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Alitalia: The world's worst airline company?
Is Alitalia, Italy's national carrier, the worst airline in the world? Anybody out there have awful experiences with them?I ask this because the other day I stumbled upon a recounting of one of the most nightmarish airline/airport sagas I've ever read, all focusing on the sheer ineptitude of Alitalia.
I can hardly improve upon it. So, I'll just pimp it here and get out of the way. Journalist Michael Totten exposes Alitalia doing the worst for its customers and its own reputation.
You can find it here. Yes, it's long (perhaps a wee bit too long), but it's utterly amazing what he captures. When you have some free time, read it.
Filed under: Airlines
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Justin Glow Mar 28th 2009 2:38PM
I flew Alitalia to India a few years ago and it was fine. The plane was sort of old and not the cleanest, but the staff was friendly and they had unlimited free beer and wine. Works for me!
BB Mar 28th 2009 3:58PM
About 12 years ago I had a bad experience with Alitalia. We had flown from Santiago, Chile to Madrid on another airline and connected to Alitalia for the remainder of the trip to Sicily. First, we were delayed out of Madrid for 3 hours because of air congestion over Rome. Several hours later we arrived in Rome and went to check in for our flight to Palermo only to be told that the flight had been cancelled. So, apparently had every other flight to Palermo that afternoon. We waited around Rome for several hours asking every now and then about a flight with no result. Someone appeared magically and said "psst, you want flight to Palermo, come with me". We followed him downstairs and to an out of the way counter where we were handed two tickets to Palermo on the next flight. Needless to say, we took them. Arriving in Palermo, we found that the baggage conveyer was broken. After about an hour and a half of baggage guys running around looking confused, someone came out and pushed a big red button on the conveyer and voila, the luggage came pouring out. By this time we were about 9 hours delayed in an already 31 hour trip from South America to Sicily....and we still had to drive to the other side of the island. When we go to our hotel in the wee hours of the morning, the guy on the desk started to give me a bad time about checking in so late. I just told him that he had no idea what I had been through but I would advise him to just back off and give us a room!
Rui A. Mar 28th 2009 4:34PM
I have nothing but a good story about Alitalia: my wife took a roundtrip to Florence from Lisbon (via Rome) in March last year (booked in January), and Alitalia still hasn't charged us for it.
So I'm glad to see that their billing department also sucks big time! Thanks for the 200+ euros that are still in my pocket, Alitalia! Arrivederci.
Yvette Mar 29th 2009 12:56AM
We flew Alitalia from Australia to Europe for our honeymoon 13 years ago. On the way home, we had requested window seats. And window seats we both were given... in separate rows... with a gap for the door in between.
So to have a quiet conversation between the two newlyweds, we had to shout from one row to the other. How nice. How cosy. How honeymoonish!
We didn't bother getting it changed because the whole flight was completely overbooked and there were families split up all over the plane too. We figured mum and dad with their kids in different places on the plane was far worse than what we had.
homobohemicus Mar 29th 2009 2:38AM
Hey there... yep its true and this saga has been on the net for a while now. Amazing what Alitalia is able to do.. more you can find ob this blog www.alitalia.blog.co.uk .. Its sort of a watch dog on ALitalia as long as its incompetent...
Ryan H. Apr 10th 2009 4:30AM
What a coincidence. Searching "worst airline company in the world" on google brought up Alitalia as the first 2 links; whom I flew with (or tried to) round trip from dallas to chicago and chicago to rome just 3 weeks ago. (March 13 - March 21). Our flight to Chicago was fine, but our flight from chicago to rome started the long unprecedented search for another flight. Our plane had issues just 15 minutes into the flight and was canceled after about an hour of anxiously waiting and wondering what happened. Alitalia has an agreement with AirOne airlines to use their planes and this is what airline we were on when departing from Chicago. 4 hours later we finally got to speak with the ticket desk (all 300+ passengers were waiting in this single line) and discovered our new flight wouldn't only leave 8 hours after it was supposed to from Chicago, but we would have another unexpected and unscheduled 6 hour layover in Frankfurt, Germany. That puts me and my friends (for spring break, mind you) 16 hours behind our scheduled arrival in Rome - and our hostel. Alitalia sets us up with a completely different company - Air India - on the way to Germany. Anyway, we get to Frankfurt and find out we weren't guaranteed a spot on the next available flight to Rome via Alitalia/AirOne after our 6 hour layover. We had somehow (and nobody even cared to mention this to us) that we had been put on standby in Frankfurt for the flight we had been promised we had reservations for. After much hassle dealing with the AirOne ticket desk, they eventually tell us where the Alitalia information center is and we go searching for this "infamous" ticket office. They're closed. For another 13 hours. Okay, well we somehow get on the flight we were on standby for and make it to Rome 16 hours after we were scheduled so the 6 of us had to spend 170 euro on 2 taxi's to take us to our Hostel. It was after midnight (Rome time) when we arrived so the metro and all other forms of transportation were closed. We thought we would have to cut a day in Florence or even Venice, and maybe another day if we hadn't made the stand-by flight. All in all, Alitalia has very, very poor communication skills when it comes to customer service and dealing with their partners. I strongly, STRONGLY suggest spending a couple more bucks and getting customer service and better airline quality than Alitalia. Granted, we are college students and were psyched that we got such a cheap deal on flights, but this experience definitely taught us a lesson when it comes to cheap travel. Good thing we bought insurance for the flight because our insurance agency said they have had many troubles with this company and are working out some sort of reimbursement for the taxis and hopefully for the flight. However, at this point I'm just hoping for whatever compensation I can get. They did however give us a $10 meal voucher in Chicago.
J_donne Jun 10th 2009 7:42PM
I've flown with Alitalia a couple of times this year (on domestic and international routes) and everything was fine. The staff were friendly, the service was ok, they didn't lose my baggage...
M Pillai Jun 25th 2009 11:32AM
I wish I had read the reviews before taking the Alitalia flights last week. My family had the misfortune of using this airline to fly from London to Rome and back. We lost both of our luggages. One was delivered on the third day. The Samsonite bag's steel pulling handle was completely missing - I do not know how could they do that. The second bag has still not traced. There is no use in calling - either no one picks the phone or they are helpless. Stay away from this airline.
Spiros Aug 24th 2009 7:56AM
I flew from Greece to Amsterdam with Alitalia (with an exchange flight in Rome). When i went there was no problem, when i returned...these jerks lost my luggage (in fact the whole plane lost their bags that day) but they said they would return our bags with courier the following day. I thought , OK ...and then, next day a courier delivered me my bag but my Cameras (2), souvenirs, a box of cigarettes where gone. I always though, it won't happen to me but,... with Alitalia anything can happen
Goddamn Alitalia, let this company rot like the rest Italy.
Jon Jan 2nd 2011 9:37AM
I recently flew from New York to Rome through Alitalia. WORST flight I have ever been on. The seats were practically on top of each other and there was no legroom. There was no air conditioning and I was stuck for 8 1/2 hours sweating bullets and dehydrated. The flight attendants were rude and nasty. My daughter had to go to the bathroom while they were serving food and they wouldn't move the cart or let her through to use it. Speaking of food, the food was DISGUSTING. It smelled like butt and looked fake. My wife actually ran to the bathroom and vomited after the food and a bottle of "wine" (I'm telling you I don't think it's wine). To make matters worse, a baby was crying the entire flight and, unrelatedly, a woman had a seizure mid-flight and we had to make an emergency landing. When we finally got to Leonardo Da Vinci Airport in Rome, we had to wait almost TWO HOURS to get our bags.
Never. Flying. Alitalia. Again.
rita Feb 19th 2011 8:34PM
Alitalia is the worst airline. They lost all of my luggage over a year ago and I am still fighting with them over the money they owe me for what I spent to re-purchase my luggage, clothing, boots, shoes, toiletries, makeup, etc. They are a disgraceful bunch of mobsters in my opinion. There is NO customer “service” as they sarcastically smirk when you ask them anything.
http://wp.me/p1l3In-4 There is so much more to the story than is mentioned on that link….like after they lost everything and I was in the Milan airport with nothing except a small tote bag, and the clothes on my back…naturally I was upset…they refused to talk to me until “I calmed down.” And, after I had to repurchase everything with my money- including luggage- since my trip was multiple cities across France and Italy- when they lost my luggage, they lost all of my clothing, my boots, my shoes, my makeup, my toiletries and my luggage and my daughter’s luggage. We could not TRAVEL until and unless I purchased everything all over again. They assured me that I would be reimbursed. But all of that is included in the link….however, the “icing on the cake” was when we were in the Florence airport waiting for our connecting flight to return home, and the Alitalia agent claimed that our luggage was now over the weight limit and she wanted me to pay for the extra baggage! So, imagine this now…..THEY LOST my luggage for the ENTIRE vacation. I only received it back in time to put it on the return flight so I had to rebuy everything, (I never even opened it in Italy!) so Yes, I imagine that I had some extra weight….. so now she was “charging” me for extra weight…..THIS was after they refused to let me even “speak” in Florence……you can imagine how upset I got. I refused to pay and tried to explain why…..But, she didn’t care….she insisted. So, I threw out the heaviest toiletries, boots, and clothes in the airport until I got down to the “acceptable” weight and now over ONE YEAR later, they are refusing to pay me what they owe me and they won’t even pay me what they OFFERED to pay me (AND I THREW OUT MOST OF THOSE CLOTHES AND BOOTS IN THE AIRPORT!)– or even acknowledge that they made a typo in the letter. Actually “Alitalia sucks” is too kind. They are criminals, hoodlums, and I pray for the day that the company goes out of business.