres bigger issues in the world than a four letter word that slipped out when it shouldn't!

I really do agree with that comment, but it can be applied to anything!

The problem was that this issue was big for me at the time and in the circumstances. If I did only have a short time left I wouldn't care what she had said.

I do know that the F word being said isn’t the end of the world, and thats why I haven’t chained myself to a fence in Crawley on a hunger strike. I took a few minutes to write a few letter and gave up when I was getting nowhere.