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Woman allegedly fired as SIA stewardess after a day for taking bottled water from hotel's lounge
SIA expects all employees to conduct themselves professionally, a spokesperson said.
A woman was allegedly fired as a Singapore Airlines (SIA) stewardess a day after signing the employment contract, all because she took a few bottles of water from an executive lounge at a hotel.
She took to social media site Xiaohongshu to lament about her predicament.
Dream job
The woman, who goes by the username Ke Ke Jiang (transliteration), wrote about her termination in a post on Nov. 5.The location tag of the post was Shanghai.
In the post, she shared about her excitement when she first learned that she got the job.
"Who hasn't been enamoured by the 'world's best airline'"? She said.
She had always dreamt of becoming an air stewardess, she told her followers, and had spent a year brushing up on her English skills to prepare for the selections.
She had also worked diligently to perfect the decorum required in the line of work and memorised the airline's manual.
"After rounds of selection, I finally received the offer. I was so excited that it kept me up all night. I immediately started preparing for my move to Singapore," she recounted.
Spent thousands on Singapore move
For a month afterward, Ke Ke Jiang would find herself trying to sort out a dizzying series of administrative matters.She spent a total of S$2,500 securing a rental home in Singapore and another S$1,500 on the required vaccinations.
"Uniform, miscellaneous spend, work visas. All of it cost about 60,000 yuan (S$10,900). With each dollar spent, I told myself, 'I'll earn it back once work starts'," she wrote.
Fired for taking bottles of water from lounge
However, things did not go as planned.According to her, after signing the contract, she and a couple of other women, who were also from China, checked in at a hotel arranged by the company.
"That evening, due to a misunderstanding, we had thought that the bottles of water at the executive lounge was self-service. So, we took a few bottles," she said.
She did not expect for that decision to spell the end of her stint with the airline.
The next day, a group of them were hauled into the office by the airline's human resources department.
They were told they were being let go due to a "violation of company policy".
"We were dumbfounded. We had just signed our employment contracts a day before. And the so-called "violation" was just us taking a few bottles of water. No one had informed us we couldn't enter the executive lounge either," she wrote in protest.
Upset at icy approach
According to the woman, those affected were told to pack up and head home immediately.She took issue with the iciness of the company's approach.
"When we mentioned that we had already sunk cost into things like house rental, all they said was that these were personal costs," she said.
The woman went on to allege that her experience was not an isolated case.
She cited the high turnover rate at the company and made claims about the company culture, such as not being able to take leave from work even when ill.
While some have pointed out that what they did was indeed wrong, Ke Ke Jiang retorted that it did not justify the heavy-handedness of the company's response.
"In their eyes, we were nothing but cheap labour on a work visa. There wasn't an ounce of respect," she bemoaned.
She concluded by saying that she wrote the post not to complain, but to warn other Chinese women who are similarly aspiring to join the company as an air stewardess.
"A real job that's worth fighting for is one that comes with mutual respect, and not one that leaves you in the lurch after you've pinned all your hopes and dreams on it," she opined.
Divided comments
Since the post went up, it has garnered over 5,000 likes and 2,400 comments.Replying to one of the comments, Ke Ke Jiang revealed that five of them took about six to seven bottles of water in total.
She also shared that apart from her, two others were let go because of the incident.
While some commenters sided with her, a handful of others found fault with her actions.
One wrote: "Taking bottles of water isn't the problem. The issue is that you should have asked the hotel's staff beforehand."
"Taking without asking? It's an executive lounge, and you can't just take what you want from there unless you're an executive-level guest. As the saying goes, taking without asking is stealing. This is the consequence," another wrote.
One commenter pointed out that they felt there was more to the story than what was shared.
Some also dismissed the post as clickbait.
Employees expected to conduct themselves professionally: SIA
Responding to queries from Mothership, a Singapore Airlines spokesperson said they are unable to comment on any confidential matters relating to its current and former employees."SIA expects all employees to conduct themselves professionally at all times and comply with company policies as well as all applicable laws," the spokesperson said.
"Disciplinary action will be taken in cases of non-compliance," they added.
Top image via Xiaohongshu, Canva
