Wednesday, August 06, 2008 Speak out: Nightmare and Cebu Pacific flight 5J 389 By May Salvana-Unchuan
I have been flying to and from Manila and Cagayan de Oro every month and I normally enjoyed flying.
I've tried all airlines and concluded that, apart from delays and little imperfections, every cfirm seems satisfactory.
That is, until Aug. 1, 2008.
My Cebu Pacific flight was scheduled at 2:50 p.m.
It was the first day that the NAIA terminal 3 opened so I checked in early.
I arrived at 1 p.m. and shortly after got my boarding pass.
As I passed through security and x-rays going to the inner terminal, the sight I saw was shocking.
I saw hundreds of confused passengers seeking help.
I tried to look for directional signs.
When I checked my boarding pass, I noticed that the space for the boarding gate was blank!
I found a girl in a Cebu Pacific shirt who directed me to a crowded counter.
There, surrounded by hundreds of noisy passengers, was one girl who was as confused as we were.
She couldn't give concrete information about any of the flights!
After 30 minutes of waiting, she asked us to go to the boarding gates and wait.
That was 3 p.m., past our flight time.
We went down and waited for 30 minutes, only to be told that the flight was further delayed and that our new boarding gate was back upstairs.
At 4:30 p.m., we boarded the plane.
After 30 minutes of waiting, the pilot announced that the flight has been cancelled because it was too late to fly and it was impossible to land in Cagayan de Oro airport when it’s dark.
We found out that several other flights were cancelled that day due to their incompetence.
No representative from management was around to at least apologize to us.
They said there was none, which was impossible as I saw top Cebu Pacific officials having a lunch party at the area adjacent to the check-in counters!
After a while, they told us there will be special flight for us at 5 a.m. and that they were going to book us in a hotel.
We waited for 30 minutes until finally two buses (with a capacity of about 40 plus each) arrived.
We were about 130, so we felt like sardines during the 30-minute ride.
To add insult to injury, they brought us to a dank, sleazy hotel somewhere in Malate where prostitutes were lurking in the doorway.
They then offered us a poor meal at around 8:30 in the evening.
They woke us up at 1 a.m., put us on the bus at 2 a.m., gave us packed food on the bus (half a bangus and rice) but they
didn't give us any water or drink!
We arrived at the terminal at 2:30 p.m., lacking sleep and very tired.
We were shocked to be told there was no special check-in lane and we had to check in like the other new passengers.
One foreigner, who was a doctor who came for a charitable medical mission in Mindanao yelled something like this: "Get me out of the Philippines!"
We finally got to check in after we made a big fuss.
When they handed us our boarding pass, they told us to go to gate 131.
We waited for thirty minutes, only to be told that we should transfer to gate 134 and that the flight was delayed.
In counter 134, passengers demanded for the one way ticket travel voucher that was promised to us.
They gave it only after an hour and after we asked for it and the counter clerk told us we had to pay travel and fuel taxes!
Another flight delay was announced.
At this point, we demanded that the duty manager speak to us, but the counter personnel were giving excuses.
We proceeded to the check-in counter to demand for the duty manager.
We finally talked to her and we demanded that she apologize and explain to us passengers why this all happened.
On the way back to the terminal, the manager was stopped by passengers from other flights asking for directions.
It turned out we were not the only ones inconvenienced by their incompetence.
At gate 134, they were about to announce another flight cancellation when people went wild.
The manager had to request that the plane from Butuan be given to us.
Finally, after what seemed like forever, we boarded the plane at around 9 a.m.
When we took off, we applauded.
To date, we still hear of cancelled flights and complaints of incompetence against Cebu Pacific staff.
