Emirates may have found themselves in a Soup Salad! They recently managed to muck up the meal of a First Class passenger, and may be on the hook for $130,000!
An Indian lawyer from Colaba was over to Casablanca to celebrate his birthday with his wife in February. On his way back, he was flying Emirates with his wife on February 27, and asked to be served an early lunch so that he could catch up on rest after the meal.
As per the Mumbai Mirror, he spotted a live insect in the chicken salad he ordered for lunch. What insect was it differs from who you ask. The lawyer claims it was a cockroach, and the airline claims it was a beetle.
The airline was sued for INR 86 Lakhs ($130K), because, the experience left him with a fear of flying and mental trauma.
The dreadful experience has left him with a fear of flying and he later skipped a work-related engagement that required air travel, missing out on “anticipated professional fees” of Rs 30 lakh, according to Iqbal’s legal notice to Emirates. He has cited the loss of the potential fees, Rs 50 lakh for mental trauma, and Rs 7 lakh for his and wife’s first-class return tickets (Mumbai-Casablanca-Mumbai) in the compensation demand.
The lawyer claims to have submitted a complaint to Emirates on February 28, but the airline only offered them 25,000 Skywards miles as a token of apology. As per the airline, they thought of it to be a seasonal beetle found in Morocco, and they offered the following explanation.
The inspection of the beetle allegedly found in your salad shows it was a common seasonal beetle found in Morocco. But, finding out how it came aboard was difficult to pinpoint. The only explanation that is plausible, is that despite fumigation of the aircraft at Casablanca, the beetle somehow got in the aircraft whilst in Casablanca airport waiting for boarding, and was possible lurking somewhere in the galley area.
Emirates has time till mid-April to pay the compensation. I don’t think he is getting such a huge sum from the airline, but maybe he gets his ticket refunded and an assured upgrade on the next flight. After all, how long is he going to be sitting in Mumbai and not flying because of this incident? But if he is going to score this kind of money from the airline, I’m totally going to try and see if I can afford him for my service recovery incidents.
What do you think about this outrageous claim for Emirates? Is it really as bad or is it just a frivolous law suit?
This is an OTT claim and spoils his point for being so. However it is true that such events spoil a journey for which one has paid several hundred dollars an hour.
We have just had a poor/bad food experience (across the flight in first and business classes) and went hungry, though not starved because of it. A while back my wife suffered moderate food poisoning on what one may consider the worlds best (south) Asian airline (Business Class) and got no reply never mind apology or recompense.
Any other food establishment would I hope tear up the bill and offer a free meal perhaps. An airline should either refund the fare or indeed off an unconditional one or two class upgrade.
Being unreasonable obliges a similar defence that spoils it for the next sufferer.
Variation on the classic planting “cockroach in my soup” to get a free meal con.
How pathetic, hopefully his PTSD clears soon, but doubt his retardation will ever be cured.
his full time job is touting suits on soi bangla, patong