Air India, embarrassingly, has served a warning to all its flight attendants after a hotel in London complained that some cabin crew members would bring boxes to save up food from the breakfast buffet table for later on.
Titled, ‘A buffet is not a takeaway’, the warning note was sent on Monday by an Assistant General Manager (AGM) of the in-flight service department. It said: “We have received an unfortunate email from the management of hotel in London stating that some AI crew members regularly come down for breakfast with empty boxes filling them up from the buffet, presumably to eat later.”
The letter warned that AI would be forced to take serious disciplinary action against the offenders, adding that “we are aware that this could have been done by a small party”. “This may include, not being scheduled on international sectors, as we have no desire to allow the Air India’s reputation to be tarnished by this act,” the note warned.
An Air India spokesperson said: “Initially this letter appears to be fake because an AGM-grade officer is not authorised to send a circular that has pan-India implications. We are investigating the issue.” But cabin crew members of AI confirmed that they had received such a letter from the AGM, who was promoted to the said post only 15 days ago.
Her decision to issue a general warning to all crew hasn’t gone down well. A senior cabin member, requesting anonymity, said, “There are a few rotten apples everywhere, not just among cabin crew members.”
Though the accusation was rejected, they pointed to three factors that could have got this practice going. “We land in London either at 7.30am or 6.30pm. We are dead tired by then as it is 14-15 hours from the time we have left home. Unlike earlier when the layover was 2 days, it’s now only 26 hours and so we have to catch up on sleep before the next flight. Even so, only a couple of us would be bringing boxes to fill and eat later. Most don’t do that,” the crew member said.
“It’s the worst for this crew who have been taken on contract as they are paid 60% less than the regular crew, ranging from $600-1200 per month during which time we do at least ten layovers,” he said.
Then again, room service is not provided for free in the said hotel. “It comes with a service charge of 10 pounds so as to discourage people from ordering meals in their room. So one has to dress up and go to the restaurant downstairs for a meal. The menu is limited to sandwiches and such things so one is not inclined to have that lunch/dinner every time one lands there. Since the hotel is located close to Heathrow airport, one has to take the long trip to the city to have a proper meal,” he said adding which is why a couple of crew might have started taking some food to eat later.
Its an accepted norm in all US hotels that serve free breakfast as a buffet from Marriott & Hilton to Holiday Inn Express. Not all members may go down or some members will go down and bring back food for persons that did not come down. Business travelers will have the breakfast and then put some food items such as Apples, Bananas, water bottles, soft drinks, etc in their bags to consumption later in the day. Almost everyone takes a cup of coffee or tea with them.
IMO, the hotel in London is being too cheap on this issue at AI. Such hatred for people from South Asia is a typical style of white trash.
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