Alitalia

AWFUL customer service, at least in Athens. The guy answering the phone is not only bored do death but he also has no clue!!! He should be fired, yesterday!

The worst experience with an airline in my entire life, and I'm an Italian person living abroad which usually takes around 20 to 30 flights per year, so I have quite a lot experience with airlines. Take some pop-corn and enjoy the story, it is hilarious and scary at the same time. I booked a return ticket London-Rome 24th-28th of July for visiting my family. Then around beginning of July we had a bad family situation for which I had to anticipate my trip, so I've decided to book another return ticket London-Rome 9-19th of July. I fly to Rome on the 9th, and get to the city quite ok. Then around the 15th I take the decision to not come back to London on the 19th, but stay in Rome until the 28th. Decided to do so also because Alitalia (this great airline) took a lot of proud on their flexible services, for which you can change any flight at no extra cost. Well guess what? The only way to change flights was by calling their customer service (yes why in 2020 you would allow such a complex mechanism of changing flights online?), and obviously it was impossible to get ahold of someone. I tried for an entire week, calling between 10 and 30 times per day, with no luck (I have phone company proof of this). Moreover the phone line is not free, you actually pay every time you call them (such a scam). I ended up paying around 60 Euros of phone bill, with no luck. But wait for it, the story is not finished, there is an even more tragic ending. At this point I realised I'm not able to change flights, and started to live with it. I still have my return flight to London on the 28th, and I told myself to be patient because the situation with the current pandemic is not easy for many people, Alitalia probably had to handle to many phone calls and different cases that they might be for sure overwhelmed with work. Fine. Then I show up at the airport on the 28th of July, to discover that my return ticket has been cancelled because I did not show up on the first flight. What??? Yes, apparently this great airline automatically cancelled a return ticket if you do not use the first flight, and you do not communicate your decision within 24 hours of the first flight departure. And what is the way of communicating such decision? By calling the customer service, easy! I told my impossibility of reaching the customer service for an entire week at the airport personal, and as an answer I get 'Yes you are right, most of our employers are on furlough at the moment and that is why nobody usually picks up the phone'. Awesome, really great company. At this point I did not know whether to cry or try to kill someone at the airport, despite my complains and my anger there was nothing I could do, I had to buy another flight to be able to get back on the same day, for the cheap price of €110. What a great experience and great company! A simple return flight London-Rome costed me more than €1000 Euros, 5 flights in total and countless hours spent on the phone. Let alone my frustration and feeling of helplessness. I believe I've tried more than 40 different airlines in my life, from low cost to high luxury ones, flying both economy and business. This was by far the worst experience of my life, and what really makes me sad is that it is from the representative airline of my country. I am ashamed, and feel sorry for all the people who will have to travel with them. I will make sure none of my friends will ever use Alitalia again, and my advice to you is to avoid it as much as you can.

Wow, what a pleasant surprise! We flew BC from Milan Linate to Amsterdam and despite of all the Covid19 issues and regulations, our purser managed to create a welcoming and friendly atmosphere with her lovely talks and caring attitude. A recommendable experience!

Customer service is like speaking with a pond shop. Tacky and inconsiderate. I tried to purchase my lauggage. There was a system error and I was asked to try again later. So I try again and it still did not confirm the purchase. It ask me to try again later. So I left it to buy my lauggage in person. The charged for both lauggage purchases without confirming the purchase or sending an email. I contact them and they already sounded rude. Acted like rats. The first time I requested before the day of flight. The guy asked me to fill out a request and to put a previous date and date of flight. Request was not going through in the website so I call again a few weeks later thinking eventually they will return the money. The second time I called the guy said there was no note of my call. I told him my call is recorded. He said that it doesn't matter because I do not qualify for it because I am late for a refund then asked me to email customer relations. I stopped there and just called my credit card company.

I flew cdg to fco in business because Alitalia offered a great price this summer. Seating is regular economy seat with the middle seat blocked. The aircraft was ok. Staff were friendly ...offer was limited, even in j class. Nothing but water or wine and coffee...no San Pellegrino or juices. The meal was the same on both legs. Three mini sandwiches with ham, cheese and vegetables, a crumble, a yogurt, nurse and a slice of cheese. It was ok. Nothing special. Because if coronavirus, interaction was limited. I had flown Alitalia before, so I know the airline is not 5* but it's more than ok. Since Casa italia is closed, they offer vouchers to be redeemed at caffe kimbo. Excellent zucchini panini.. yummy.

On 14 July, 2020 they informed me by email that the return leg of a flight had been cancelled. The email said that if I wanted to reschedule the trip I had to call certain numbers or go on the website for other options. The website included reimbursement as an option, but the Alitalia email informing me of the cancellation had a booking number which the website did not recognise. The electronic ticket number gave no joy either as, for some reason, Alitalia generated different ticket numbers for this journey - and so I just couldn't be sure that the request had to be recognised. The website is full of glitches and is generally frustrating to use. Having wasted quite a bit of time on the website, I had no option but to get on their "helpline" which, I knew from various previous experiences, is a misnomer. I called several times, was put on hold for very long periods and then cut off and, when I was lucky enough to be transferred to an operator, that person cut me off without offering any assistance. A few weeks on, I still have no idea if my ticket will be reimbursed and have now wasted hours on this matter. Unfortunately, this is not a covid-related development - this is the kind of service I have experienced with Alitalia for many years. Unfortunately, I often have no option but to fly with them. The in-flight experience with Alitalia is no worse than with a budget airline, but their customer service - through both the website and the call centre - is the worst I know. With all the covid uncertainty, these services are more important than ever as passengers are more likely than before to have to re-book or cancel flights. Avoid Alitalia if you can.

We flew with Alitalia from Athens to Amsterdam with a transfer in Rome. We were disappointed with the experience! First of all because the flight attendants were not very friendly as they didn’t welcome you aboard, nor did they say goodbye when leaving the aircraft. They just stood at the exit and stared you out of the airplane. Secondly, we had 2 flights and in both flights we didn’t get a drink or small snack. I wasn’t expecting this from a national airline. KLM, Lufthansa etc all give at least a bottle of water and a snack, even now during coronatimes. I would expect this from lowbudget companies like Transavia, but even there we had the opportunity to buy something. They don’t meet the expectations of a national airline!

Our flight was crowded, and no meals or drinks were served "due to the pandemic". But the Alitalia lounges at the airports were closed as well, which was very unsatisfactory. All restaurants at the airport were open, so why not the lounges????? You can do better, Alitalia!

Flight was cancelled due to Covid. After requesting a refund and being told to wait 30 days before calling, I waited 50 days with no refund. Chased an update via an email address they provided, no response. Tried another email, no response. Now being 3 months later I still haven't received a response or refund. Many hours on hold to customer service to finally get through to someone who said they will 100% be processing the refund that day and it should be with me shortly, still didn't happen. I'm now on hold again for 30 minutes without an answer to question where my refund is if I ever get through. Probably would have been fine otherwise but customer service is pretty much no existent by the looks. Not worth the issues

I have flied Alitalia a lot recently, especially on the Milan London route, and I am liking it much more than BA / easyJet / Ryanair. Their phone customer support is outstanding and they offer benefits that other airlines stopped offering years and years ago... That might be part of why they are almost bankrupt, but as a consumer I highly appreciate that they offer full cash flight refunds vs. Those rats of BA who give you some voucher at best. Flights are always pleasant and personnel is super kind and helpful onboard.

They sent me an email every day asking me to pay for business class (email coming from alitalia). That communication was easy for them. The information that they moved my flight forward by 7 hours?? 1 email from a “noreply” email that by default goes to your junk folder. This email doesn’t even come up when you search “Alitalia”. 1 email. Not even coming from the airline. The motive behind this strategy? So that you miss your flight which you paid for and then have to repurchase another ticket on arrival at who knows what price? I mean, why else would you send such a vital email just once and from a “noreply” random email?? It’s intentional and it’s disgusting. In our situation, we went to check in to our evening flight online only to find it was a different flight to what we booked and was leaving in 1.5 hours. We lost all our day of tours, had to drop everything and race to the airport. This was a horrible and stressful experience and I’m sure it’s intentional just to gain money. This airline is an embarrassment to Italy. In addition: this isn’t a budget airport but they hire the check in desk and gate that is the furtherest away from the entrance possible. There are no benefits paying the price for this airline. I was so much happier even flying with Ryanair. Oh god this was just horrible.

We had problems to back to Spain from the US. All the airlines forbidden bunnies (rabbits) excepting Alitalia. Thank to Alitalia we could back home with our pet. We are pretty grateful to Alitalia. Al the trip was fantastic, very polite and on time everything

FCO-REG. At the gate it took a while for passengers to board the aircraft, there was a good welcome once on board. The flight was already behind schedule and then there was announcement advising passengers that a suitcase had to be offloaded which delayed the flight further. Pushback was about 35 minutes behind schedule, passengers were advised that there would be no refreshment service due to Covid restrictions. Arrival into Reggio Calabria was about 30 minutes late. The flight itself was okay but time was lost due to boarding delays and the time taken for a case to be offloaded.

MXP-FCO. The boarding process should have been quite smooth with specific rows being called to board. The problem was that the announcements were muffled and to make matters worse there was a flight to Brindisi being called at the adjacent gate at the same time. Eventually it all came together with buses taking passengers to a remote stand. There was a friendly welcome once on board, push back was 30 minutes late. An announcement was made to advise that due to Covid restrictions there was not going to be a refreshment service. The flight was smooth with good views of the west coast along the way. Arrival into Fiumicino was about 15 minutes late. The flight was fine but the boarding procedure could have been a lot better.

Alitalia is absolutely the WORST airline ever. I never saw anything like that in other airlines. For instance, I saw them mistreating a lady that was asking for her special meal because she was ALLERGIC and the fly attended told her "we are not a restaurant".

This airline is not worth it, customer care & reimbursements can be nightmare. Baggage loss are often with no attendants to inform at the arrival, not the best courteous staff. I would rather pay a few dollars more & get another fligh, do not travel on this one at all

Still waiting for a refund of a flight booked in April. Do not fly with them! They owe money to thousands of people.

Alitalia is a joke. I had changes on my flight which was also with stop over and I tried to reach them for taking money back it voucher and nobody answer. They don’t have active email address or phone number that you can reach then. Really poor company with really poor clients service. Never book a flight trough Alitalia. Worst experience ever happened to me. Someone should shut down this company. Dear NIKOLINA LEVENOVA, We regret to inform you that the schedule of your flight has been changed : Aug 13 - AZ 00107 AMSTERDAM - AMS 12:50 ROMA - FCO 15:05 Aug 13 - AZ 01167 ROMA - FCO 17:25 LAMETIA TERME - SUF 18:30 Aug 25 - AZ 01162 LAMETIA TERME - SUF 06:35 ROMA - FCO 07:50 Aug 25 - AZ 00108 ROMA - FCO 09:30 AMSTERDAM - AMS 12:00

My problem started at the check-in when the company informed me that I’d have to pay for the luggage that I've previously paid. After I've called my agent and they solved the problem. The airplane was dirty and poorly maintained and the screens were small and old. I'm still waiting for my miles been credited, even 3 months after the flight.

Hi all, rather than post a scathing review of Alitalia and their horrid, horrid service, I thought I'd try to be helpful and post something that worked for me: If you're reading this, you're probably desperately searching for a way to contact Alitalia in English without getting hung up on. It's dreadful, I know. Here is the number I used to contact Alitalia Ireland (I'm not Irish, and I am not flying in our out of Ireland: +353 124 765 46 I used Google Phone calls, and it costs .02 a minute, but after spending hours on hold with Alitalia's customer "service" number, it was a small price to pay. This number actually puts you in touch with a call center in Slovenia who can help you in English, regardless of your flight destination. I can't do anything to fix their horrendous refund/voucher policy, but at least you can start to fix what you need to. I for one was able to get a refund because of a small change in the flight schedule they made, but I had to push for it. Don't back down. And if you manage to get a refund, for god sake don't book with Alitalia again.