Funny Virgin Complaint Letter
I’m sorry if you have already seen this, but it had myself and Bf crying tears of laughter! I found it on Yahoo News.
This is a letter recently received by the Virgin Atlantic customer complaints team and is currently being hailed on news blogs as possibly the funniest customer complaint letter ever!
Virgin Atlantic press office confirmed that they received the letter and that Richard Branson himself called the author to thank him for the feedback! I don’t blame him, I would have done too!
Dear Mr Branson
REF: Mumbai to Heathrow 7th December 2008
I love the Virgin brand, I really do which is why I continue to use it despite a series of unfortunate incidents over the last few years. This latest incident takes the biscuit.
Ironically, by the end of the flight I would have gladly paid over a thousand rupees for a single biscuit following the culinary journey of hell I was subjected to at the hands of your corporation.
Look at this Richard. Just look at it:
I imagine the same questions are racing through your brilliant mind as were racing through mine on that fateful day. What is this? Why have I been given it? What have I done to deserve this? And, which one is the starter, which one is the desert?
You don’t get to a position like yours Richard with anything less than a generous sprinkling of observational power so I KNOW you will have spotted the tomato next to the two yellow shafts of sponge on the left. Yes, it’s next to the sponge shaft without the green paste. That’s got to be the clue hasn’t it. No sane person would serve a desert with a tomato would they. Well answer me this Richard, what sort of animal would serve a desert with peas in:
I know it looks like a baaji but it’s in custard Richard, custard. It must be the pudding. Well you’ll be fascinated to hear that it wasn’t custard. It was a sour gel with a clear oil on top. It’s only redeeming feature was that it managed to be so alien to my palette that it took away the taste of the curry emanating from our miscellaneous central cuboid of beige matter. Perhaps the meal on the left might be the desert after all.
Anyway, this is all irrelevant at the moment. I was raised strictly but neatly by my parents and if they knew I had started desert before the main course, a sponge shaft would be the least of my worries. So lets peel back the tin-foil on the main dish and see what’s on offer.
I’ll try and explain how this felt. Imagine being a twelve year old boy Richard. Now imagine it’s Christmas morning and you’re sat their with your final present to open. It’s a big one, and you know what it is. It’s that Goodmans stereo you picked out the catalogue and wrote to Santa about.
Only you open the present and it’s not in there. It’s your hamster Richard. It’s your hamster in the box and it’s not breathing. That’s how I felt when I peeled back the foil and saw this:
Now I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking it’s more of that Baaji custard. I admit I thought the same too, but no. It’s mustard Richard. MUSTARD. More mustard than any man could consume in a month. On the left we have a piece of broccoli and some peppers in a brown glue-like oil and on the right the chef had prepared some mashed potato. The potato masher had obviously broken and so it was decided the next best thing would be to pass the potatoes through the digestive tract of a bird.
Once it was regurgitated it was clearly then blended and mixed with a bit of mustard. Everybody likes a bit of mustard Richard.
By now I was actually starting to feel a little hypoglycaemic. I needed a sugar hit. Luckily there was a small cookie provided. It had caught my eye earlier due to it’s baffling presentation:
It appears to be in an evidence bag from the scene of a crime. A CRIME AGAINST BLOODY COOKING. Either that or some sort of back-street underground cookie, purchased off a gun-toting maniac high on his own supply of yeast. You certainly wouldn’t want to be caught carrying one of these through customs. Imagine biting into a piece of brass Richard. That would be softer on the teeth than the specimen above.
I was exhausted. All I wanted to do was relax but obviously I had to sit with that mess in front of me for half an hour. I swear the sponge shafts moved at one point.
Once cleared, I decided to relax with a bit of your world-famous onboard entertainment. I switched it on:
I apologise for the quality of the photo, it’s just it was incredibly hard to capture Boris Johnson’s face through the flickering white lines running up and down the screen. Perhaps it would be better on another channel:
Is that Ray Liotta? A question I found myself asking over and over again throughout the gruelling half-hour I attempted to watch the film like this. After that I switched off. I’d had enough. I was the hungriest I’d been in my adult life and I had a splitting headache from squinting at a crackling screen.
My only option was to simply stare at the seat in front and wait for either food, or sleep. Neither came for an incredibly long time. But when it did it surpassed my wildest expectations:
Yes! It’s another crime-scene cookie. Only this time you dunk it in the white stuff.
Richard…. What is that white stuff? It looked like it was going to be yoghurt. It finally dawned on me what it was after staring at it. It was a mixture between the Baaji custard and the Mustard sauce. It reminded me of my first week at university. I had overheard that you could make a drink by mixing vodka and refreshers. I lied to my new friends and told them I’d done it loads of times. When I attempted to make the drink in a big bowl it formed a cheese Richard, a cheese. That cheese looked a lot like your baaji-mustard.
So that was that Richard. I didn’t eat a bloody thing. My only question is: How can you live like this? I can’t imagine what dinner round your house is like, it must be like something out of a nature documentary.
As I said at the start I love your brand, I really do. It’s just a shame such a simple thing could bring it crashing to it’s knees and begging for sustenance.
Yours Sincererly…
I have to say, this is probably the least appetising in flight meal I have ever set eyes on! I can only imagine what the poor crew must have had to listen to from the offended passengers!
OMG I love it…..that was hilarious!!!!!! Poor guy!!!!!!
Karen - January 27, 2009 at 7:36 pm |
I know! I love that he sat there photographing it all! I sat there unable to read it aloud to Bf because I was laughing too hard!
Partner of a Pilot - January 27, 2009 at 10:33 pm |
This is sooo good! My DH heard that Branson actually replied to it…
Silvie - January 27, 2009 at 10:50 pm |
Oh my God, that really cheered me up!! What a brilliant writer that bloke is…
Flying High - January 28, 2009 at 11:57 am |
I know, even when I read it through subsequently it has me laughing out loud!
Quality!
Partner of a Pilot - January 28, 2009 at 2:30 pm |
This has been going around work…it is just too funny! Only once in a while does somebody write a truly brilliant complaint letter – this is it! :-)xx
May - January 28, 2009 at 3:35 pm |
this is hilarious–somehow i missed it! thanks for sharing!
art predator - January 29, 2009 at 5:11 am |
[…] Funny Virgin Complaint Letter I’m sorry if you have already seen this, but it had myself and Bf crying tears of laughter! I found it on […] […]
Top Posts « WordPress.com - January 30, 2009 at 1:08 am |
I am printing this one and reading it out loud with the accent. Too good to pass up.
Joel - January 30, 2009 at 1:44 am |
Lol, i would love to see the reply from Richard…. cracking letter.
angel - January 30, 2009 at 12:18 pm |
lmao…wow that was a horrid meal….i dont kno if i could manage to make it through that meal….the crime scene cookies are best tho…
alphonso p4l - January 30, 2009 at 3:08 pm |
Absolute classic!!!!!
I loved it!!
Raven - January 30, 2009 at 3:10 pm |
Now that’s how to complain about something. Meticulous and hilarious. I hadn’t see this, so thanks.
typecat - January 30, 2009 at 3:12 pm |
Yeah…i want to see Richard’s reply to this letter too. Wondering what he would tell the poor guy!
meltormes - January 30, 2009 at 3:13 pm |
huii..^
harry26 - January 30, 2009 at 3:15 pm |
this was so perfect
the crime-scene cookie has got to be the best part!
mandie - January 30, 2009 at 3:32 pm |
How good can it get. The oppurtunity to culinary research whilst in flight is almost to good to ask for. The movie of course was meant to distract the viewer from the comestable. Brilliant…..
medevtr - January 30, 2009 at 3:36 pm |
I had tears running down my face at some stages I was laughing that hard. That guy definitely has a future as a writer/comedian. Hilarious stuff!
Fish Tank Filters - January 31, 2009 at 2:35 am |
ha..ha..ha…crime scene cookie?…..LOL…..thanks for sharing this letter….I do want to know how Mr Branson reply to this one.
ijusmanis - January 31, 2009 at 5:12 am |
Lovely letter, good sense of humor !
After 23 years of: “Chicken or Beef”? on another airline, I have learned how tough it can be, to listen to complaints…remember folks, the poor crew has to eat this stuff too. But this letter makes me want to bring a sandwich, I am not much for food of foreign
climes. Better to keep it bland, bummer to have to arrive sick already !
Hello to all airliners and those who eat there. #:-)
Heide d'Alquen - January 31, 2009 at 8:17 am |
Raven, thanks for posting the link to Fireblades.org!
Partner of a Pilot - January 31, 2009 at 12:41 pm |
Now I know why I’ve never been able to affford to fly Virgin!!! Such a wonderful repast!
Good old BA swill will have to do for me.
Ah! how the rich and famous do live!
Anthony - February 2, 2009 at 4:14 pm |
Absolutely digusiting i agree that meal was something you throw out or throw up – poor guy richard give a all inclusive meal paid for by yourself at a top restaurnt of his choice.
Its a shame for the rest of the passangers to eat that crap.
lynn – oldham
lynn gee - February 2, 2009 at 9:52 pm |
nice pictures. thanks
pupok - February 3, 2009 at 7:32 am |
Makes BA food look extremely good.
russ - February 3, 2009 at 10:22 am |
Hilarious!!
Its your hamster Richard. Its your hamster in the box, and its not breathing!! LMAO!!
Jane - February 3, 2009 at 2:31 pm |
This has got to be the most hilarious letter of complaint I’ve ever read. Yes Richard the MOST hilarious.
Its obvious that between his dead hamster and this flight he has been scarred for life.
Tracey - February 8, 2009 at 9:43 pm |
That will teach you, remember to take something slow and big to suck on a long haul flight!!! Hehe that’s how he makes his money.
Bill - February 13, 2009 at 3:36 pm |
The yellow sponge shaft , and the dead hamster , LMAO, I have had raw fish served on a flight before , pregnant at the time de not help sounds like some of the complaints we get
carol - April 18, 2009 at 12:52 pm |
[…] the web even today – here it is on a blog that chose not to make comments all the way through it: https://partnerofapilot.wordpress.com/2009/01/27/funny-virgin-complaint-letter/ – it still raises a […]
Online complaining – is anybody listening? « Sponge NB – we mean new business - March 22, 2010 at 2:09 pm |
i laughed out loud after reading this and to think that he already went out and replied to the letter… 😀
partner portal guy - May 20, 2010 at 6:56 am |
I don’t know if this would have become more interesting if
I had bothered to read it all, but surely I can’t be the only one
to find it incredibly boring !
Cathy - January 23, 2011 at 7:33 pm |
Simple Brilliant!
Alan Galdones (@twittilates) - September 15, 2011 at 8:36 am |