Dubai: Six months after jewellery worth Dh7,000 was allegedly stolen from his checked-in baggage, an Emirati passenger says he is still awaiting compensation from the airline.
Mohammad Rasheed, 50, claims the incident took place after his Lahore-bound Pakistan International Airlines (PIA) flight PK 204 from Dubai on December 31, 2014 was diverted to Karachi at the last minute due to fog.
Rasheed, a retired government employee, says he was travelling with three checked-in suitcases and three handbags.
However, he claims that the PIA staff at Karachi allowed him to carry only one handbag as he left for the hotel arranged by them.
Later, when he and his family finally arrived in Lahore the next day, he says, two of the three suitcases were missing and to his horror one of his handbags was tampered with.
Jewellery gone
“Shockingly, we couldn’t spot any of my wife’s gold jewellery worth more than Dh7,000 in the bag and things were certainly not in order, as if someone had rummaged through our bag for the gold ornaments we were carrying,” says Rasheed who claims PIA staff scanned the two handbags in front of him before checking them through to Lahore.
“So they clearly knew what was inside our bags and the theft must have taken place after we left. We travel around the world frequently and are always very careful with our belongings, but we had to trust them with these two bags carrying our valuables in the situation, as we were asked to carry only one bag with essentials for the night’s stay in the Karachi hotel.”
Rasheed, a resident of Al Warqa, says his ordeal got even worse on January 11, the day of their return, when PIA refused to let his daughter fly back to Dubai, apparently because her booking was cancelled. “Strangely enough the officer said that I had cancelled her booking in Karachi. When I pressed the staff to explain how that was possible, he issued passes for me and my wife eventually, saying PIA would arrange a ticket for my daughter the very next day,” says Rasheed, who was visiting the country with his wife and daughter for medical purposes. “Obviously that did not happen. My daughter eventually landed back in Dubai on January 13, two days after we returned home. We were told all flights were booked before that.”
Rasheed says he has lodged a complaint with the airline regarding the theft and his daughter’s cancelled booking. But despite several email and telephonic exchanges with the firm’s managers, he says, nothing has emerged. “We have not just been robbed by the airline but also shortchanged throughout the journey. Having to leave my daughter behind was the worst bit,” fumes the father of three who has vowed to never fly PIA again.
PIA: claim not verifiable
When XPRESS wrote to PIA’s office in Dubai, PIA Dubai’s ticket office manager Muhammad Shoaib, said: “The passenger’s claim is not verifiable from any quarter. As per standard airlines rule, no claim is acceptable, after the passenger leaves the customs area without lodging a written complaint with the ‘Lost & Found’ section. However, the complaint was still sent to the relevant office for verification. Unfortunately, we have not received any reply from our head office regarding the subject’s claim as it is not verifiable from any corner.”
However, Shoaib added, PIA are still in pursuit of the case and say the passenger will be compensated as per corporation’s rule if any verifiable evidence is found in respect to Rasheed’s claim.
