Flew Iberia Airline Boston to Bologna thru Madrid - worst experience ever!
Just flew from Boston to Bologna with a layover in Madrid and it was the worst flying experience I ever had. And to clarify, I fly to Europe at least once a year, sometimes 2-3 times a year. So not a business flyer but often enough that I have flown many of the big airlines at least a few times (Alitalia, ITA, Iberia, Lufthansa, Swiss Air, Air France, British Airways, plus the major American carriers).
So, first about 4 hours before the scheduled departure time (5:40 pm) we received an email saying the flight would be delayed by 2 hours(7:40 pm). It actually said that the flight was cancelled and we were rebooked on a new flight 2 hours later but the flight number was the same. When we got to the airport, the departures board listed the departure time as 7:10 pm, the website and app listed the departure time as 6:28 pm and the sign at the gate listed the departure time as 7:45 pm. There was mass confusion as they insisted that everyone had to be issued a new boarding pass at the gate even if you already had an updated mobile boarding pass or had gotten one at the ticket counter when we checked your bag.
Meanwhile we knew that our connecting flight would be in jeopardy because we only had a 2.5 hour layover in Madrid but we were told in Boston that they could not help us rebook either at the ticket counter or the gate. We had to wait until we got to Madrid. We tried calling Iberia directly and were told the same thing - they would rebook us an hour before the flight landed automatically and to expect an email. When I asked how I would get this email while on the plane I was told that since I am an Iberia Club member, I would get free WiFi in the flight.
We didn’t actually push back from the gate until 8:40, so it ended up being a 3 hour delay. When I tried to follow the instructions to get the free WiFi both the website and the app said my password was wrong. It wasn’t. It had been working all day up until we got to the plane and worked again after we landed. So it was just a glitch on the plane. And so I didn’t get free WiFi and couldn’t check for news on the rebooking. When I asked the flight attendant if he had anything to suggest or anything he could do he said “no.” Literally, just “no,” and walked off.
Meanwhile the seats were really, really uncomfortable. Way beyond what I normally experience on a trans-Atlantic flight. The seats were narrower, the aisle was tiny, the seat bottom was abnormally shallow, the legroom was absolutely minuscule. I have very short legs and my knees were JAMMED against the seat in front of me. My mom is barely 5 feet tall and she said her knees were uncomfortable too. And the seat itself was hard. It was painful from about the first 30 minutes in and through the entire flight.
There were other problems too. The climate control was a joke. My row was sauna hot - even my mom who has Raynaud’s and so is ALWAYS shivering cold was sweltering and had to take off her sweater and then her undershirt. Meanwhile, just five rows back from us was so cold that I could hear people’s teeth chattering as I passed them in the way to the bathroom. They were huddled under multiple blankets and coats.
Just after take-off we found out that the delay was due to unscheduled but necessary maintenance and there was no backup plane. First time in the process that anyone would tell us what the delay was about.
Food was really unappetizing. No ice available for drinks. And there were 2 bathrooms for the entire plane so there was a constant line. And the bathrooms were small. I mean really small. Much smaller than those I’ve seen on other planes. And the sink didn’t drain. And it was filthy. Clearly hadn’t been cleaned any time recently.
When we arrived in Madrid, we finally got notice that we had been rebooked from our missed connection. For a flight 6.5 hours later. When we tried get new seat assignments, the agent spoke almost no English (ok, I understand that it is arrogant to expect that in Madrid) but luckily my daughter speaks Spanish so she could communicate with him but the agent seemed incapable of understanding what kind of seats we wanted. I thought that it was that the seats were unavailable which would be understandable and we would have accepted that, but then he said that the flight was fairly empty. He just couldn’t keep straight that we wanted two aisle seats and a window and were ok not being next to each other. He kept trying to put us 3 across next to each other. Very frustrating.
We asked if we could have access to the lounge for the day since we had such a long wait and had just come off a red-eye where we were sweating for 6+ hours and he said that he couldn’t do that. What he said was that there was no option to get a day pass to the lounge, we had to buy a yearly membership. We passed on that expense but then found out later that they do offer day passes but wanted to charge us $55 per person for 3 hours.
Finally we asked about compensation for the three hour delay and the missed connection. We had carefully read the fine print that came in the email which first told us about the original delay and we were eligible. We were told that it had to be done on the website. The email had said that it would be through an Iberia agent at the airport and that the compensation would be given that day but the agent refused to even read the email. Probably because it was sent to us in English and he didn’t speak English well. So we went to the website and there is nowhere to do this. The closest we could find was a button to request a refund but that immediately gave us an error message that this flight was ineligible for a refund. So what do we do now? Customer service requires us to go through a chat bot that just reiterates that the flight was ineligible for a refund.
So incredibly frustrating!!! I am never flying Iberia Airline ever again.