| Complaint filed by | |
| Complaint filed on | November 9th, 2025 |
| Complaint filed against | MALAYSIAN AIRLINES |
- Text of Complaint by Naamah Katabjiwala
Dear Sir/Madam,
It is with deep regret; I have to lodge a complaint as I feel it is pertinent to bring to your personal attention the methods deployed by Malaysian Airways to extort money from innocent passengers at the last minute by check in staff at Mumbai airport.
We flew to Mumbai on 20th September 2025 from London and had 1 piece of luggage 25kg each, 1 cabin bag 10kg between us and a personal item with no issues via Qatar Airways. We used the automated check in at London Heathrow so our bags were not overweight and everything was smooth sailing.
However, this was not the case on our onward flight from BOM to KUL on 2nd October 2025 with MH195. Having a ticket that advised we could check in 25kg each and carry 7kg each in hand when we got to the check in counter Mr Shoiab Shaikh, Customer Service Executive told us to weigh our cabin bag which came to 10kg, my handbag 2kg and my husband rucksack 2kg before we even put our check in bags on the scale. He then told us that we had to split the weight equally between us as my husband was carrying a rucksack and the cabin bag.
We didn’t have additional bags so were unable to do this and argued that this practice was highly irregular. In the past year alone, we have travelled ten times and have never once had to weigh our hand luggage let alone split the weight equally between two passengers. We asked what could be done and he said we would have to pay for the additional 3kg excess weight and add it to our check in bag. My husband said this was not fair and asked to speak to the manager (Mr Vaibhav Chaugule, GHA in charge) who came along and re-iterated the same nonsense. We said begrudgingly that we would pay the 3kg but asked Mr Chaugule to write down the agent, his own and his manager’s name which he did begrudgingly.
We then went to pay the 3kg and move it to our check in bag and Mr Chaugule told us that we had to pay for the full 9kg cabin bag to be checked in due to it being overweight. We asked why and he said because we took down their names and were going to complain he would make sure that we paid more and had something to complain about. We felt we were wasting time reasoning with them and were left with no option and forced to pay 12616 INR for the 9kg cabin bag.
Whilst we were checking in, we saw Mr Chaugule go away, make a WhatsApp video call to his family whilst sitting at the desk socialising during work time. Mr Shaikh saw my husband take a picture of him doing this and told us to delete the picture to protect Mr Chaugule or he would call security.
After Kuala Lampa we flew to Langkawi, Singapore and back to London all with an allowance of 25kg check in bag, 7kg cabin bag and a personal item. Considering that we were travelling to so many places you would expect us to shop and add to our luggage yet we did not encounter any issues or further charges and were within our weight allowance all the way back. I can prove this as I have kept the baggage tags from London all the way back to London showing the weight of each of our bags which I can submit if needed.
Travelling numerous times, a year it is a question personal integrity as it defies logic how we could have been overweight with 64kg when we had 2 x 25kg, 1 x 10kg and 2 x personal items at 2kg each.
Sadly, one gets the impression that the passengers at Mumbai Airport are held at ransom by being placed between a rock and a hard place by authorities to extort money at any opportunity by deploying bullying tactics. As we were going through immigration and security, we were discussing what had happened and a police officer overheard and asked us what happened, when we explained he said it is common practice at Mumbai Airport and the staff are encouraged to do this to make more money for the airline/airport.
I will be taking this matter further to the CAA in order to highlight the extortion at Mumbai Airport to ensure that other innocent victims are protected from these antics. We were subjected to humiliation by the above experience of the methods deployed by Malaysian Airways/Check in staff to boost profits at whatever cost at the expense of innocent passengers based on mis-information and varying standards by the staff at different airports.
I look forward to receiving full re-reimbursement of 12616 INR (£108.81 GBP) as well as compensation for humiliation, time wasting at the airport and further having to write to raise this issue.
Kind Regards,
Mrs Naamah Katabjiwala
Booking reference and/or flight number 80EQ7S, MH195
