Day: October 16, 2011

Air Asia Monopoly “Blogger Hit…!!”

8 Comments

Our previous article was just a Hors d’oeuvre or also known as starters or appetizers. When our fellow blogger who writes in http://mudatengah.blogspot.com/ on the merger of MAS/Airasia for the past few weeks we listened,nodded and gave only our 2 cents of opinion. Surely, he must be wondering why we are not together on this subject. Sorry bro. Now I know…..

In God’s time something must give and it had to happen to my good friend Malaysia’s Honorary Representative to Mongolian National Chamber of Commerce and Industry and yours truly in Sabah of all places.(mosts of Sabah’s revenues are from the tourism sector). First he commented the LCCT is so busy and its too small to accomodate the influx of tourists. He was on a 3.05 flight to KL while I was on 3.30 flight.

Like all seasoned “kiasu” travellers we arrived early 1.30pm on the dot. It has been five years since he travelled to sabah and the last trip was on MAS. He has already checked in through the internet. (He said so much has changed since the last time he came to Sabah.Was this like the usual commentators curse?)

Fine, he made a mistake his bag was slighlty bigger than the allowed measurements and he had to check in. So I waited for him in the long queue as I had already done the necessary online checkin with justs a small baggage.(2days trip) . He waited in line as he will be a diplomat soon but he was surprised that his online checkin was unacceptable and he had to checkin again with the bag. This he told me not much $10 only and I smiled.

The crunch came as we were about to go through the police and immigration processes. The Air Asia Staff on duty must have seen my friend and myself perspiring after going through the process of checkin. He pulled my bag up and weighed it on the scale and it showed 10kg. “Ini tidak boleh.Cannot the Police also will not allow it.” I did not want to kick a fuss up as they were so many people around.”

I told my friend you go ahead first “I check the bag in” Since they requests i justs do the necessary and had to queue up obviously eventhough I have already checkin through the internet. Air Asia No frills Airline? Are you sure?

The airline should set up another counter justs to accomodate those who are found to flount the law of 7kg. Of course people will pay up but the inconveniences that comes along with it the airline has to seriously look into. An airline is after all in the service industry and if passengers all boycott you might justs as well close down.

Next you will all say why not use MAS and pay for it. Competition is good for the customers and if there is the merger the customers will all be short changed. I am indeed happy to be caught in this predicament and in this episode at this time. It had to happen to me of all people and none other was stopped after I told the Guests relations Officer “you justs costs me M$45. Randomly picked? SOP..Standard Operating Procedures. Please lah Tony Fernandes.!! It has losts its original taste of Everybody can fly.

Come unnoticed to Sabah and do an investigative work. Your man are not working and you have losts out on the millions $$$$$$$ more that should have been collected in excess baggages..

On the way to KK from Kuching I used the same bag. I did not do any shopping nor was there any additions to my clothes.Maybe I accumulated the sand from the beach front of Sutera Harbour Hotel”  Has someone put a gold ingot in? Tony and Air Asia should thank me for this and the least they can give me is a member of the board in the Air Asia/MAS merger.

Tony has moved on to manage a football club and the airline business might justs be too much on his hands. Rafidah Aziz as Chairman of Air Asia should consider buying him out too.

There has been a fair few comments on the bag issue and I am sure there are hundreds or maybe thousands who have to cry silently meaning also to be sliced open nicely. We posts here some of the comments from Facebook/twitters for the Air Asia/MAS Merger committee to ensure it is written in the agreement and above all the operating procedures which should not be relaxed nor compromised.

We wrote:- Air asia is this bag too big and can carry on board.Wah your staff said full flight.Got daily briefing or not on passenger lists full or not or just assume? People like this posts and also commented “Time for Sarawak to start its own airlines. We should name it Kenyalang. Maybe Hornbill. Or, perhaps FairWings.

We wrote:-Tq air asia for your consistency in weighing bags checkin.so many poor souls have to pay xtras.luckily they pick me up and charge me$45. Wonder those who can’t complain are crying or not.Say no to merger of mas/airasia. Your arrogant staff in sabah at 230pm shd be replace. People like this posts and also commented,

“They reduce the airfare to compete with MAS but from other charges added,AirAsia can be much more expensive especial to those who do not travel light.They knew fairly well that majority of the travellers would have more things with them dur…ing their trip home and this is one area where they can charge them to offset the cheaper fare.Many are unaware of these as most people would only compare the pricing of the fare offered.Anyway,we can’t blame them totally cos our own National Carrier(MAS),our nation’s pride is a total failure.Lately,our airports are turning………. “RED”.What a shame!!! those who managed MAS should resign immediately.

We wrote:-This bag is bigger than mine.hmmm They commented,”yours got gold bars“

We wrote:-Wow the bag issue even the staff use the police saying they will stop  conspiracy when they cannot perform.BAD he took on the wrong person but correct thank you Sabah.

We wrote:- Tks Sabah for the bag 7kg incident

We wrote:-One baggage per person. Its discrimination and these two ladies got away with four.Wow!

Mudatengah blogger has a few articles which are recommended to read

We wrote:-One baggage per person. Its discrimination and these two ladies got away with four.Wow. They commented,”You not beautiful.”

The timing cannot be more PERFECT than this to hit the blogger. Well at least we are giving back to the silent majority who finds it uneasy or may even get “threats ‘ if they bring up this subject.

Air Asia do what you have to do but remember”Malaysians are Watching”