Being penalized for something you didn’t do wrong
From time to time, the University of Calgary in Canada flies me over to help them out in the Oncology department for around a week. While being in Canada can be fun, going through an airport is not. I’m typing this because I’ve missed my flight not by my own means, but from a broken process, and had to pay for their mistake.
The airline in question would be United Airlines, and my flight was at 8:42 AM. I was told from the itinerary to be there an hour early, and I was. However, checking in (via easy check-in) proved more frustrating than it should have been. My passport wouldn’t scan (or it did, and the system couldn’t process it), and their system wouldn’t accept my confirmation number.
One of the agents stop by and say if I’m done with my check-in, and I say, it’s not accepting my codes or my passport, and my flight is leaving in less than an hour. They redirect me to another line, which was just as long as the first line I was in, and 7:20 soon became 8:00 AM. This line barely moved at all, and by the time I made it to the front, it was already 8:45 AM, essentially missing my flight.
I told the new agent that because of this broken process, I’m now late for my flight. She said that I should have been here 45 minutes ago, and I told her that I was here almost an hour and a half. Throughout this conversation, there were no apologies or no words of consolation, other than I can be re-booked for an 11:30AM flight, and it costs $75 if I did not want to do stand-by.
My contact at the University of Calgary who booked the flight told me to call her if I have to pay to rebook so she can give the university’s credit card details over the phone, but the agent said she cannot take anyone’s calls at all. I ended up paying for the $75 (but the University says they’ll reimburse me, which I have no issue with). Not only that, after she charged my credit card (I felt proud that it was a Virgin America credit card), she asked how many bags I have to check in. I said I had one, and she replied it was twenty-dollars. I sighed in defeat, and handed over my credit card again. At that point, I had my plane tickets, and a real disgust for United Airlines.
I don’t get it, I did everything right, I was on-time, and in the end I was penalized for following protocol. All of this wouldn’t have happened if I could have spoken immediately to the agent I needed to go to, since she was able to quickly find my flight. Prior to being in the second line, I did try to sneak myself behind the current person being served, but the new agent said I had to stand in the second line like everyone else. That line took over 45 minutes to completely move over.
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Since the economy is shit, and flying planes around the world is costly, airlines have been everything they can to gyp its customers. Unfortunately, they do this because most people do not have any alternative, and ultimately, like you, succumb to their devices.
The key is to fight back. You have to make it clear that it is absolutely unacceptable to do this to customers. You have to make a scene, get angry, and put your foot down to show that you will not tolerate this kind of behavior. It’s because you let them do this to you, that they continue to do this to you, and everyone else too.
Maybe it’s because money and time wasn’t a big deal this time around that you let them get away with it. But this is not the case for the thousands of others using their services, and customers as a collective need to stand their ground.
Face it, if customer services is not their number one priority, then you shouldn’t need to deal with their shit. They just want your money. (Think about it: an extra $100 on top of your ticket is like 50% more revenue. They *want* to do that to everyone they can.)
Wine. Gripe. Get angry. Say it in their face: Fuck you, United Airlines. I’m taking my business to Virgin (or Southwest), and I hope everyone else reading my awesome blog will too.
Change your return flight. (without paying any fees. Call them up and say: I was *very unhappy* about the first leg of the trip, and I am cancelling. They’ll try to convince you, but stand firm until they give it to you!)
Comment by spyra — June 30, 2009 @ 9:59 am
I don’t think you watch Southpark, but have you ever seen the one with Mr. Garrison’s “IT” invention? Basically the whole episode’s joke was even after putting a rod up your ass and one in your mouth, you still feel less fucked than going to the airport.
My parents’ rule of thumb for international flights is 3 hours, and I haven’t missed a flight with that yet. I did have to wait in lines 2.5 hours one time because of the kind of shit you had to go through. (Oh sry, this ticket isn’t for us, it’s for our partner airline on the other side of the airport, etc.)
Comment by ninja_bill — June 30, 2009 @ 1:55 pm