Iberia Impresses Me With Follow-Up on Photo Policy

Last month a pair of Iberia FAs prohibited me from taking pictures onboard my flight from Madrid to Los Angeles. I reached out to Iberia via Twitter and asked for photo policy clarification. Yesterday, I received a final follow-up note.

I already shared my initial back-and-forth in an earlier post entitled, Iberia Apologizes, Clarifies Onboard Photo Policy.

There, I shared a Twitter conversation in which we exchanged the following notes–

From Iberia:

Hi. We apologize for the situation that has arisen. Photographs on board are not prohibited. However, it is not possible to photograph the personnel on board, maybe has it been a misunderstanding on this point, that they believed that you wanted to photograph the staff. If you need photos or media for your agency, you can also ask for that, contacting Iberia Agencias. Do you think it was a misunderstanding? Regards.

My response:

I thank you for your prompt response. I don’t think it was misunderstanding because I clearly stated that no personnel or passengers were photographed. Perhaps you can speak to the purser of the flight today, just to clarify the policy. I understand that it may be curious to a crew why a passenger photographs his seat or the meal, but I think customer photos are so much more helpful than corporate/media photos. That is why I prefer to take them myself. I again emphasize how impressed I was today during flight until this occurred.

Iberia’s response:

Thanks for your kindness. We will move your comments with our colleagues so they can verify what happened. Can you indicate your Iberia booking code and the route in which this situation has occurred? Regards.

Iberia Follows Up on Onboard Photo Policy

I provided the relevant info and figured I probably would not hear back. It took nearly a month, but yesterday I received the following note via Twitter:

Hello, Matthew. Firstly, we’d like to take this opportunity to offer our sincere apologies in relation to the incident during your flight with us. We do allow passengers to take pictures from inside the aircraft and are happy to even use the pics on our social media channels. Unfortunately, due to a misunderstanding, our onboard crew haven’t provided the most accurate information and denied your request to take such pics. The only thing that we do not allow is passengers taken pictures from other passengers or crew members, since this might violate privacy rights, which clearly wasn’t the case. Therefore, please accept our apologies. Kind regards

I do hope that Iberia actually talked to my crew and heard their side of the story. More importantly, I hope that the crew now is aware that it is perfectly fine (and not illegal!) for a passenger to take pictures of the cabin.

CONCLUSION

I am very pleased at the level and quality of engagement from Iberia. This situation could not have been handled any better.