Emirates review by Alan 2014-10-22

Firstly I launched a complaint on 14th September with Emirates concerning the bad attitude and sloppy handling of the ground staff at the first class terminal in Dubai.Still no response from Emirates. Being a frequent flyer and part of the "elite" skywards rewards program I have yet to recieve the treatment I am promised as a Gold memeber, and a reasonable response to my complaints. Emirates Ground staff in Dubai are rude, unhelpful and are unable to handle compalints adequetly when faced. I waited the required 30 day period and flew with them again due to convinience of the route I required. However, once again I have had a bad experince. I travelled on the 19th of October from Johannesburg to Dubai, Dubai Athens both with returns. Landing in South Africa this morning. Other travellers should beware that Emirates is selling buisness class seats as frst class seats.Having payed for a first class ticket, I was very dissapointed to be put in the usual buisness class seat sold as a first class option. In my opinion a waste of money. I was hopful and then dissappinted after I had an emergency and had to change my flight,I tried to book an emirates complimentary chauffer drive more than 12 hours in advance and was denied. I was told the request was unavailable due to no 24hr notice period. Despite this fact the unhelpful Emirates call centre staff just repeated the fact that I hadnt booked in advance, regardless of the fact that I didnt even have 24hrs to give them notice. I can undestand this circumstance,but fail to understand why I am paying for a first class ticket when I get a seat that is not first class and they cant even assist me with a chauffer drive. Why do they have these frequent flyer programs when the rewards and services promised are not delivered. As stated before I have tried to contact Emirates regarding my complaints. I use Emirates frequently due to the fact that I travel to Dubai frequently and the availability of flights into Dubai. I am very dissapointed that everytime I encounter this Airline I have unresolvable issues. I do not look forward to my next encounter with his airline. EDITORS COMMENT: on the aircraft used on these routes the Firts Class setaing could be confused with Business seating as it's in a 2-2-2 configuration where as in first class you would expect to have a single seat and no on e next to you