Israir Sucks

Why Israir sucks – personal experience - Around the world in twelve days

2007-05-23T14:06:00.000-07:00

There is this old joke about this guy that travels to NY and asks the check-in person to ship his bags through London, Berlin, Baghdad, Tokyo, Oslo and only then to NY.
“We can’t do it Sir,” says the man at the check-in desk “you are flying direct”
“I’m sure you could manage if you try, ” answers the passenger “after all – that’s exactly what you’ve done in my previous flight”.
Don’t fly with Israir if you don’t want this joke to be on you.

The Hebrew speakers (readers) among you can find the details of my personal story here: Israir - big NO , however, I’ll make a long story short and mention the cream de la cream of the story.

Around the world in twelve days

We flew from Tel Aviv to NY (JFK) and couldn’t find our suitcase. Apparently it was mistakenly sent to Amsterdam (lucky bag!). Those things happen from time to time so we were not too upset. We were assured by Israir representative at JFK that we’ll get out bags ASAP, probably the next day.
We received our suitcase only twelve (12!!!) days later. Yeah, you’ve read right - 12!
A just a quick note – it was 80 F in Tel Aviv when we left and 35 F in NY – not a big deal you say, well, our coats were in the suitcase…
The bag was traveling through The Netherlands, Austria, Italia NY and Montreal.
The suitcase was left for 2,3 or 4 days in each airport along the way – no effort was made by Israir to verify that the suitcase is being delivered.
Oh, we called Israir representatives at least twice a day to urge them to deliver the suitcase. Once and again we were promised that they are sending someone to take care of it. Once and again they did nothing.
For the record – in each and every day Israir knew exactly where the suitcase is located, delayed or ignored - we were following the travels of the suitcase over the phone (int. calls, don’t expect them to provide 1-800 number) – pinning flags on a world map – marking the route of our suitcase.
A chutzpah, ah? Wait for this one - when the suitcase finally arrived we were asked to come to the airport to claim our bag since Israir didn’t pay for the delivery from the airport to where we stayed…
Just to top it off – the suitcase came torn into pieces.

As soon as our suitcase oddity ended (with a torn suitcase) - our Israir costumer service oddity has just began:

Our emails were not answered.
Our phone calls were not answered.
Messages we left were ignored.
Reception of our fax’ were not confirmed.
According to Israir’s website the answer calls only between 13:00 to 16:00.
Well, they don’t.
After a trying to call them for a few days I called the management just to be told that the costumer service are answering calls only between 10:00 to 12:00 (“the website was not yet updated” they said. Well, the website is still not updated… I wonder if they simply want to screen the calls of angry costumers).
Finally, when I got through I’ve been told that it will take at least two month to deal with my complaint. Two month’s! What the hell takes two month if it’s all in the computer and they have all the flight and cargo details?!
I called after a week and was rudely asked not to call again and wait the two month’s.
Surprisingly enough, it took them exactly two days to check the issue after a reporter (Ma’ariv) called them to inquire about it.
not surprisingly – they offered a ridiculous compensation stating that they actually don’t have to compensate at all and since they don’t have their own workers in the various airports they are not responsible for anything, ignoring the fact that the bag was torn, ignoring the fact that it took 12 days to deliver our bag, ignoring the fact that in fact the shipment IS their responsibility, ignoring the fact that we had to pay for the last mile (from the airport to our home) and totally ignoring our complaints regarding their rude, offending and inefficient costumer service.

No wonder it reminded us of the old joke. Don’t fly with Israir if you don’t want this joke to be on you.

So if you want to help simply link to this blog, link to the Hebrew post (http://www.notes.co.il/oren/32036.asp ) or distribute the story by email.

You could read here why you should help.

Israir sucks - so what?

2007-05-21T06:44:00.000-07:00

I'm sure you have gotten very excited by my "manifesto" in the first blog entery. Now you probably ask yourself 'why the hell should I read/link/distribute this blog?'.
well the answer is simple and goes 3-ways:

contribute to the 'improve your service' campaign - after all, many of you might visit israel someday and having another decent carrier to fly with is beneficial. You'll help in forcing Israir to adopt the BlueJet model and not the TowerAir model.
you'll help in proving that the simple man can fight back the big-bad-companies using internet resources only.
you'll view lovely pictures from my trips in Israel, and use this blog as an Israeli trip advisor and Israel Travelling Forum (better info than the NY-Times travelling & hiking sections).

So you have decided to help? (you've maid a very good decision, if I may.)

link to this blog from your blog, facebook or web page.
even better - link to the (Hebrew) post discussing why Israir sucks (http://www.notes.co.il/oren/32036.asp). Obviously you could link to both :-)
Spreading those links by email will also help greatly.

And here are some pics to wet your appetite:

up left: Some friends, two 4x4's, two days in the desert. Sunset in Lotz Wadi (next to Mitzpeh Ramon).
bottom right: Ein Eqev (or maybe Aqew?)

Why Israir Airlines sucks?

2007-05-15T22:02:00.000-07:00

The blog motto - Israir sucks!

Israir is an Israeli Airlines that tries to break El Al's dominance within the Israeli air carriers market. Competition is always a good thing, however when the underdog acts like a bully and lacks all respect or regard (what an understatement) for its clients, one starts to rethink the benefits of having a competition that degrades customer service.

In this blog I'll try to inspire a change - in particular, a change in Israir's attitude towards the passengers and in general a change in the relationship between Israeli service suppliers and their costumers. As NY-times columnist Thomas Friedman announces in his book The World is Flat "the playing field is being leveled."

If you want to help in this effort please link to this blog from your blog or web page.
Even better - link to the (Hebrew) post discussing why Israir sucks (http://www.notes.co.il/oren/32036.asp).
and obviously you could link to both :)

Spreading these links by email will also help greatly.

why Israir sucks? (hebrew)

This blog was inspired by http://www.alitaliasucks.com/ a site that bashes Alitalia Airlines for different reasons.