To begin with,

1. Seating: I understand that budget airlines have minimal leg space in order to accommodate maximum passengers in the aircraft. This is often excused by the passenger as the flight duration is lesser and the fare paid is also less. However, the Airbus 320 on which I travelled for 4.5 hours from Kochi to Singapore does not warrant the same. The fare that was charged was equivalent to that of a full service airline, however, the seating was similar to that of a budget airline. How are passengers supposed to sit in such a position uncomfortably for so long? My family & I used this airline simply because there is no other non stop flight to Singapore from Kochi. Now, I think, I should have opted to take a flight on some other airline which had a stopover. My parents developed swelling on their feet & knees as they had to sit in those cramped seats for such a long time. It has been more than a month & the swelling on my mother’s knee has not subsided yet. Disgusting seating & deplorable experience.

2. The Inflight service: I have been using air travel for the past 25 years, and this must be the first airline I have seen that takes 1.5 hrs after take off to serve special meals to a fraction of the passengers AFTER which the rest of the aircraft is served. On both flights, I received my meals after 2.5hrs, half way through the journey. What type of service is this? I don’t even want to get into the meals, on both times, before the stewardesses reached our seats, meals got over, my mother being a vegetarian had to forego her meal, as it was over by the time it reached us. In fact, now, I think it was good. The meal quality was horrible and so minimal, I don’t see why any meals were served in the first place.

3. In-flight entertainment: Oh, I am sorry, there is nothing to mention here because there is nothing! Some episodes of Mr. Bean & some episodes of people playing pranks on one another, Yuck! Is this the standard of singapore airlines? Disgusting!

4. Baggage: If things couldn’t get any worse, on my return flight from Kochi to Singapore, I received my baggage in a damaged condition. (Picture attached)

Now let me go into the harrowing experience I have had airing my concerns to Singapore Airlines & Silk Air. I submitted this complaint on the Singapore Airlines website on 15th April, to which I promptly received a reply on 17th April from Ms. Soumya Antony (soumya_antony@singaporeair.com.sg) informing me that they were looking into the issue. I sent in a reminder email on 20th to which there was no reply. Later on 25th April, I sent in a ‘not so gentle’ reminder to which I received some justification (for justification sake) the next day about how the inflight entertainment is limited because it is not cost effective as that would mean more weight on the aircraft. Excuse me? What about my damaged luggage? What about the seating? Wait a second, if extra weight is not cost effective, why exactly is metal cutlery provided with the meals? I replied promptly, asking her about the rest of my queries to which there has been no response despite repeated reminders on 1st and on 7th of May.

I realised that this was a lost cause, which is when I decided to embrace Social Media! I posted my concern on the Singapore Airlines & Silk Air Facebook pages on 28th April, following which I promptly received an instruction to email the details to sq_social@singaporeair.com.sg. I emailed the details along with my ticket & photos of my damaged luggage on 29th April to which I promptly received a response apologising for my experience and with a note that the concern had been forwarded to the concerned authorities.

Guess what happened after that?

Yeah, you guessed right, no response!

I am sick and tired of following up on this over & again. It says a lot about the ‘award’ winning customer service.

How exactly is Singapore Airlines an award winning airline?

I request you to please support this cause & sign the petition so that this does not happen to any passenger in the future.

I frequently scrutinize my account to make sure that no strange activity takes place causing problems for me. Knowing that the bank closed on Wednesday, May 2, 2012 at 6:00 p.m., I went online to see if the check was processed resulting in a 35.00 NSF fee. I was relieved to see that my account had 4.00 in it so I felt safe in knowing i would get the money deposited early on May 3rd.

When I went to Wells Fargo at 9:26 a.m. on May 3rd, I deposited 450.00–more than enough to cover the 300.00 check! I got a receipt documenting that my balance was 4.29 (that had been in my account for several days) + the 450.00 I deposited (for a total of 454.29)!

I left the bank feeling relieved that I deposited the money to cover the check before the check got processed!

Low and behold, when I read my emails at 1:07 p.m. (over 3 hours after I deposited the money), I was notified by Wells Fargo that I had a NSF fee of 35.00!! I then walked to Wells Fargo and confronted them about the fee.

They told me the check came in after hours on May 2nd and I didn’t deposit the money until May 3rd and that was why I was accessed the fee.

I responded that the check came to the bank via computer when nobody was there, so the check was not processed until AFTER I deposited the money! The manager showed me the computer screen that showed that the check came in on May 2nd, but still it wasn’t processed until after I made the deposit!

I responded that 2 things are going to happen when they “PROCESS” the check–1. There will be enough money in the account to pay the check or 2. There won’t be enough money in the account to pay the check. In my case, when they processed the check (which was easily AFTER I deposited the money) the money WAS IN MY ACCOUNT to pay the check!!

The outrageous and unacceptable conduct by Wells Fargo in looking at the Computer and reasoning that since the check came in the night before AFTER HOURS and I made the deposit later (even though there WERE funds in my account to cover the check) that they could assess a 35.00 fee for NSF is nothing short of “STEALING” my money!!

The fact that my account didn’t show any NSF notice nor did I get one until more than 3 hours after my deposit shows how glaring their greed is!!

It is pretty sad that people like me are helpless in this society against Big Business like Banks. This is what really outrages me!! If anyone can point me in the right direction as far as any breach of any law or code that may exist so I can draft and file my own lawsuit and expose Wells Fargo to the public as being the cheats that they are, I’d really appreciate it!!

I checked online to see if other customers were experiencing the same problems as I was and to my dismay there are dozens of customers who ordered 10 times the amount of merchandise in recent weeks that are still waiting on receipt of their orders and cannot (like myself) get them to respond in any way – complete lack of communication and customer service – better name for it would be internet fraud!

Please help!