Saturday, May 24, 2008 Talk back: What we just want from Cebu Pacific By Adrian Lino Arquiza
THIS is in reaction to Mr. Alvin John Tan’s letter that was published in the Speak Out section of the May 21, 2008 issue of Sun.Star Cebu.
Yes, it is true that you do get monkeys when you pay peanuts. It’s true that Cebu Pacific’s fares are really low, and yes, we do take advantage of their cheap fares.
But who told them to drop their fares in the first place? It was a business decision on their part. It had nothing to do with us.
In their desire to grab as many passengers as they could from their competitors, they came up with this idea, and it seems that, logistically, it turned out to be a bad one for them.
I’ve heard tales of overbooking, changed flights and horrific delays from a lot of disgruntled people.
We’re not asking for the sun and the moon. We don’t expect hot meals, not even free drinks.
But when we pay to take a flight at a certain hour, we expect to take that particular flight. Not an earlier flight, certainly not a later flight.
And if there are any changes, we certainly expect to be informed about it at least a day before. We don’t want to be told upon checking in that our flight has been moved to an earlier time.
We definitely don’t want to be asked, upon checking in, if we were informed of the change in the schedule. We definitely don’t want to wait any longer than we have to for our flight.
In short, all we want is for Cebu Pacific to stick to the schedule.
It’s been said that “beggars can’t be choosers” and that we get what we pay for, but there’s also what is called a “moral and legal obligation” to one’s customers.
Cebu Pacific accepted our money to convey us to our destination at a certain time. The least they could do is live up to their end of the bargain.
As to your comment that we should look at ourselves first and determine if we made mistakes that added to the problem, I don’t see what kind of mistakes we could have made that would contribute to an airline’s logistical problem.
Isn’t it up to them to find out if they’re booking too many passengers for a particular flight?
Maybe the only mistake we made was that we were stupid enough to patronize Cebu Pacific.
