Another reason not to fly Malaysia Airlines

Five years on from the two tragic losses of aircraft in 2014, Malaysian Airlines [MAB] is still struggling. The airline has apparently not turned a profit since 2010 due to increased competition, cost problems and the aftermath of the 2014 tragedies. MH370 disappeared in 2014 less than an hour after take-off from Kuala Lumpur International Airport. Four months later, MH17 was shot down over the Ukraine killing all on board. The tragedies amplified the airline's decade of ongoing financial woes.

Prime Minister Mahathir Mohamad was quoted earlier this year saying the government was considering shutting MAB down. This is after injecting more than $200 million as part a $2.3 billion recovery plan. Having just traveled with them this month, we learned some of no-so-obvious reasons why the national carrier is continuing to fail. The 12,000 staff airline delivers an average to remarkably negative customer experience. Our experience of 'Malaysian Hospitality' (the airline's slogan) was anything but. Dental surgery would have been faster, cheaper and less upsetting.

The company extracted an extra $500 from us when we missed our connecting flight due to misinformation from their ground staff. This is remarkably short sighted for an airline needing all the positive word of mouth it can get. It is worse when you realise helping us out would have cost them nothing. In a previous post about Samsung we described how their approach to white goods customer care suggests the South Korean giant has got their CX cost benefit calculation right. Sadly Malaysia Airlines seems to have got it wrong. Our story is not happy, but it is instructive.

We had bought tickets to get from Brisbane to Bangkok, changing planes in KL. Our first plan ran late, but we were still able to make the connection because the second plane was delayed for a tyre change. You could see the work happening from the gate lounge as we arrived. Unfortunately we ended up missing that plane because of some bad advice from ground staff. Our challenges started as we got through security into the gate lounge.

We experienced a minor medical emergency. The details are not worth sharing, but basically we needed to get to a pharmacy to still be OK to fly. Nothing life threatening, but uncomfortable and ego affecting. So we approached gate staff for help. They shared directions to the pharmacy in KL airport. The problem was this meant taking a train to a different terminal and back. The gate staff assured us we had time. But what also convinced us to go was a public announcement at around twenty to six. The PA declared a revised departure time would be provided at six. Figuring they had to take at least 15 minutes to board starting from six at the earliest, we decided to head for the pharmacy. We thought we had a half hour.

After getting to the train, waiting to board, traveling to the other terminal, finding the pharmacy, queuing to pay and then retracing our steps we arrived back at the gate at four minutes past six. It was disconcerting to see no one else in the gate lounge. It was worse to see our bags being wheeled across the tarmac outside. They must have started boarding almost the moment we left. In some physical discomfort and growing emotional concern we set off to try and get another plane. Things went downhill further.

At the service desk for Malaysian Airlines we learned we could not fix the problem from the transit side of the airport. The service staff had no ability to issue new tickets. They advised we had to pass customs into Malaysia, get our bags back and then get tickets from level 5 of the terminal. It took over an hour to get through customs and then another half an hour to find out our bags would not come out on a belt. We waited for another half an hour or so at baggage services for them to retrieve our luggage before setting off for the airline ticket counter.

At the ticket counter we explained what had happened to the staffer and asked her to issue tickets for the next flight. She advised she had seats, but we would have to pay $800 in penalties for missing our connection. We explained again. Given the bad information from the gate staff, it seemed only right to put us on the next flight for free. The staffer advised she did not have authority to do so. So we asked to speak to someone who did. She told us there was no one. We held our ground and she finally began to get beyond a focus of just charging us more.

Initially she queried if our second flight was delayed at all (implying we were responsible for arriving late). This changed when she confirmed the actual delayed takeoff time and saw our used boarding passes from Brisbane. Then she spent around twenty minutes trying to raise the gate staff on the phone. She advised leaving a security gate after screening is not permitted and wanted confirmation from the ground staff about what had happened. It was clear she thought our story was dubious. It took more than half an hour and several calls to get through to the gate staff. At first the staff reported no one had left the gate. Then they admitted we had, but asserted we had gone out to smoke. Neither my wife or I smoke. The gate staff also denied giving us pharmacy directions and assurance we had time to to get there and back before boarding. It was only when we showed the pharmacy purchases to the counter person she started to accept our report of events. Then she finally escalated the case to a manager, but not one in charge of ticketing.

She eventually got the Assistant Station Head on phone. He refused to help and initially did not want to speak with us. We did eventually get to explain to him what had happened. He did not want to accept responsibility for his ground staff's involvement. He was quite rude but we persisted. After more back and forth he asked our counter staffer to check if we had a receipt from the pharmacy. I got more optimistic because this seemed to be about validating our situation. We shared the proof of purchase with the counter staffer and she went off to continue the phone call privately with him. On returning she told us his position was we had left the gate at our own risk. It seems the proof of purchase was requested only in the hope we didn't have it to provide an excuse not to help. We were told we could complain to customer service afterwards, but were going to have to pay for tickets.

We tried to appeal to her human side. We asked if she felt this situation was fair. She couldn't look us in the eye. We asked her if the gate staff could have lied for fear of getting in trouble. She agreed that probably was the case. She insisted it was something we should take up with customer complaints later. I asked her if she really believed we had any chance of a refund if we did, and the look on her face said it all. We had been stitched up. There was no way anyone in MAB was going to stick their neck out when the company stood to profit from this situation. In the end she got us tickets for $500. It was the best she could do. But we had endured four hours of stress, disappointment and frustration just to be extorted.

We arrived 8 hours late to meet friends in Thailand. It was a big group, assembled for a birthday party. All were international travelers with the means to go to a party in a different country. The ideal target group an international airline would want to attract. Our friends asked why we were late and we told them how we had been treated. Now all of them will think twice before flying Malaysian Airlines. The worst part of this story is how stupid this is for any airline, even though MAB are not alone with this kind of policy.

It would have cost MAB nothing to put us on the next flight with spare seats. They didn't because their short term financial issues have over ridden their service considerations. They could have been heroes instead of a company you warn people away from. For close to zero marginal cost.

For the benefit of getting an extra $500 immediately, MAB has lost any chance of future business with us and suffered reputation damage with all the friends we talked with, plus anyone who views this article. The profit focused consultant in me thinks this does not make financial sense. It all comes down to bad management. In MAB the issues appear to be systemic.

I followed up with customer service and complained in writing as directed. It took them weeks to come back to us with their verdict. They basically said, according to their ground staff, we lied. Their position was the airline was completely within rights to charge us penalties when we missed the flight. They ignored responding to our disappointment at the Station Head's rude manner. When a customer feels upset about how they have been treated, it does not improve their mood to state your company has followed its own rules. Especially if it is those rules which caused the customer to be upset.

I also reached out to the Assistant Manager, Marketing & Customer Experience (MCX) at Malaysia Airlines, Muhammad Nur Haliff Mohd Jamil on LinkedIn. You can't connect with him, but you can InMail him, so I did. I wanted to see if there was anyone at the top of the company who understood what was going on with their CX. I sent just four lines saying I had bad experience and planned to share it. I also asked if he wanted to comment on what had happened. Still awaiting a reply, and don't expect he will bother.

According to Mr Jamil's profile he has been with the company since 2014. He started out as a as a management trainee and is now one of the upper managers in charge of CX. But it seems he knows little about it. His profile shows he has training is in applying lean methods to cut costs and he has worked for the airline as a pricing analyst. They are they people who adjust ticket prices to extract as much as possible from passengers for seats. When you look at his training and career, you can see how the company might have been purposefully set up to extract as much as possible from us. Customer facing staff were not authorised to act, feared being responsible, lied to avoid accountability and then applied extra charges. Why? Bad leadership. Bad culture. Bad structure. Bad processes. Worse CX. Don't fly Malaysian Airlines if you have a choice. We wont.

It took ages to write this article because I really debated if it was something I should share. But we are on a mission to help the good guys win. Part of that is being resolved to name and shame the bad guys. Maybe this will help them improve. Have you had a similar experience? Have you had a contrasting experience? Please comment below.