Beware of Travelling Air Lanka – Booking changed due to Computer Glitch?? Flight UL503 on 05 August 2015 & ACTS OF SRI LANKAN AIR LINE STAFF
Posted on September 26th, 2015
RE: Computer Glitch.
This Computer Glitch occurred in the Sri Lankan Air line computer system may be the Worlds first computer Glitch ever occurred, as it affects only one individual customer. I live in Australia and most Air lines including Qantas, Virgin and other Air Lines close the entire Air Line ticketing system when a computer glitch of this nature occurred, as with my 30 years of computer knowledge a computer glitch never occurs to one individual customer in a Air Line ticketing system.
This is a cover up, and I advice you to take up this with the relevant authorities in UK and in Sri lanka to unearth this corrupt practice of the Air Line staff also you may take up this with IATA and complain to them.
Few years back my wife and daughter travelled in Business Class with Sri Lankan Air Lines and on their way back they were demoted to Economy and the two seat were given to some others by the Air Line Staff. But they failed to do their dirty deal as I telephoned the then Chairman of the Air line and complained to him. Sri lanka Air Line is Few years back my wife and daughter travelled in Business Class with Sri Lankan Air Lines and on their way back they were demoted to Economy and the two seat were given to some others by the Air Line Staff. But they failed to do their dirty deal as I telephoned the then Chairman of the Air line and complained to him. Sri lanka Air Line is now going loosing it’s reputation as one of the best with these corrupt activities and very soon people will stop flying the Airline. I never use the Sri Lankan Airline after that incident.
Dr. Upasiri de Silva
All other Email Communications
From: milni@outlook.com
To: obasithanna@yahoo.com; shri.jayawardena@srilankan.com; inga.rodrigo@srilankan.com; yohan.pathirana@srilankan.com; troncy.nanayakkara@srilankan.com;
Subject: RE: UL503/05 August 2015 & ACTS OF SRI LANKAN AIR LINE STAFF
Date: Wed, 23 Sep 2015 01:28:47 +0100
Below is the Email we had from Inga Rodrigo [ Manager Customer Affairs (Customer Affairs) | SriLankan Airlines Ltd. Mktg-Customer Affairs, Airline Centre, Bandaranaike International Airport, Katunayake, Sri Lanka. Tel: +94197331315 | Mobile: +94710211315 | Fax: +94 19733 5145
E-Mail: inga.rodrigo@srilankan.com | Web: www.srilankan.com ] in Sri Lankan on the 9/Sep/2015 : She was saying Computer GLITCH and it had issued a ticket and system itself has found a FREE EMD number and generated ticket number.
Then Shri Jayawardena (Mrs) – Customer Relations Executive [ SriLankan Airlines Ltd. 7th Floor, 1 Lampton Road, Hounslow TW3 1JB United Kingdom ] –
on her email to us on the 1 Sep 2015 written below said ” Please note our Refunds Department has informed me that only one EMD 603 8200360755 had been processed as a refund.
The other EMD 603 8200344284 had been utilised on 04August 2015 to issue ticket number 603 2107467210. ”
When we asked her (Shri Jayawardana) passenger’s name of this tick number but She refused to name the passenger .
Ingo Rodrigo saying that Passengers ( Mother and the underage Child) came to the Air port 12.05PM. This is a white lie.
We have proof that they came at least between 10 – 11 AM. We will produce those evidence soon.
- They( Sri Lankan Staff) should get their CCTV recodes and check it.
2 . They(Sri Lankan) should Produce the Computer records of this “malfunctioned event” of there computer system , including full error logs, full system details , company that had developed Sri Lankan System with their details.
We are still waiting to receive the refund of the of the ticket which was tried to ROB by the Staff in Sri Lankan Air Line !
=============================================================================================================
From: inga.rodrigo@srilankan.com
To: milni@outlook.com
CC: shri.jayawardena@srilankan.com; yohan.pathirana@srilankan.com; chanaka.olagama@srilankan.com; subodani.weerarathna@srilankan.com
Subject: FW: UL503/05 August 2015 & ACTS OF SRI LANKAN AIR LINE STAFF
Date: Wed, 9 Sep 2015 11:15:16 +0000
Our Ref: CMB/11906/07082015/1508793470
Dear Mr Gunasekara,
We write with reference to your mail below.
It has been established that one of the EMD’s issued to you as compensation for the denial of boarding while traveling from London to Colombo on UL504/16 July 2015 has been erroneously made as used by the system due to a technical glitch. This has been now rectified and we have authorized our colleagues in London to proceed with the refund of the said EMD to your family member. Please accept our sincere apologies for any inconvenience caused due to this incident.
Our further investigations carried out confirm that your wife and child have reported to the Check in Counters approximately at 1205 by which time the counter has been already closed as informed to you in our previous response
However considering the possible inconvenience caused to your family in the event of denial boarding, we have made arrangement to accept them for the flight even after the counter closure thus, we were compelled to provide them with the last two available seats which have been away from each other.
Mr Gunasekara, we hope you understand that we have no reason to keep your family on standby for Check in if they have reported to the flight at 10.30 hours which was 2.30 hours prior to schedule time of departure. Further we would like to inform that no passengers have been kept on standby for this flight.
Nevertheless we are sorry for not meeting your family expectation on this occasion and we value their patronage and hope that we may have the pleasure of being at their service once again on a future occasion.
Thank you.
Yours Sincerely,
Inga
Inga Rodrigo – MCA
Manager Customer Affairs (Customer Affairs) | SriLankan Airlines Ltd.
Mktg-Customer Affairs, Airline Centre, Bandaranaike International Airport, Katunayake, Sri Lanka.
Tel: +94197331315 | Mobile: +94710211315 | Fax: +94 19733 5145
E-Mail: inga.rodrigo@srilankan.com | Web: www.srilankan.com
Date: Tue, 22 Sep 2015 22:50:19 +0000
From: obasithanna@yahoo.com
To: milni@outlook.com; shri.jayawardena@srilankan.com; inga.rodrigo@srilankan.com; yohan.pathirana@srilankan.com; troncy.nanayakkara@srilankan.com; ps@presidentsoffice.lk; dimunge@hotmail.com; cs@presidentsoffice.lk; pmo@pmoffice.gov.lk
CC: upasiri@bigpond.com; secretariat@srilankaembassy.be; dambaraamila@gmail.com; subodani.weerarathna@srilankan.com; jayabimalanka@hotmail.co.uk; ranapriya007@gmail.com; daya.hewapathirane@gmail.com; skd140@hotmail.com; tilakfernando@gmail.com
Subject: Re: UL503/05 August 2015 & ACTS OF SRI LANKAN AIR LINE STAFF
Sri Lankan might still have the “Ata Pass” fools & Bxxxxxx, and they don’t care about the customer service or the future of the Air Line.
They only bend to dirty politicians.
They will deny all the mistake they do, that is how they’ve been treating many decent passengers.
Let us know if they admit any!
From: Milni Gunasekara <milni@outlook.com>
To: “shri.jayawardena@srilankan.com”
Sent: Wednesday, 2 September 2015, 0:13
Subject: RE: UL503/05 August 2015 & ACTS OF SRI LANKAN AIR LINE STAFF
Dear Mrs Jayawardena
RE: SRI LANKAN AIR LINE STAFF AND CUSTOMER SERVICE
Further to your email, I would like to urge you to request an inquiry to uncover this forged action by informing the law enforcement authorities in Sri Lanka as well as in the United Kingdom, as they have used the name of my spouse and the EMD number.
My spouse and daughter had two return tickets that was purchased from Expedia (as cooperate purchase), and there is no reason to utilize any of those EMD numbers.
It looks like that a member/s of Sri Lankan Airline staff has acted to complete this forged transaction. Although I had heard of Sri Lankan staff’s involvement in similar dodgy activities, I had never imagined that my family would become a victim of the rogue Sri Lankan Staff.
Please can you send us the name and address of the Ticket Purchaser and the Sri Lankan Staff who did complete the utilization process and any other relevant information to initiate legal action.
In addition to the above Ticket issue, My Underage Child and the Spouse had to go through another Saga when they were at Sri Lankan Air Line counter in Colombo.
We have also requested you and the Sri Lankan airline staff in Sri Lanka to investigate separately, why they had separated underage daughter from her mother on the way to London from Colombo, and why they had given their two confirmed seats to others ! and so on.
Explanation given by Sri Lankan Staff [ Subodani Weerarathna (Indika) Customer Affairs Supervisor ] in your email is not true. No one has explained why they have separated the Child from the mother.
“According to our reports your family had reported to Check in Counters around 1205 hours after the counter closure. Thus we were not able to accept them to the flight as our flight was already finalized at 12noon.”
Above quoted explanation by Subodani Weerarathna is an absolute lie and they came to the Air Port around 10.30 AM. There are many witnesses including some passengers that are available to prove that your staff was lying. However, as soon as they (Spouse and the daughter) came in they have joined the queue .
According to many who had flown with Sri Lankan Air Line, this type of menial actions are very common.
I did telephone and try to get the answers from a few male Staff members and a few female Staff , of which one happend to be a Director Customers Services etc called Mr Olagama, who promised me that he would contact me within 24-48 hours, but I did not hear from him at all. Another one male staff gave me the Name (Shacini Fernando) who did the dodgy act on the checking counter. Among the ones I spoke to on the record are :
Inga Rodrigo-Manager Customer Affairs – +94710211315 inga.rodrigo@srilankan.com
Yohan Pathirana – Manager Airport Service Delivery (Departure) +94710210989 yohan.pathirana@srilankan.com
Troncy Nanayakkara – Airport Service Manager (Ramp) +94710212430 Troncy.nanayakkara@srilankan.com
Mr Olagama – 0197 -332004 – So called Director was in London as the Manger according to himself.
Maffhiya Anis – Acting head of customer service
However, I would like to have a written explanation to the following actions taken by the Sri Lankan Air Line Staff in Colombo:
1) Why did your staff told the underage child and the mother that they were on Stand-By ? and By Who?
2) Having received the confirmation of allocation of two seats adjacent to each other on the 4th of August 2015, why did your staff cancel that allocated seat ? and Who took that action and under whose instruction ?
3) Why did your staff keep an underage Child and the mother at the counter standing from 10.30am to 12.30 pm? and By who !
4) Why did Sri Lankan Staff keep their baggage until the last minute? and we also found that two of the bags had got damaged too.
For the benefit of all Sri Lankan passengers who do get treated in such a menial way by Sri Lankan Air Line staff, we are demanding you to issue a written apology clearly stating each mistake you have done. We would also suggest that Sri Lankan Air Line Management take necessary action to learn and implement a decent customer service structure which is clearly transparent to regular passengers.
We look forward to hearing from you with the answers and solutions .
Yours Sincerely
D Gunasekara
CC: Expedia Group
Oneworld Airline Alliance
From: shri.jayawardena@srilankan.com
To: dimunge@hotmail.com
Subject: FW: Gunasekara ** UL503/05 August 2015
Date: Tue, 1 Sep 2015 16:53:21 +0000
Our Ref: CMB/11906/07082015/1508793470
WITHOUT PREJUDICE
Dear Mr Gunasekara
We write with reference to our conversation regarding the seat allocation for your spouse and daughter at Colombo Airport.
Herewith I am forwarding the email once again which had been sent to you on 07August 2015 by our Customer Affairs colleague in Colombo.
Please note our Refunds Department has informed me that only one EMD 603 8200360755 had been processed as a refund.
The other EMD 603 8200344284 had been utilised on 04August 2015 to issue ticket number 603 2107467210.
If you need any other information please do not hesitate to contact me.
Yours sincerely
Shri Jayawardena (Mrs)
Customer Relations Executive
SriLankan Airlines Ltd.
7th Floor, 1 Lampton Road, Hounslow TW3 1JB United Kingdom
Tel: +44 ( 0 ) 208 5382000 | Fax: +44 ( 0 ) 208 572 0808
E-Mail: shrij@srilankan.com | Web: www.srilankan.com
From: Indika Subodani Weerarathna
Sent: Friday, August 07, 2015 2:22 PM
To: ‘dimunge@hotmail.com‘
Cc: Mifthiya Anis – CAM
Subject: UL503/05 August 2015
Our Ref: CMB/11906/07082015/1508793470
Dear Mr Gunasekara
We write with reference to your verbal complaint which was made on 06th August 2015 to our Customer Affairs Manager Mrs M. Anis.
Firstly our apologies for any inconvenience faced by your daughter & spouse during their recent travel with us.
Our perusal in to your complaint reveals that our flight, UL503/05 August 2015 was scheduled to depart from Colombo at 1300 hours. Generally the Check in Counters are closed 01 hour prior to scheduled departure time. Accordingly our Check in Counters were closed at 12 noon for the said flight.
According to our reports your family had reported to Check in Counters around 1205 hours after the counter closure. Thus we were not able to accept them to the flight as our flight was already finalized at 12noon.
However our colleagues at Check in Counters had gone to extra mile and obtained permission to reopen Check in Counters to accept your family. We are sure that you will agree with us that we need to have a reasonable time period to get clearance to accept passenger after flight finalized.
Further please note that generally we release pre reserve seats at the last minute when passengers are not show up to the flight until flight finalize. Accordingly their pre-reserved seats also had been released as they had not turned up to the flight until counter closed.
Consequently when our colleagues had been granted permission to accept your family only 02 seats were available in economy class cabin as it was almost fully booked flight. Hence our colleagues were compelled to accept your family with said seats.
However we are sorry if you are not happy with the manner of handling said scenario.
Further we thank you for taking your valuable time to write us and giving us an opportunity to explain and we value their patronage and hope that we may have the pleasure of being at their service again on a future occasion.
Thank you.
Yours faithfully,
Subodani Weerarathna (Indika)
Customer Affairs Supervisor (Customer Affairs) | SriLankan Airlines Ltd.
Mktg-Customer Affairs, Airline Centre, Bandaranaike International Airport, Katunayake, Sri Lanka.
Tel: +94 19733 1398 | Mobile: +94 (Mobile) | Fax: +94 19733 5145 (Fax)
E-Mail: subodani.weerarathna@srilankan.com | Web: www.srilankan.com
Please acknowledge receipt of this mail
Book your next SriLankan Airlines flight from the convenience of your home or office at www.srilankan.com
September 26th, 2015 at 6:10 am
What do you expect from our establishments.My son was offloaded to give his seat to someone else,later after a long wait in the lounges he was routed via a Mideastern country and his missed his first day of his work,though he had booked the ticket several months before.
Presidents set a bad precedence by going on extravagant trips to Europe with a big team and in the process paying passengers are offloaded.
We should privatize Sri Lankan air to stop politicians abusing it.
September 26th, 2015 at 9:07 pm
There have been several instances even I have had the opportunity to expose the high handed or the despeable behaviour of Sri Lankan Airline staff through the Sri Lankan newspaper columns in the past and also through Lankan websites. ‘Rotten apples of Air Lanka’, ‘shut your face ‘ ( how an airport manager at Heathrow once barked at a passenger) comes to my mind straightaway out the many exposures I have done. There have been very good managers in the past such as Mr. M. Fazeel, who went out of his way to put things in the perspective once something like this was exposed.
Recently there was an incident where a sister of a cabinet minister was stopped embarking the place at middle of the night to a Sri Lanka Paris bound plain where a Sri Lankan airline upstart demanded to see her sponsor’s letter from Paris despite her possessing a Shenanigan and a British visa after submitting all the relevant papers were sent to the appropriate embassies. This was even after the passenger had gone through customs and immigration and satisfying the authorities. Even this I have taken up with the airline but as usual they always have an excuse to cover up. However, on the following day the passenger was put on a different flight and upgraded as well. But the bird had flown by that time as she was supposed to have attended a family wedding which she missed.
This kind of nonsense have to come to a stop and its high time that the new management take some interest in affairs of this nature and take strict and remedial action not to repeat the same mistakes done in the past, and with what is vogue today, the’ yahapalanaya’, justice, honesty and an efficient service should prevail.
September 26th, 2015 at 9:55 pm
This kind of behaviour out of SriLankan airline staff is not new. This has been going on from AirLanka days where I have exposed through the Sri Lankan English newspaper columns such erratic and despicable behaviour of some of the staff.
‘ Rotten Apples of AirLanka’ comes to my mind straightaway as an incident I experienced as a passenger of the airline at first. Subsequently there was a case of an airport manager at Heathrow barking at a passenger saying ‘ shut your face’ in front of a queue of other passengers to such a humiliation, which I took it up again (thankfully that manager was transferred from London after six months of that complaint).
There was anorther case where a Sri Lankan ( a company MD ) was harassed at the Bandaranaike international airport insisting that ‘he was not the person who held a valid ticket and passport’, and of course he had shaven his moustache and beard at the time , which was different to the picture in the passport. However, this was after showing the airline staff member all his credit cards in his possession including that of the American express. Finally the passenger had to challenge and the Airline had to bring the police to the scene where the passenger sat at the checking in counter protesting and not moving an inch from there (on the platform where baggage is weighed). Finally the Sri Lankan airline official had to knuckle under like a beaten dog with his tail behind his hind legs.
There was another incident which I took it up with the airline and exposed through the social media how a lady was stopped embarking to a SriLankan Paris bound plane by a highhanded Sri Lankan official at the ‘ exit lounge’ when in fact she had both a Schengen and a British visas by demanding to see her sponsor’s letter from Paris. This was even after her going through the Customs and Immigration formalities. Every time they take a misstep, the National airline seems to have an excuse to cover up their sins after committing atrocious blunders.
In the past there have been efficient Senior executes such as Mr M. Fazeel, who was once the Station Manager in London and then became a much senior and responsible senior manager in Marketing, who has unfortunately resigned from the Airline ( as I understand) and not to my surprise though!
National airline has a record of bad history of ill-treating its customers by being arrogant, overbearing and conceited. No wonder why so many Sri Lankan passengers have abandoned flying the national airline merely because of such shabby treatment. The airline authorities should take into account that their passengers pay, at times even a higher fare, expecting a courteous and a friendly service with a smile (as they used to brag!), and not to harass passengers and making passengers subjected to their ‘ narcissisms’.
Its high time that the SriLankan new Chairman take constructive criticism and ensure that in the present new vogue of ‘ Yahapalanaya’ ensure that justice always prevails- needless to say, customer satisfaction is the blood for the survival of any airline to survive.
I have forwarded the above set of emails to all the national English newspapers in its entirety, lets see how many will publish it. However, my hats off to Lankaweb for exposing this issue.