AirAsia Bhd chief executive officer Riad Asmat said the airlines will waive all of its bicycle-related fees for the month of April this after a passenger claimed her bicycle was damaged.

“As a gesture of goodwill, for the month of April, we would like to waive all fees with regards to bicycle transportation.

“But more importantly, I apologise to our cyclists and our customers who had to endure such pain this last day,” Riad said in a video uploaded onto AirAsia’s Facebook page today.

The Group CEO Tony Fernandes had also earlier apologised and pledged to do better.

“We now have a joint venture ground handling company... but we take full responsibility. We are a company that if we make a mistake, we stand up and take the heat.

“We will get better. Apologies,” Fernandes (below) said in a posting on Facebook today.

The post was accompanied by a 30-second video, which depicted two ground staff at an airport unloading baggage from a plane.

The video, which appears to have been taken from inside the plane, showed the two staff handling the baggage and throwing them onto the ground and onto a cart.

A Facebook user who uploaded the video claimed that her bicycle was damaged in the process.

“Thanks AirAsia, you broke my bike. This was filmed while we were still seated in our flight AK171 from Kaohsiung to KLIA2,” read her posting, which also included a close-up picture of a damaged bicycle.

At the time of writing, her posting had been shared over 9,000 times on Facebook.

Action taken

Fernandes said Riad would get in touch with the passenger and make sure there was no damage.

“After meeting all my ramp boys and girls, I am really disappointed. (We) will make a statement to reassure all cyclists,” he added.

Fernandes later replied to a comment on his posting about the ground staff possibly struggling with the weight of the baggage.

“(It) was not heavy but we are looking into that point. We do carry hundreds of (bicycles).

“First error but wrong,” he said.

In the video, Riad said action had been taken in this matter.

“As a cyclist myself, I was pretty disturbed when I saw the actions of our ramp staff and rest assured we have taken action.

“We are looking into the matter seriously and stern action will be taken accordingly.

“With that, I hope that we will continue to improve ourselves,” he said.