I am writing to you in order to report the terrible experience I had with Austrian Airlines, on the flight 222 from Dusseldorf to Graz on the 1st of June at 15:00. The incident occurred, due to the fact that I have been carrying my wedding dress on Austrian Airlines and it has been totally ruined because of the non-attendance or help on the behalf of the flight crew.
Because my German is not optimal, I decided to speak in English to them. The stewardesses totally ignored me when I was asking for help. My travel itinerary was from Madrid to Graz (ticket bought through Lufthansa with my frequent traveler card). Before my departure, I had asked the personnel of Lufthansa and Austrian Airlines in Graz and in Madrid, if it would be a problem for me to carry my wedding dress on their planes. Both airline personnel assured me that the crew members would be happy to assist me and the dress would be hung up in the cabin wardrobe, in order for it not to get damaged or wrinkled. However, this information doesn't correspond at all with the experience I have had to endure with Austrian Airlines.
My big disappointment was when I entered the Austrian Airlines plane, being that this one was larger than the one before, and not becoming any help whatsoever to carry my wedding dress into the plane. One of the flight attendants whose name is Martina, refused to hang out my dress or to lay it down on several vacant first class seats, receiving only an answer that none of the both possibilities were allowed. After telling her that I was assured by Lufthansa and so Austrian Airlines that hanging the dress was possible, she kept denying me that and gave me the excuse that my dress was too long for that, when actually the dress cover can be carefully folded in half and so hung up without a problem.
Then after asking desperately for a solution, she informed me about two free seats at the back of the plane. There were a lot of rows of three seats only occupied by one passenger and she could have easily requested that one of them moved into the rows of 2 seats. She refused to help me, even when I asked her. All she did was to walk away from me. Therefore, I had to, as best I could, carry it to the back of the plane. As a consequence of all of that, the cover from my dress got dirty and this has gone through to the top of my dress, besides having so many wrinkles. For a flight, such as this one, that was half occupied, I personally find this unacceptable and so incredibly unbelievable that I was treated this way!
The wedding dress got completely ruined as it was full of wrinkles and got dirty as well. The airplane seats where I placed my dress were dirty and some of this dirt went through my dress cover. The bill for cleaning and ironing my dress is of $70. As I mentioned before, I am a frequent traveler and I also organize several flights for my students to Spain and to England every year and I have to admit that I've never experienced before this kind of treatment to the point of being totally ignored by your flight crew.
Then, I have made a formal complaint to Austrian Airlines Customer Service on the 1st of June. Their answer, on the 22nd of June, is that they refuse, not only to pay for the damages but to take responsibility to the problem, adding that it was the passenger's fault (my fault) to bring such an item on board. In other words, my complaint has been totally ignored by their department.
