Aaaaaand we’re back.

If you’ve been following my Jet2 Saga in blogs 1 and 2, you’ll know that the response I finally received to terrible staff attitudes and being refused access to my own wheelchair was lacklustre. I was not satisfied with the response (obviously), so I sent this reply.

I feel the handler’s name is not identifiable, so I haven’t changed it. If I sound like a bit of a bastard, it’s because this complaint is about more than me – it’s for every disabled person who has been treated poorly when flying.

Let’s see if the next episode is any better.

Email follows:

Hi Laura,

This is a rather disappointing response, particularly after several holding emails, not least that you referenced the issue occurring at a different airport, which makes me concerned that you were more occupied with replying to my complaint than addressing it.

You opened with an apology that you had been unable to speak to me more personally, suggesting you had attempted to contact me via other means, when I have no missed calls or correspondence prior to your reply.

We’ll get to the points you didn’t address shortly, but I could have overlooked the above if not for this statement in your reply. “I appreciate you may have been unsure of what code to use.”

This is at the heart of my issue with Jet2. Your use of this phrase once again asserts that the problem is due to my not understanding which codes airlines use, something the crew were also happy to insist upon. This suddenly makes it feel a lot more institutional than the actions of one misguided member of staff.

May I remind you that the coding of me, as your passenger, is entirely a process that Jet2 concludes. I did not ask to be a Charlie, Sierra, Whiskey, Tango or Foxtrot. I explained my access needs and Jet2 made that decision for me. Whether I know what code I am or am “unsure” is irrelevant and again, not my fault.

Whilst I appreciate that you are trying to explain how this system works to me, I have had it explained several times. I am no longer unsure how this internal industry process operates, but I am sure that it is not my responsibility to codify myself.

My other points

I have attached my initial complaint email as a Word document as reference, but the points you did not address are:

Anxiety and past experience

You did not show any understanding that I might be anxious about not being provided with my own equipment, after my last Jet2 holiday saw £5000 of equipment damaged beyond repair, detailed in the link to my blog I provided.

The impact on my family

You did not acknowledge that my wife and 13-year-old daughter were placed in a position where they had to help airport assistance take two other wheelchair users through an airport to ensure my passage from the plane. Nor did you consider that they may have been distressed by both the experience and by seeing how their husband and father respectively was being treated.

My humiliation

You made no reference to my statement that I felt humiliated and made vulnerable, nor did you consider how horrible it felt to have my autonomy removed when a simple solution was present.

See this excerpt from my previous email:

“I’d like to take a moment here to tell you how I felt in that aisle chair. I felt small. I felt that I had first been stripped of my ability to self-advocate, that my voice was considered little more than an irritating whisper from exasperated lungs. 

As the straps were fastened, I relinquished control of my body to a stranger, my legs were tethered, and I was quite literally “wheelchair bound”, a term here that refers to my being fastened to a chair so that I could not exist without it. As my ability to move freely was taken away, I felt more disabled in those few minutes than I have in years. In those moments, I was made vulnerable.”

I was once again vulnerable sharing these emotions with you, but that evidently does not matter.

Incorrect and dangerous advice

You did not reference that a member of the flight crew advised me to lie about my access needs, or indeed the danger this could cause for other passengers if I were to complicate matters by suggesting I was unable to walk, potentially busying crew during an emergency when their aid would be better directed at passenger with greater need.

The value of my time 

I also highlighted that I had to spend not only additional time on the plane, but additional time at the airport to start this complaint process – not to mention the time in writing a detailed complaint (which I do not feel was valued) and now this response highlighting matters you did not address.  

“The code can be difficult to change”

Additionally, you stated in your reply that “the code can be difficult to change”. Does it take longer than the extra 30 minutes I was on that plane pleading with staff to have my wheelchair brought to me, when it had already been offloaded and was on the tarmac at the bottom of the stairs?

I was not unsure which code to use. I don’t use the code, the airline does. At no point on the phone or in person did I say “Put me down as a Sierra”. I don’t need a grasp of the phonetic alphabet to fly. What I do need is staff to understand my needs and support me, not to make me the problem.

As I attempt to condense my thoughts into this email, it feels that with the exception of Ashleigh, whom I spoke with at Edinburgh Airport, not Thessaloniki Airport, everyone I have spoken to seems to want to labour the point that I should know industry codes.

As stated, this is immaterial to me as a passenger. I do not work in aviation, I’m just subject to the treatment that occurs when I attempt to fly as a disabled person.

I trust your reply will come sooner than the last, and that it will acknowledge my concerns, rather than offer decidedly hollow statements such as “I apologise if you didn’t feel as though this was the case” and “feedback has certainly been passed on to our ground team”.

Please show me that you can restore my confidence in Jet2.

Thanks,

Joe.

Tune in next week kids, or in like six weeks when I hear back.