Air France forces stranded passengers to sleep on the floor

I just flew in from India to Boston on Air France, on the 5th of August! A trip to remember, if nothing, as a lesson to avoid Air France and Paris, Charles De Gaulle at all costs.

My connection from Charles De Gaulle to Boston was flight AF332, to depart Termina E of CGD at 1:15 on Sunday the 5th. The plane was delayed for technical reasons. After repeated delays, it was eventually cancelled at 5PM. The person at the desk informed me that I would be put up in a hotel and that I was to fly out the next day on Monday the 6th at 10:30 am instead.


I do not have a French visa. I could not enter France to go to the hotel. I informed the guy at the desk of this and asked to be put on an alternate flight to the Boston. Not possible, he said, its full. I asked to be flown to NY. Not possible, he said, the flight is full. Air France will speak to the police he said. We will try to arrange a temporary visa for you.

So I stood in a queue for two hours to get coupons for the hotel. Then a young Croation fellow called Igor led me, 13 other Indians, and a number of other people who needed visas off to the security area to get us transit visas.

The police denied all Indians (including me), a couple of Jordonians and an Armenian visas. It took several hours to come to this conclusion.

It was late by now and we had been waiting for the flight for a long time. Some of us had flown into CGD at 6am; I had arrived at 8am! We were in the security area, we were hungry and thirsty. There were no water fountains. There were two dispensing machines, but they would only accept Euros. We were travelling from India (or Jordan or Armenia) to the US, we had no Euros. And we weren't going anywhere. There was an Air France transfer desk near the security area, so I asked the lady there, a brunette by name of Jessica Louisa Asnoun, if we could be let into the business lounge instead, since we didn't appear to be going to the hotel.

No, she said, not possible. She was quite curt.

In that case, was Air France was going to compensate us for all this in any way, I asked. No, she said. We have given you coupons to the hotel, it is the police who are holding you up, its not our fault.

I said I didnt want to go to the hotel, I wanted to go to Boston. She pointed me to a complaint form and welcomed me to fill it out and post it to Air France, if I felt like complaining.

Time passed. Igor went back to request the police again for the visas. He was turned down again.

By this time we were quite tired and frustrated. We went back to the desk to demand that we be let into the lounge. No, said Jessica. Air France had provided us coupons to the hotel.

The coupons are useless, another passenger said. We cannot go out. That is the police's responsibility, Jessica replied.

I was tired. I slapped the desk and yelled, what do you mean "no", we didnt want to be here, we are not here because the police held us up, we're here because Air France's flight did not take off.

Dont get aggressive, she snapped at me. Otherwise you will spend the night with the police instead of here.

The audacity of it! Somehow I doubt she would have said that if I were caucasian. Then again, maybe she would have -- after all she was French!

A supervisor guy turned up. Let us into the lounge, I said. Sorry, he said, we have no staff. So what will we do, sleep here? we asked. Terminal B has chairs without arm rests, he said, we will take you there and you can sleep on the chairs. But first let me call my supervisor (a super-supervisor?) to talk to the police. (For some reason he didn't appear to think it was feasible simply to go back to the boarding area in Terminal E itself!)

More time passed. Somewhere along we were all issued new coupons to replace our hotel coupons. The new coupons were for a dinner in any food joint in CGD. Eventually the super-supervisor called back. No visas.

More time passed. Nothing happened. Eventually someone complained of hunger. The supervisor guy said we'll take you to Terminal B, there's a restuarant there. We waited around a bit more, but nothing happened. Nobody took us to Terminal B. He just stood there and apologized. I suggested that Air France owed us an apology, and, maybe complimentary tickets. He thought a bit and went away. Shortly thereafter he returned with a box.

We cant give you complimentary tickets, he said, so we're giving you this instead, and gave us each a toilet bag with a toothbrush and assorted toiletries and a "staralliance" T-shirt.

Eventually, it struck someone that it was time we were fed. The supervisor took away our coupons. What's it good for, we asked. A sandwich, a dessert and a drink, he said. We will get it from Terminal B. More time passed. Then they came back with a cardboard carton and gave each of us a cheese sandwich and a bottle of water (so they got the sandwich and the "drink", though they did miss the dessert).

Then he said, we will lead you to Terminal B. Couldn't we simply go back to the boarding area in Terminal E, we asked. No, its too late, we were told.

We need blankets, we said. Its cold in the security area. The supervisor guy went away and returned shortly. We have only 4 blankets he said, and handed out 4 blankets. The ladies in the group grumbled loudly. Then he said, there may be blankets in Terminal B, please wait, we will get blankets from Terminal B. We will get the blankets, and then take you to Terminal B.
Cant you simply get it off a plane, we asked. No he said.

More time passed. Much more time. Eventually someone came by with 13 4x4 (or equally absurdly small) blankets. Then the supervisor said, Im sorry, but I must take my leave. One of us will lead you to Terminal B, and then he left.

That left us, Igor, and the ladies behind the transfer desk. After a time they all packed up and began to leave as well. A new crew arrived at the transfer desk. Wait a minute, we said, aren't we going to Terminal B? The new crew had no idea what was going on. We had to explain the situation to them. One of us led us to a door from which one could catch a bus to Terminal B. The door was shut. It was too late. There were no more buses. We were led back to the security area.

Here are pictures of us sleeping all around the security area of CGD.

We woke up early in the morning, as soon as the boarding area was open and crawled back upstairs. We had to convince the person at the transfer desk to get us breakfast coupons; thankfully they did, although it did take half an hour.

Some of us lost our luggage. Fortunately my luggage arrived safely, but I left the unfortunates standing in yet another queue to report lost luggage at Logan!

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An update.

I filed a complaint with Air France about the treatment meted out to us. After a few weeks I obtained a letter from them, dated 13th of September, where the representative claims "Unfortunately the travel dates mentioned in your letter do not seem accurate". Note that I have sent them copies of my boarding pass and the receipt.

Apparently the fact that the receipt states 05 August as the date of travel and the boarding pass reflects the date of the rescheduled flight -- 06 August -- instead is proof enough for Air France that I am out to scam them!