A frail 95-year-old widow was reduced to tears after a holiday to her favourite city turned into 'absolute hell'. Great-grandmother Joan Alderson encountered massive problems from the moment she arrived at the airport with her son Robert for the ill-fated trip to Florence, in Italy.
Teacher Robert arranged the holiday as a final trip away to the location she loved to visit with her late husband. But Robert described how the pair were stopped from boarding their initial KLM flight at Manchester on June 25 because it was 'overbooked', meaning they missed their first night of the trip.
After an overnight at a hotel near the airport, the pair eventually got away. However, on the return journey, they missed their connecting flight home at Paris because airport staff did not have the facilities to help 95-year-old Joan off the plane in time.
In an ordeal that Robert described as 'horrendous', his mum's personal wheelchair also became 'lost in transit' on the way back, reports the Manchester Evening News.
Joan, who is going blind, said: "It was absolutely awful. I am still waking up in the middle of the night now thinking I am in Florence and having nightmares about it. I haven't got over it."
Robert described how the ordeal began after they were informed their outbound flight had been overbooked. He said: "We were desperate to get out of the airport. I thought my mum was going to have a stroke at this point. It was horrendous. I couldn't believe the attitude of the airline towards someone so elderly and disabled."
Further disaster struck on the journey home. The pair had initially booked tickets onto an Air France-KLM flight from Florence on June 30, with an hour long connection at an airport in Paris.
But, Robert says it then took staff at Paris an hour to help him and wheelchair-bound Joan off the aircraft, which had already started to be cleaned by staff in time for the next flight. Despite the best efforts of a staff member who attempted to rush them to the following gate in time, they had missed the plane home back to Manchester and were forced to spend another night in an airport hotel.
After a night at the Yotel hotel, the anguished pair caught a flight back home the following morning. Upon eventually landing in Manchester, Robert was informed that Joan's personal wheelchair, which she uses to get around on a daily basis had become 'lost in transit'. It safely arrived back in the country a few days later.
"The whole thing was horrendous. It was absolute hell," he continued. "The holiday was completely ruined by this experience, made worse by the fact she spent our whole first day in bed because she was so tired and unwell.
"During this trip, which was meant to be so happy and my mother's last farewell to Florence, it has been a total nightmare. The worst thing is that my mother who is frail, 92 per cent blind and has lots of health issues, was so excited about this trip, ended her day with excessive pain, worry and sadness."
Reflecting back on the trip, Joan added: "It meant I didn't enjoy the trip. I am 95, and I love Florence, it is my favourite city in the world. This was a surprise trip, in case I wasn't able to go again. But all that week I was just in a daze and kept bursting into tears, it was horrific.
"It made my head in such a world I didn't know whether I was coming or going. It ruined the holiday."
Following the trip, Robert says he has now been offered compensation for all flights, as well as a refund of Joan's flight ticket. They have been offered a travel voucher of £470 and he has also been told the airline will 'exceptionally consider' the first night's accommodation in Italy which they missed out on.
A spokesperson for KLM and Air France said: "On behalf of both airlines, I can confirm that the customer was contacted today and was offered a refund in addition to compensation for the issues that surrounded their trip. Mr Alderson now has an email confirmation of what was agreed. I hope that we can now consider this case resolved.
"The customer has been compensated in accordance to the EU regulations and an additional gesture of goodwill was given in view of the overall circumstances. All the amounts agreed for the compensation and refund was communicated to the customer directly."
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