Air travelers file complaints with aviation regulators for a variety of reasons. Maybe it’s over safety concerns, or over airline refund policies, or over accessibility issues. Well, here’s a new one for me — flight attendants at Bangladesh’s national airline have been accused of running a romance scam, targeting business class passengers. Let me first share what’s being claimed, and then I’ll share my take.
In this post:
Flight attendants accused of ghosting, blackmail, and more
Two Biman Bangladesh Airlines flight attendants who are close friends have been accused of running a romance scam, whereby they’ve been blackmailing and extorting business class passengers (among others), under the guise of love. This involves everything from selling engagement rings, to blackmailing with explicit videos.
A formal complaint has been filed with the company’s managing director, along with the Civil Aviation Authority of Bangladesh (CAAB). The two flight attendants are being named publicly, though I won’t publish the names, since these are just accusations.
The first complaint came from a Bangladeshi businessman based in Qatar, who claims he met one of the flight attendants in October 2024, at a luxury hotel in Doha, where she introduced herself as crew for Biman.
According to the man, “she said she wanted a serious relationship, and next thing I knew, she was on my arm at the beach, asking me to shop for her.”
The two flew together several times while he was flying Biman business class, and the claim is that she “manipulated” the scheduling system in order to get on his flights. On August 7, 2025, around 10 months after the romance started, everything changed. While the two were at a hotel in Dhaka, the flight attendant told him “I don’t stay in a relationship with one person for more than two months, it’s better to change the test.” She then blocked him.
According to the man, “it wasn’t just emotional damage,” but “she took an iPhone 16 in pink, gifts, and my dignity,” and now he’s “being threatened by her other boyfriend, Ryan, who calls me to warn me to stay silent.” According to the man, the flight attendants are “using Biman’s image to lure professionals, doctors, executives, expats,” and “they’re not cabin crew, they’re con artists in uniform.”
The other flight attendant is accused of playing more of a long game, with marriage baiting and blackmail. The other man is a Bangladeshi national who filed a criminal case on July 20, 2025, accusing the Biman flight attendant of embezzling money, including wedding expenses, a diamond ring, and more, all under the false promise of marriage. He claims the amount came to nearly $18,000.
The couple had met on Facebook, and he flew Biman business class many times just to be with her. According to the man, “she promised to marry me on my birthday, September 25, and I gave her the ring,” and “then she said I had to pay for the entire wedding first.”
He paid, and then when he asked to have the wedding, the woman and her mother demanded gold and more cash. “She started asking for intimate photos and videos,” according to the man, and “later, she tried to blackmail me using those clips,” making him “a victim of fraud, emotionally, financially, and personally.”
Should I be more sympathetic than I am?
I of course don’t support anyone running a scam, and if this is a widespread issue, then action should absolutely be taken against these people. However, I can’t say that I’m overwhelmingly sympathetic… is that wrong? I dunno, maybe the fact that I’ve seen every episode of 90 Day Fiance and Love After Lockup has made me too jaded.
I feel sorry for people being scammed, especially when it’s seniors who might not know better. But if these are just well-off middle aged businessmen who are under the impression that women find them utterly irresistible without any ulterior motive, then maybe they need to look within.
By his own admission, the first guy acknowledged that shortly after they met, “she was on my arm at the beach, asking me to shop for her.” I feel like he must have been overlooking a lot of red flags. Meanwhile if you’re getting ready to marry someone, but they tell you that you have to pre-pay them for a wedding, that’s probably a decent time to cut your losses…
In the case of the Doha-based businessman, the flight attendant defended herself by claiming that “he proposed to me, not the other way around,” and that “when I saw he drinks too much and talks nonsense, I cut contact, and now he’s trying to ruin me.” That narrative can’t necessarily be ruled out either.
Bottom line
Two Biman Bangladesh Airlines flight attendants are accused of running a romance scam tag team operation, luring wealthy men, getting everything from them that they can, and then cutting ties. Obviously if that happened as claimed, it’s unethical, and shame on them.
At the same time, these guys need to take some accountability for just overlooking red flags, because they should’ve been suspicious, and that’s just based on their own version of what happened. I am curious if this was just a one-off situation, or if this duo had several men they were exploiting for money. Hopefully the airline does investigate, and if there are other similar claims, these two shouldn’t be working as flight attendants.
What do you make of this Biman Bangladesh romance scam claim?
FA s should be sacked
Ahhh Ben, aren’t you a believer in true love?
LOL !
Bangladesh lol
Gosh. We just call them gold diggers here in the states. You know, the ones that like to date your wallet.
This goes beyond simple gold digging.
You are very correct there UncleRonnie. Emotions, reputations et Al.
The conspiracy is even bigger than you know… i've been broken up with by employees of a hospital, a veterinarian, a university, and a restaurant.... after sinking literally 10s of hundreds of dollars into the relationship