Dear Air France KLM, this is going to hurt badly.

To say the least, the airline industry is just not waking up to the power of social media. Do these guys who run some of the so called world class airlines realize that we do not live anymore in the stone age! Every customer armed with a camera mobile phone and a personal computer, is a global citizen – and command all the power to decide the fate of brands at the click of a mouse.

These airlines had a huge wake up call to get their act together, when a disgruntled businessman Hasan Syed made news after buying several promoted Tweets to blast British Airways -  for allegedly losing his father's luggage on a flight to Paris.

But that does not seem to have served a wake up call to the aviation industry, and the CEO’s who run the businesses.

Not to  Alexandre De Juniac, CEO of Air France-KLM at the least!

Disgruntled – well that is an understatement by all means – passenger Jay Shah has had a nightmare of an experience with Air-France, along with a bunch of co-passengers. Read Jay’s experience/letter to Alexandre here. To quote from the blog: 

I’m over and done with this debacle but not without spreading the word about your service amongst my friends and family. There’s no doubt that your company is not competent or professional enough to take passengers world over. You may get defensive and say that this is a one-off incident but unfortunately, it isn’t. Number of people have voiced a similar opinion about the treatment meted out to them by your company. It is rather unsettling. Don’t know the effect this letter might have on your customer service but rest assured, you can thoroughly deduct an average of 5000$ from your annual profits if not more. Although that might be just a whisker in your overall mess, it’ll be one which was done with due diligence. We’ve had enough of your staff’s condescending bullshit. We have encountered inadequacy of service, which I never knew was possible for such a big company along with ignorance and stupidity of humungous proportions. 

Let me make it very clear, we don’t fly your airlines for free and more often than not are the only people flying on this particular sector. You might try and make some damage control but be completely sure, that we will never forget the way we’ve been treated at the hands of your staff. You have failed miserably in meeting the expectations of your customers based on the promises you’ve made to them. 

All the best Alexandre De Juniac – please do salvage what’s possible of your airlines now battered image. 

One last thing – when will people who work is customer service (we will say ‘public facing’ roles) wake up to the reality that every consumer is a journalist?