Nigerian womenswear designer Wana Sambo has recently had a bad experience flying with Arik Air, and isn’t playing games when it comes to letting them know, penning an open letter to the airline on her Instagram page.
The talent, whose Instagram following is currently at 29.9K, wrote yesterday that Arik’s staff were “rude”, “derogatory” and “dismissive”, and not up to scratch in customer service etiquette when dealing with queries regarding her delayed flight.
Ms Sambo posted;
“Here’s an open note to ARIK airline @flyarikair. Please see to it that your staff do better with customer service on both your international and local flights as I’ve had the worst experiences with some of your employees on my international trip 2 months ago and another on a local trip just today.
Your staff are often rude with complete disregard for customer service etiquettes. I do not understand how a simple “hello, will the flight be delayed today?” can lead to a reply like “ask me again, can’t you see the flight time on your ticket? Are you blind?”((((WOW)))) being thrown back by such response I ask “excuse me?” only to get a “my friend excuse me”, in the most derogatory [and] dismissive tone.
I spent 5hrs waiting for a flight on Friday the 1st of July and today, I was booked on an 11am flight when I got a clear confirmation over the phone for a 3pm flight. On getting to the airport, I had to pay an additional “no show” fee for an error which wasn’t my fault and then asking your operations manager if we’ll be experiencing flight delay, etc led to me being disrespected just before boarding a flight.
I would narrate a series of experiences like this which have occurred with friends and family while flying ARIK airline, but I’ll rather leave it here.
It’s not ok for your staff to leave people disoriented and crying at the airport just before boarding a flight. It’s completely unacceptable. Kindly fix this issue. @flyarikair@flyarikair@flyarikair“
Since posting, the designer’s following have responded with their comments, with nearly 50 replies echoing similar experiences – one user posting;
“@wanasambo thanks for this post. @flyarikair same experience I had 2 years ago and even last year on an international flight a friend booked to the UK. Personally, I think Nigerian businesses don’t understand who the customer is.
Your attitude and total disregard for time is very irritating and wrong. Please work on it. [I] personally won’t fly @flyarikair ever again.”
While other users wrote with their agreement, one posting “100% correct @wanasambo it’s so unacceptable”, it doesn’t appear to have generated a social media response from Arik Air as yet, despite the company being tagged by serval people throughout the conversation.
But what do you think to this method of complaint? And what do you think to the airline? Tell us your thoughts on Arik Air’s customer service below in the comments box and whether you agree with Wana Sambo’s open Instagram letter.
Image source: @Wanasambo
