Mother claims airline staff mocked her daughter because of her unique name

Boarding a plane is the last place that you would expect to encounter insulting remarks about your name and social media abuse.

Sadly, that's exactly what happened to a mother and daughter when they boarded a Southwest Airlines flight from John Wayne Airport in Orange County, Florida, to El Paso, Texas.

Traci Redford and her five-year-old daughter Abcde (pronounced Ab-city) pre-boarded the plane first, which is something they often do due to Abcde having epilepsy.

After the gate agent saw Abcde's name on the boarding pass, a photo was taken and uploaded to Facebook, mocking the child's name.

To make matters worse, Redford reports that this wasn't done discreetly, with the staff member informing her colleagues about the name, while also laughing and pointing, which Abcde noticed.

Taking to abc7, Redford said:

The gate agent started laughing, pointing at me and my daughter, talking to other employees. 

So I turned about and said, 'Hey if I can hear you, my daughter can hear you, so I'd appreciate if you'd just stop.

She said, 'Mom, why is she laughing at my name?' And I said not everyone is nice and not everyone is going to be nice and it's unfortunate.'

Redford added that she complained to the airline about the treatment and the Facebook post but after two weeks Southwest had failed to take any action.

While I was sitting there, she took a picture of my boarding pass and chose to post it on social media, mocking my daughter.

It was actually brought to my attention by somebody who had seen it on Facebook and reported it to Southwest Airlines.

And after two weeks of doing a formal complaint, Southwest hadn't done anything.

Southwest did eventually provide this statement after Redford took her story to abc7.

We extend our sincere apology to the family. We take great pride in extending our Southwest Hospitality to all of our Customers, which includes living by the Golden Rule and treating every individual with respect, in person or online.

The post is not indicative of the care, respect, and civility we expect from all of our Employees. We have followed up with the Employee involved, and while we do not disclose personnel actions publicly, we are using this as an opportunity to reinforce our policies and emphasize our expectations for all Employees.​

HT Lad Bible

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