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Horrible and consistent bad treatment of Sky Team Partners by Air France

Horrible and consistent bad treatment of Sky Team Partners by Air France

Old Jul 11th, 2011, 04:44 PM
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Horrible and consistent bad treatment of Sky Team Partners by Air France

My wife and I were flying on full fare tickets all the times I mentioned.

THIS is NOT a DELTA problem. I am a Delta platinum elite and my wife is a gold elite and we have been for many, many years with Northwest. I think I might have 3,000,000 frequent flyer miles over my lifetime. In the last 6 months or so the treatment my wife and I, and apparently many, many others, have gotten at the hands of Air France has been nothing short of disgraceful. In November 2010, coming out of Paris on the 3rd of December they put us in the center of a 4 seat isle in the back of the plane. We were on a full fare tickets. My wife was ill, so the poor person on her end of the isle was really in a bad place. We did complain when we got back to Atlanta and to the Platinum line on several occasions. Delta representatives said they were getting a lot of complaints from Delta elites like us and even they personally had bad experiences with Air France and tried not to fly them. This past May, we incurred another bad experience with Air France when we flew from Atlanta to Paris on flight AF 683. We had booked our flight personally through the Delta 800 line and were assigned in rows 35,36. When we checked in the day of the flight we had been put in row 47 in the back in the middle two seats. I called the Elite line for Delta and was told they were locked out of Air Frances seating reservations and that we would have to check at the gate for other seating options. When we got to the gate in Atlanta, the Air France staff was less than friendly, and basically gave us the cold shoulder. A rather nasty guy at the Air France gate, told us the flight was over booked and we were lucky to get seats at all. I was polite and calm and reminded them I had 3,000,000 frequent flyer miles with Delta-Northwest but this was the worst my wife and I had ever been treated in 30 years. We were pretty much told to count our blessings that we even had seats and then to “go sit down and wait for boarding.” Only upon boarding did they miraculously find 2 seats in about row 43-42 on the isle across from each other. On the connecting flight from CDG to Naples on the 7th of May we finally found some very nice girls who saw we were madder than Hell and were at least civil at the Air France elite check- in at CDG. They said they would fix that right now. SOOO sorry. They put in the VERY LAST ROW of the plane. HOWEVER, they did tell us that our Skymiles numbers had never been put in the Air France system. I talked to others in the Delta Skymiles club and this was a frequent experience.
Needless to say, in the future we will avoid flying Air France. I would advise anyone reading this to stay clear particularly if you are a sky team elite. These people don’t give a crap and are eager to tell you so. This not a DELTA PROBLEM and they gave us some certificates for each of us, for bringing this to their attention with details they needed to confirm our complaints. We did file a complaint with Air France and Delta. We got a detailed reply from Delta in a couple of weeks. Last week got a so sorry email from Air France.
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Old Jul 11th, 2011, 06:37 PM
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In my experience AirFrance ranks far below Delta, KLM and Kenya Airways, but as an elite with Delta, my options are restricted depending on route.

There have been other complaints about AirFrance on this forum
http://www.fodors.com/community/air-...t-together.cfm

I now know what to expect from AirFrance and will plan accordingly.
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Old Jul 11th, 2011, 09:47 PM
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Not the biggest Air France fan, but I would offer that you can check your seats and FF number yourself. Go to airfrance.us and plug in your Delta confirmation number under manage my booking. You can choose seats (long-haul only) and verify/change your FF number.
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Old Jul 12th, 2011, 01:39 AM
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Let me get this straight.

This entire horrible and consistent bad treatment rant boils down to:

1. a single one trip where you had middle seats, not aisle, and

2. a second trip where you almost got stuck in a middle seat, but AF did move you to aisle seats but you had to sit 2' apart from each other across the aisle.

3. Hearsay complaints from other passengers.

I have no opinion about AF, but for a 3,000,000 miler you don't seem to be a very savvy traveler. You could have easily checked your seats and FF miles as tg suggests. And surely you could have done some homework before choosing AF in the first place and found out how horrible they treat Delta elites. You also don't seem to be aware that yes, in fact seats may open up at the last minute due to no shows, etc, and it's not really a miracle, but a common occurrence on very full flights.

In the scheme of things I really think you're making a mountain out of a mole hill. The attitude you project here on Fodors comes across as very demanding, prima donna type personality. I would not be surprised if you projected the same persona at check-in and the AF agent said to herself "I have plenty of seats I can move them to but this s.o.b. is being a royal p.i.t.a. to me and I'll show him who's in charge..."

Honey attracts a lot more flies than vinegar, and I sense a lot of acid in your attitude.
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Old Jul 12th, 2011, 04:06 AM
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Typical distorted all negative whiny grudge post

www.airlinequality.com/Forum/af.htm

doing your honework on coach in AF wise.

No One on AF cares at all about your "status" on Delta

They make no guarantees on seating like all others or upgrades

That is typical always of other carriers that codeshare

First class on AF is awesome a tonne better than Delta for me

Delta also sucky in coach for me lots of times so suck it up

Coach can be cramped still not bad compared to many others.
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Old Jul 12th, 2011, 04:16 AM
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No One on AF cares at all about your "status" on Delta

They are supposed to provide priority seating to SkyTeam elite and elite plus members. When they don't, it is a legitimate complaint.

That is typical always of other carriers that codeshare

Delta and Air France do more than just codeshare. They operate their TATL services as a joint venture. Quite a different situation.

First class on AF is awesome a tonne better than Delta for me

Considering that Delta does not offer long-haul first class, exactly what is AF's first class better than? Considering the pricing differential, I would certainly hope it is better than business class on both carriers.
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Old Jul 12th, 2011, 03:09 PM
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No, I think this poster is complaining about having reserved seats taken away and then given intentionally bad seats even when a Sky Team Elite. Happened to me, very similar. Was NW elite, reserved bulkhead one way and good seats near the front on return (Papeete). Outbound, got given two middle seats at the airport, just a shoulder shrug when I said not the seats I had reserved which I still had when checked in on line. On returns, they put all the local residents in the front of the cabin and displaced any one with reservations in that area to the last four rows. KLM did the same thing, at a time we were both elites, but not quite as bad it was in the business cabin so the seats could only be so bad. All paid itineraries. There was at least one more incident that I can't recall. So I agree, the Sky European carriers don't care you are elite on Delta (or old NW) and seem to take pleasure in "stealing" your seat reservation.

Guess what--I've cleaned out my delta miles and won't fly on the alliance any more even when it is cheaper or faster. All my flights and miles are Oneworld or star. Now, Oneworld has the BA problem...but that's another story.
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Old Jul 12th, 2011, 06:53 PM
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I took the OP's tone to be more 'buyer beware' and I agree with his low opinion of AF.
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Old Jul 12th, 2011, 07:26 PM
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This is totally consistent with AF's corporate attitude towards seat assignments. True when I flew them about 5 years ago, true when my parents did a couple times 2-4 years ago, same now. In short, they always see seat assignments as a courtesy. They let you choose seats, but they can and DO reassign them as they wish without any reason or notification.

Basically, if assigned seats are important to a flyer (and that applies to many of us), fly other airlines. Until they're solid proof they've changed that attitude.
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Old Jul 13th, 2011, 05:49 AM
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I disagree that this is a whiny post by a prima donna. Its about a corporate policy inre to seating assignments that has affected the OP 3 times and others as well. Contrary to other posters whose first and usually last post here is a vent about something this OP has been around for a few yrs. There is a difference between righteous indignation and a self serving acidic attitude and I think this case shows the former. Actually Ipod it seems you are the acidic one. JM2C.
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Old Jul 13th, 2011, 12:47 PM
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FYI Bobtrav-the AF crews are horrible to other airline crew members. It is the standard joke with my airline to try and get past them in customs as they take forever (and they are all going to their layover hotel)and quite a few of us commute to other cities. When we ask them if we could get ahead as our commuter flight leaves in less than 30 minutes it is always NO!
Thank God for Global Entry for me!!!!
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Old Jul 14th, 2011, 09:03 AM
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In support of both ipod and the OP. I agree that the way the post is worded does make it sound like the poster believes they are more "entitled" than others, but then I read the responses, and understand that the poster perhaps is justified in his feelings.
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Old Jul 14th, 2011, 09:04 AM
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BTW, I've just scratched Air France off my list! I know I would not deal well with the random seat-relocation issue, even if I'm NOT a gazillion-mile flyer.
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Old May 13th, 2014, 03:29 AM
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Alex Dol , Vice President of Sales at Axal SA, a full french subsidiary of Air France KLM Group in charge of Air France partnerships commented that an investigation is still underway to determine what went wrong. Usually in these type of situations the airline is trying to compensate the angry passengers as fast as possible.
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Old May 13th, 2014, 05:53 AM
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aldol, you say "the airline is trying to compensate the angry passengers as fast as possible" - did you notice that this post is from 2011? That doesn't seem very fast.
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Old May 13th, 2014, 10:46 PM
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Weird that new member 'aldol' has a very similar name as this Alex Dol . . .
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