Highly dissapointed in the lack of communication, service and common sense from SAA

<p>Dear South African Airways,</p> <p>On 26 April 2017 I packed my bags and headed to OR Tambo for my 10:05am SA471 flight to visit my family for a week-long holiday in East London. I only get to see my parents twice a year, so this is something I look forward to. Not having watched the news, I was only made aware of the SAA cabin crew strike for an increase in meal allowance by the Uber driver on my way to the Gautrain station. The first point I would like to bring up is that there was no email or sms communication sent out to any passengers booked on the numerous SAA flights that were cancelled today. Arriving at OR Tambo, I checked in and proceeded to the boarding gate (there was no mention of strikes or potential cancellation from the staff at check-in). The notice board for my flight had no boarding gate listed but I followed the one on my ticket. All the East London passengers waited at the boarding gate at 09:35, we waited till 09:55 and there was no sign of SAA staff. Eventually an elderly gentleman went to find out what was going on and we were informed the flight had been cancelled and that we should report to the SAA service desk. Upon arrival at the service desk the queue was enormous, since all SAA flights had been cancelled. I proceeded to wait in the queue for 3 hours. While waiting there were no SAA staff that went around to everyone to explain what was happening. I was standing behind three Germans who had come to South Africa for the first time on a business trip and this was their first experience of our country. My second point is that the SAA chief operating officer should have anticipated this strike, since it was already on the cards, and yet hordes of people gathered in a queue for the service desk with only 3 out of 5 workstations occupied at the section I was queuing for. The Germans were also highly disappointed at the lack of communication and staff assistance. They had been on a 13 hour flight from Germany and had arrived to these circumstances. I eventually got to the front of the queue at 1pm. The staff member who assisted me did not apologise, nor did he even say hello, he just looked at me and my response was "how can you help me?". He took my ticket and did not say a word, he then told me that there are no other flights to East London today and gave me a small contact card and said I should phone this number tomorrow to see what the situation is. I then requested that he tell all the other East London passengers in the queue so that they don't spend more hours waiting for news that could have been communicated hours ago. His response was "I will tell them when they arrive at the front." This upset me a lot and I want to know if your staff have ever been trained on customer service? They were rude, unapologetic and it felt like I was bothering them. I then proceeded to walk along the entire queue and ask if anyone was flying to East London, if they were I let them take a photo of the contact card I received, so they did not have to spend hours waiting in the queue. I basically did the job that your staff should have done. After this I took the Gautrain back to Sandton and then took an Uber back home. I phoned the number and rebooked my flight for tomorrow afternoon. SAA, you have ****** 2 days of my holiday from me. This is time I could have spent with my loved ones. Furthermore, I have spend R300 on the Gautrain and R100 on Uber today because of the strike that you did not communicate. Are you going to pay me this money back? When I queried if the strike would be over tomorrow, the lady that assisted me on the phone said I must just go to the airport and if it is cancelled they will rebook my flight free of charge, so I asked her "Will SAA send out communication to let passengers know if the strike is still ongoing tomorrow?" Her response was "Yes, they probably will send out communication". Just like SAA probably should have just paid the extra $49 meal allowance to avoid this reputational damage that is going to cost you much more.</p> <p>From,<br />A dissapointed loyal customer</p>