Emirates Bans First Class Passenger For Legitimate Credit Card Dispute

Here is what we went through with Emirates and post this incident I have Stopped flying with them.

To whom it may concern

I am writing to register a complaint of a very serious nature with reference to booking number ECPW66.

My daughters aged 9 and 12 were scheduled to travel as unaccompanied minors from Karachi to Singapore via Dubai on July 14. When making arrangements for them to travel unaccompanied, I was assured by Emirates staff at the Karachi ticketing office that a female staff member will be assigned to my daughters and will be with them from the time they arrive at the airport till they are taken through to the aircraft where the crew will take charge. Upon arrival at Karachi airport, we were informed by a gentleman (Iqbal) from DNATA/Gerry’s that no female staff is available to escort the girls. Coincidentally, as their maternal grandparents were also booked on the same flight, I did not hesitate to hand the children to his custody.

Shortly after, I received a call from my 12-year-old daughter, Emaan Hashwani, saying that she is not being allowed to board and a PCR test is being requested. As per the rules of the Singapore government and Emirates travel guidelines, there is no testing, vaccination or quarantine requirements for children born in the year 2010 or after. It transpired that Emirates check-in staff took it upon themselves to ask for this additional requirement because they misinterpreted the vaccination rules – while Emaan by virtue of her age does not require vaccination to enter Singapore, she is recently vaccinated; she received her first dose of Pfizer shortly after her 12th birthday on June 13 and her second dose on July 13. Emirates ground staff insisted that a “new rule” had been issued on July 1, 2022 which is not visible on any traveler-facing site about a 14 day gap required post-vaccination before travel is allowed. They were asking for a negative PCR test as a “solution” to a rule that doesn’t exist and/or was being grossly misinterpreted. My younger daughter was free to board, but they were adamant that Emaan did not meet the criteria so at best they would send word to Dubai (Covid Compliance Centre) and Singapore. Distressingly, Emirates staff, a Mr Anthony DeGama on the ground at the time, did not have the decency to speak to me about any of this. He flatly refused to communicate with me. My father-in-law checking in himself at the counter attempted to argue the case with evidence from both the Singapore government and Emirates website. He was rudely dismissed and was told that he could also be offloaded. Emirates staff assumed that my father-in-law was the children’s guardian - I trust him implicitly but as the children’s unaccompanied travel was booked and paid for before their grandparents also booked on the same flight, there was no need to appoint my father-in-law as their guardian for the flight. On this basis, they refused to speak to me. This is unacceptable on so many levels. My children were entrusted to Emirates (not DNATA or for purposes of the flight to their grandparents), indeed we paid extra for them to travel as unaccompanied minors, and no one from Emirates felt it necessary to communicate with me. They treated my children and father-in-law disrespectfully, refusing to listen to reason and claiming to adhere to rules that do not exist.

While we waited on word from Dubai, I called the Emirates call center in Dubai directly. I spoke to a very helpful representative, Shamim, who informed me that children under 13 do not need to be vaccinated and there is no PCR requirement. The DNATA agent brought my daughters out of the airport around this time. Apparently, Covid Compliance in Dubai had reverted with a decision that Emaan could not board the flight. Shamim was on the phone with me and I requested the DNATA agent to take my phone and children back in to the check-in counter so that Emirates staff could speak to each other directly to resolve this issue. The line was disconnected by the Karachi staff and once again, my children were brought out by the DNATA agent with the information that Emaan is still not permitted to board. I called the Dubai call center again and was connected to another agent named Jorge who also confirmed that the kids should have been allowed to board as there is no restriction on their travel from Karachi to Singapore. Once again I requested the DNATA agent (the only person in this entire ordeal who at least attempted to facilitate) to get someone from Emirates to talk to me or the agents in Dubai to resolve this issue. Again, I was dismissed by the Emirates airport staff who were too busy to speak to me till after departure of the flight. At this point, I made a third call to check for next available seats and was informed by the agent that while there is nothing available till August 5, there was no reason for the staff at the airport to prevent Emaan from boarding her scheduled flight. Finally after the flight has left without my children, a Mr Kamran Kaiser and his staff including Mr DeGama came outside to speak with me – I was informed that this was the manager and his staff (as it turns out, both were check-in staff and neither was the manager as per the information shared with me subsequently by the Karachi city office). They continued to argue their position and their misinterpretation of the rules, said that the final decision was made by Covid Compliance so the matter was out of their hands or else they would be fined. After a lengthy discussion, including one where Mr DeGama spoke to Emirates staff in Dubai on my phone, they still did not admit their mistake, told us that the Dubai call centre staff was issuing misinformation, but now said they would do us a “favour” by emailing Singapore for approval to override Covid Compliance. They offered to book the children on the next flight to Dubai and when I mentioned that no onward seats were available for the DXB – SIN sector, they said they will “manage something”. We came home after a 4 hour ordeal only to wait till 1:30 am for the same DNATA staff to call me with apologies that no response had been received from Singapore and the issue should be taken up at the city ticketing office the next day.

Meanwhile, my father-in-law on arrival in Dubai approached the Business class lounge counter where the staff shared the actual rules with him (not what Karachi staff was manufacturing) and commiserated about the fact that Emaan was offloaded for no valid reason. She encouraged him to lodge a complaint. My brother-in-law in Singapore went to the Emirates city office first thing on July 15; the staff there was extremely helpful and apologetic. She not only confirmed in the system, but also with Singapore Immigration that Emaan was eligible to travel and that she wrongly offloaded in Karachi. At the same time, I went to the Karachi office where no one was willing to take responsibility or accept fault – despite everything shared by Emirates Dubai and Singapore and in the face of all evidence from Singapore government and Emirates website itself, they still believed that they were correct. May I suggest very seriously at this stage with no intended disparagement of my countrymen that Emirates consider investing in English lessons for its staff? If they had just read the rules and understood them, this issue would not have arisen. I can only assume that this is either because they do not understand simple English or that they willfully offloaded my children to accommodate other passengers. If it is the latter, I am sure you will wish to look into such unethical practices. Instead of being facilitated to now resolve the issue, I was told by the Karachi city office staff that there are no seats available and that I would have to pay cancellation charges for the flight from which my children were offloaded. When I shared the commitment made by the Emirates airport staff to communicate with Singapore and book flights, I was informed flippantly that in that case I could ask the airport staff directly to do what they can. For the next hour or so, Karachi office went about trying to find the email address for the Singapore office. Allow me to make another suggestion here - the Karachi Emirates staff needs lessons on how to contact other Emirates staff. I am sure there is a phone and email directory, but city office cannot call the airport office and expects the passenger to do so, the airport staff do not have the ability or common sense to speak to Dubai staff and everyone is clueless about how to get in touch with their colleagues in Singapore or Dubai on email. Of note, the Singapore office never received any email that was promised by Mr Kamran – either he doesn’t know how to send emails or he lied to a passenger – I don’t know which is worse. While no one in Karachi made any attempt to help resolve the situation, the fantastic Singapore office staff went out of her way to make arrangements and contact those required. She managed to rebook the children on the next flight. In fact, the Karachi office was shocked to see communication coming in from Singapore. In addition to not knowing how emails work, Karachi Emirates staff don’t know the travel guidelines, how to book flights or facilitate passengers. What purpose do they serve? If it helps with your operations, they do know to never accept responsibility and instead find someone else to blame, including their own colleagues in other cities. The matter did not end here. Once seats were booked, the Karachi office still did not want to take responsibility and insisted that my brother-in-law go back to the office in Singapore to request them to put into the system that the children are OK to board and that no vaccine or PCR test is required for passengers under 13. Again, Karachi office’s work was done by someone else. The manager in the Karachi city office was not available due to illness through all this, but he did have the decency to call me later and admitted that the entire episode was mismanaged.

Please consider this an official complaint to which I expect a prompt response. My wife and I have been a loyal Emirates Skywards passenger for decades. We returned just last week along with our daughters on Emirates from Africa. We are scheduled to travel to France on Emirates in August, and to Rome next year. In light of what has happened, we will now be turning with immediate effect to Qatar and other airlines with better customer service. At this point, I would also like to share that I literally spent hours on hold on the phone while in Africa to speak to an Emirates representative for a matter related to another flight for one of our household staff. The level that Emirates has fallen to, Covid notwithstanding because all airlines have been impacted by that, is very disappointing.

Not only am I am filing this official complaint, but I have every intention to share this episode with all my friends, family, colleagues and acquaintances. Most are Emirates customers and many have had other bad experiences with Emirates. These are the straws that break the camel’s back and you can be rest assured that we are now all turning to other carriers. There are other options. I will be posting this episode on social media and reserve the right to take legal action against Emirates particularly for the fact that in a case involving unaccompanied girls entrusted to Emirates for a night flight, no female escort was available and no airline staff saw fit to speak directly to their legal guardian. The incompetence of the Karachi Emirates staff has caused my entire family mental torture, anguish, disappointment and the cost of umpteen calls to Dubai and trips to the Singapore office.

I look forward to your immediate investigation and subsequent response.

Thank you

I previously had a return flight booked a few months in advance from LHR to BKK via DXB but about 2 weeks before departure departure covid struck so all flights were cancelled and a rebooking was offered up to a year ahead at no extra cost or a refund but it would take up to 6 months for the refund
So I called emirates offices in London and spoke to someone there and said it was a lot of money to me to wait on and there and then on the phone they not only cancelled my flights but also deposited my money back in my bank in 24 hours
I personally cannot fault anything at all the service I got from them

This same thing happened with me with eva air!! They don't have any concept of customer service. I flew to shanghai and on the return trip we had an issue with the flight home and some no customer service available on site and no one answering their phones. It was chinese labor week when most people are on vacation we had to book a new flight with a different airline to get home. When we got back we had to file a refund request and they denied it saying cause we took the arrival flight to China or ticket is considered used. They would not home the refund we were promised at the delaying city. Coat me over 10k USD

I am only guessing, but there's probably some weirdness with the pricing on a one-way vs a return at issue as well. Not that the airline should be able to claim that since they canceled the outbound...

I'd go with contacting regulators. Frankly, Emirates /should/ be told "You are going to resolve this with the passenger or you can drop LHR from your network"...

...but this isn't the first time Emirates should have been told that (and I've wanted the UAE arresting pax for having alcohol in their system - which has happened a few times - to be met with "Well, then I guess your London routes are all dry flights now").