A mum has spoken out about her "nightmare" experience with easyJet after her flight to Tenerife was cancelled twice and her family was forced to sleep on the airport floors.
On Monday (23 May), Nicola Caine, 37, from Cheshire, was due to fly from Manchester Airport to Tenerife in a group of 13 with her husband, children and several family members. The group had booked a package holiday with EasyJet to celebrate Nicola's parents' 40th wedding anniversary and their 60th birthdays.
They were booked on the EZY1903 easyJet flight to Tenerife South for a seven-day holiday, which cost around £2,500.
And Nicola described how the experience was "one problem after another", which was traumatising for her family, especially her 12-year-old son, who is autistic. After boarding the plane, the passengers waited over an hour due to baggage issues, only to be told that the flight was cancelled.
Mum-of-two Nicola, who is married to husband Dave, told the M.E.N: "We were sat on the plane for an hour and a half. A pilot came and said ‘unfortunately, due to staff going over their hours, we are going to have to cancel this flight.’
"The reaction on the plane wasn’t good at all. My son b roke down in tears and screamed the plane down.
"Then we were told we couldn’t get off the plane because an Emirates plane had just arrived, and they take priority. So we sat on the plane for another 30 minutes.
"Luckily, the staff on the plane were really good, they let us go to the front of the plane to calm my son down."
When they exited the plane and arrived back in the terminal, Nicola said the passengers were not greeted by EasyJet staff. Instead, Manchester Airport staff advised passengers to download the EasyJet app to rebook new flights.
But there were more issues with the EasyJet app, Nicola claimed.
She continued: "E veryone was trying to get on the app, but it was crashing. No-one could get on it at all.
"The app didn't work because we were on a package holiday. While we were stood there, two cancelled easyJet flights came through from Turkey and Egypt.
"So we were left, all these people from three flights, not knowing what would happen. Luckily, we live 30 minutes from the airport, so we decided to come home.
"We didn’t know whether to unpack because we didn't know whether we would be going on holiday or not."
At 5:30am, Nicola received a text, telling her to be at Manchester Airport for 10:30am, where a coach would take them to Gatwick Airport to catch a flight to Tenerife at 7:10pm that evening.
"We were absolutely devastated," Nicola explained. "We had not slept all night because my son was crying.
"I just thought, how can I go on a coach for almost five hours and sit in an airport for three hours, and then go on a four and a half hour flight? EasyJet said it was a suitable alternative and that we would lose our money if we didn't go on that trip."
After arriving at Gatwick Airport, Nicola quickly booked her son for an antigen test, as his PCR had run out.
At the gate, waiting to board the flight to Tenerife, the passengers had to wait over 30 minutes while the plane was cleaned. They were then told by easyJet that they could no longer operate the flight, but stand-by crew would be there for the flight in an hour.
They were then asked to return to departures, which raised alarm bells for Nicola, who suspected that the flight would be cancelled.
She said: "I questioned the staff because I knew this had happened the night before. They assured me that everything was fine.
"But we had to go back to departures, which was a tell-tale sign that we weren’t getting back on the plane. So we went back to departures and stood at the customer service desk for another 45 minutes.
"Again, there were no easyJet people there. At 9pm, we all got an email to say the flight was cancelled."
The passengers were asked to move to another gate and look at new flights on the easyJet app, which angered Nicola.
"I was so angry because I had heard it all the night before," she continued. "I told the staff, this happened at Manchester Airport, we cannot book new flights on the app because we are have a package holiday.
"A police officer advised us to stay in a hotel overnight. We said, why should we have to do that, t here should be a level of service.
"The nearest hotel was £690 for the night.
"We came back to the terminal and met the other passengers, not knowing whether we were going to fly, or get taxis for another four hours to go home- because what if easyJet book us another flight?"
Exhausted, the family decided to stay in the airport to wait for news of another flight. With no accommodation to stay in and no food, Nicola and her family resorted to sleeping wherever they could find space.
Her 60-year-old mum was laying on the floor and her children were laying across dining table chairs.
"It was an absolute nightmare," Nicola described. "It was freezing cold.
"My husband and I had to lay on the floor. EasyJet didn't even provide food vouchers.
"The children were tired and upset. You wouldn’t even treat animals the way we have been treated."
A new flight was arranged, but with a three-hour delay. Nicola's parents, who were on a separate booking, went to check in for their new flight and were informed that their seats were not allocated on the flight.
She said: "At this point, we decided, we cannot subject the children to this any longer. We decided to go home. The woman on the easyJet hotline was so helpful, she said it was completely unacceptable and organised taxis to take us home.
"It was another four and a half hour journey back home. And my parents found out they weren't allocated seats on their flight, they were on stand-by.
"When we looked at the app, we found out we weren't allocated seats, either. If we had stayed at Gatwick, we would have been on standby. It’s been one problem after another. I would never ever fly with easyJet again."
The experience has been distressing for the family, as they had eagerly been anticipating the chance to celebrate Nicola's parents' birthdays and their wedding anniversary in Tenerife.
She added: "My daughter kept crying and saying, ‘we waited two years for this, mum'. My son was very frustrated with all the delays- I had to distract and reassure him.
"When the flights were cancelled, he was screaming uncontrollably and crying. Because of his autism, this will be something that will never go away now.
"Every time we go on holiday now, he will fret about cancellations, because it happened three times.
"It's traumatic for him to have a Covid test- we have to hold him down. Everything adds up and it has been an absolute nightmare."
Better communication from EasyJet would have made the situation easier, Nicola suggested, as the passengers felt "stranded".
She added: "We have paid all this money to go on holiday and easyJet have not had the decency to put us up somewhere or offer us information. All I needed was information. If someone had said to us, 'you will receive an email with new flight details. If you live nearby, you can go home. If not, we can put you in accommodation.'
"That would have put so many people’s minds at ease. We expect to be told what is going on, not left in the dark for three days. I would hate for this to happen to anybody else."
A spokesperson for easyJet said: "Unfortunately, we were unable to operate the EZY1903 from Manchester to Tenerife on Monday, due to air traffic control restrictions earlier in the day leading to the crew reaching their maximum operating hours. We’re very sorry that the flight the family transferred on to from Gatwick was also cancelled.
"We always aim to minimise the impact on our customers, providing them with the options to transfer to an alternative flight free of charge, or receive a refund or a voucher. Our customer team are in touch with the family to talk them through their options."
This week, the budget airline cancelled flights across the UK due to an IT failure and has apologised for the cancellations and disruptions caused.
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