- Flying is rarely pleasant, but this is ridiculous.
Nobody likes airplane seats. They’re small, the backrest is somehow never at a good angle, and leg space is something you can only dream of.
But hey, there are silver linings. At least the seats aren’t usually soaked in someone’s bodily waste.
Usually.
A New Zealand couple on a recent Qantas flight from Bangkok, Thailand, to Sydney, Australia, wasn’t so lucky. As they sat in their seats, they discovered the floor under them was wet.
Assuming it was just a bit damp from cleaning, they put their things down, including the pillows they later ended up using. Much to their horror, though, they discovered that the floor wasn’t wet with water but human urine.
After the flight, the couple requested a refund from Qantas due to the unsanitary flight conditions. Naturally, the airline immediately apologized and gave them their money back.
Nah, just kidding. Qantas initially refused to hand back a dime and blamed the issue on their contracted third-party cleaning service.
After much back-and-forth and gnashing of teeth, the flight operator finally relented and gave the couple a full refund. All’s well that ends well, we suppose — but you really shouldn’t have to do all that after being forced to sit in piss for hours.
A Disgusting Discovery
The pee incident happened on December 30, 2023, reported the New Zealand Herald. The couple — who graciously haven’t been named in the media — had been vacationing in Bangkok over the holidays and were preparing to return home to New Zealand.
With no straight flights to Kiwi Land, the first leg of their return trip involved a schlep from Bangkok to Sydney. So, they boarded the more than nine-hour-long flight operated by Qantas.
Boarding went without issue and the couple sat in their seats. The problems began when the man of the couple put the small complimentary pillow onto the floor.
When he picked the pillow back up, it was wet.
They hadn’t just put the pillow on the floor, either. Their headphones, a neck pillow, and nearly $50 worth of duty-free shopping were also damp.
Yet, the couple simply assumed there was some water on the floor, perhaps spilled by the cleaning crew. So, they stowed their shopping in the overhead compartment, laid back on the dry parts of the pillows, and the plane took off.
The horror began toward the tail end of the flight. Suddenly, a traveler sitting behind the couple reached under the seat — and pulled out a pair of urine-soaked children’s underwear.
Yeah, it wasn’t water on the floor.
“Now we know that we have been sitting in urine for a 10-hour trip,” the couple told the Herald.
“And the travel neck pillow, well, I had been using that for the last couple of hours, under the assumption it was just a bit wet from water.”
Reluctant to Recompensate
After the disgusting discovery, the couple immediately called for a flight attendant. She took the filthy underwear away for disposal and said she’d talk to her supervisor.
The flight attendant returned after a call. According to the couple, the supervisor had offered to compensate them generously — with 10,000 Qantas points.
“[That] does not make up for the fact we were sitting in biohazard waste,” the couple said.
Once they were home (and had thrown away their travel pillows and duty-free shopping), the couple got in touch with Qantas. They requested a full refund of the $3,829.95 in New Zealand dollars — around $2,350 in American money — they’d paid for the tickets.
A perfectly reasonable request, if you ask us. Qantas, however, wasn’t having any of it.
“I understand that due to inconvenience experience you want to request for a refund of flight. However, we regret that we’re unable to meet your request as the ticket was fully utilized,” read the spelling-error Qantas email the couple received.
Well, that was no good. The couple wrote back that they expected to be refunded, at least for the Bangkok-Sydney flight if not the follow-up one.
They also acknowledged that it likely wasn’t Qantas staff that left the seats dirty. That said, they argued Qantas was responsible for its hired assistance.
“They are contracted through Qantas so it is your responsibility that you must own,” the couple wrote.
Long story short, this back and forth went on for a while until Qantas said they would “investigate” a matter. In a turn that honestly surprised us a little, the company eventually agreed to a full refund as “a gesture of goodwill.”
How very gracious of them.