Last weekend, we did a quick round trip to Hyderabad from Bangalore on Air Asia; here is our expereince as a family with 2 children and both of us having some disability (Hema has problem with her right hand and I’m a person with low vision).
Check-in counter staff both in Bangalore and Hyderabad are sensitive enough and arranged a personnel to assist us. However, they are not sensitized towards how and why they should be assisting us. That person was just walking ahead of us and once we found it difficult to trace him. AirAsia have announced a priority boarding but that sequence was not maintained after boarding the transit bus.
Stairs to board the aircraft are a bit strange, they are strong but some stairs are too high. It was tough for Hema to climb with an infant. When we have tweeted to Air Asia with this information, received a casual response stating “Hi there, sorry, you may contact the ground staff”; but no mention that they would look into this matter and improve accessibility of boarding. Even personnel who have escorted us to the gate did not inform staff at the boarding gate that we would need assistance. While returning from Hyderabad, check-in counter staff has mentioned, there will be someone at the boarding gate who can asist; but we could found none.
Also, we found no personnel at the ground on arrival. Overall, Air Asia seem to have “assistance” as a checklist item but training of the personnel is due.
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