Enugu Metro calls on Airpeace Airlines to reach out and apologize to the Emir of Kano for delayed flights and aggravations.
Dear Airpeace, it does not matter which party is right and which party is wrong in the ongoing spat. What matters is that a customer is complaining about your service. Do not forget customer service excellence. The goal of customer excellence is for a business to keep ringing in the change while leaving customers satisfied.
Get it?
If the management of Airpeace does not get it, let us remind them that Airpeace is a business. It’s not a political organisation. Therefore, join other businesses that routinely apologize to customers, even when the customer is wrong.
In every business, the customer is king. Thus, businesses that fail to heed this axiom live to regret the consequence of poor services. Additionally, when a business deals with a customer with social capital, public sympathy blesses the customer. And this may lead to a backlash in many unanticipated ways.
Is it right to apologize to the Emir? This is however not the issue at the moment as full details of what happened are hoarded.
Did the Emir make an international booking either online or through an agency? If he did, his trip qualifies as an overseas flight to Kano with a Lagos stopover. If this were the case, Airpeace will have three options to appease any customer in that situation, regardless of his or her social status.
Apologize to the Emir
One is to put the customer on the next available airline flight to the destination. The second is to check them into a hotel at no charge to wait for the airlines’ evening flight. The third is to delay the flight to accommodate the passengers from abroad, since Airpeace was responsible for their lateness. It’s not a good excuse to say that the local jet was already in motion. That flight shouldnt have taken off without the international passengers if this was a connecting flight from a stopover.
It is our suspicion that the Emir booked separate international and local flights for his return to Kano. He consequently hoped to cover the Lagos time lag with an overseas initiating flight that leaves on time. This explains why the Emir and his team allegedly suffered no-show penalties.
Howbeit, we encourage Airpeace to err on the side of caution and do the right thing for their business. Kindly call up the Emir and ask for an audience to explain the situation. When he grants the audience, offer an apology for the inconvenience that he and his entourage suffered. And offer a compensation; a bonus business class ticket for the Emir will not be a bad idea. A number of upgrades to business class on subsequent trips may also serve as a good alternative.
Local airlines keep dealing unfairly with their Nigerian passengers. Those goading the airline to stand up to the Emir fail to recognize that they themselves suffer serious aggravations. Does the Emir not have the right as everyone else to complain and seek redress? Every international passenger has recourse to the NCAA and the courts to seek redress, and they chose the former. And their complaint is valid. Their originating overseas flight left late and made them miss a second scheduled flight. They suffered the inconvenience of waiting a whole day in Lagos for a connecting flight.
It is good customer service to pacify aggrieved customers, whether VIP or not.
Apologize to Kano Emir Airpeace
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