Just Another Cebu Pacific (Horror) Story!

The recent brouhaha involving the now infamous Raymart & Claudine and the equally infamous Mon Tulfo at the NAIA Terminal 3 has probably died down. It has generated polarizing reactions from all sides. TRC has nothing to do with show business but I believe the root of all this chaos is something that has to do with TRC -- Cebu Pacific!

I guess I didn't need to detail the root of the commotion on that fateful day but it has something to do with Barretto's lost baggage from a Cebu Pacific Caticlan flight in which Barretto and company were passengers. Cebu Pacific issued a statement and explanation of what happened to the baggage in its Twitter account. Even before I read CebuPac's statement, I already know that the reason has something to do with the flight's safety so I was with CebuPac on this one.

However, what CebuPac failed to do was to inform the affected passengers either while on air through the pilot-ground communications system and as soon as the flight landed T3. The passengers had the right to know (and not kept them waiting). So Barretto getting mad at the ground crew was probably understandable BUT cursing the poor staff for the inefficiency of the company she works for is below the belt. But that's another story and I don't intend to touch on that here.

I had been flying Cebu Pacific (alhough not exclusively) for my domestic & international flights since perhaps its maiden voyage but I have stopped flying CebuPac recently until it has resolved its issues since I, too, became a victim of its indiscriminate policies!

CebuPacific Palpak:

On April 10, after spending Holy Week in my husband's hometown in Davao City with my six-month-old son, I and my son were booked on a Cebu Pacific flight 5J962 to Manila that leaves Davao at 6.20am (according to my e-ticket). My son & I arrived the airport an hour before but the long queue to the x-ray machine kept us in the line for quite some time. As soon as the baggage scanning was over, I hurriedly ran (armed with my 8kg baby in a baby carrier in front of me) to the check-in counter only to find out it was already closed for the 5J962 flight. We were there at the counter at exactly 5.25am, 55minutes before my flight. We were refused check-in despite being on-time. The ground crew said the flight was at 6.15am which contradicts with my e-ticket that says 6.20am. There were two other ladies who came at the same time I did and who were also denied check-in. Indeed in their e-ticket, it says 6.15am.

But it was 6.20am in my e-ticket and I NEVER received any new ticket or email/text/call advise that the flight was moved 5 minutes earlier (isn't that the purpose of the contact information passengers provide when they buy their air ticket?). They closed the gate early (much earlier than the allowable 45 minutes before the flight time) to give way to chance passengers whom CebuPac can milk since a chance passenger ticket is expensive! To add insult to the injury, I paid FULL FARE for my and my son's ticket. It was even more expensive than PAL's but I had to take it because I had a 9am meeting and PAL's & Airphil's flight arrival time did not fit my schedule. 

The ground crew insisted I needed to rebook my flight. And since I was on full fare, I needed not to buy a new ticket but a rebooking fee of P1,620 applied. This irked my husband & I even more since I made it to the 45-minutes-before-the-flight check-in rule and it wasn't our fault that they gave away my seat to chance passenger. It was already boarding time at that point, I could hear the announcement. I think the ground crew purposely took so much time checking the system so my baby & I could miss that flight!

Realising we won't stand back (why would we? We were right!), the personnel in charge offered to book my baby & I for FREE on the next available flight which was after 4 hours! CebuPac, without consideration, made a six-month-old baby wait for four hours in the airport because it is simply greedy & disorganized. Worst of all, there was no compensation, not even a simple apology!

My baby & I took the flight 4 hours after because it was my right to be given FREE flight after what they did. Of course, I missed the meeting! The cost of my time, waiting for 4 hours, was more expensive that the full fare I paid. I could've sued CebuPac for that and demanded compensation 1) for my lost time, 2) for lost opportunity due to the missed meeting, and 3) for the physical, emotional, & mental stress. Then again I realised I'd be wasting my time even more on a company that does not put its clients' welfare first.

So I decided on a more logical thing to do and boycott CebuPac until it cleans up its act.