Tuesday, May 12, 2009
Amazing but true travel tales
Two years ago, I vowed never to fly U.S. Airways again when they canceled my sister's flight home from my grandfather's funeral because there weren't enough people on it. (They seemed unable to comprehend that the people who were on the flight had booked it because they wanted to, or in my sister's case needed to, get home that night.) Of course, I've never been very good at sticking to my principles in the face of a major sale, so when I found a flight on U.S. Airways from D.C. to Madrid for $500 for the first week of May--almost $250 less than the Iberia flight I'd been stalking for months--I completely abandoned my "no U.S. Airways" policy and snapped it up.
If only I'd had the willpower to stick to my principles. Not only did the price of the Iberia flight drop to $450 a few days after I'd purchased the other one, but U.S. Airways proved to hold fast to its mission statement of "We'll get you there...eventually. Just probably not when you need to/want to be there." The Friday before last, I was sitting in Reagan National Airport, waiting for a flight to Philadelphia, where I'd catch a connecting flight to Madrid. The fact that an earlier flight to Philly had just started to board minutes before mine was scheduled to take off should have raised a red flag, but at that point I still retained some misguided faith in U.S. Airways. However, that faith soon disappeared when I looked up to see that my flight's departure time had suddenly been pushed back by an hour, with no announcement. I was scheduled to depart Philly for Madrid at 6:30, so the new departure time was going to leave me with a very tight connection. I walked up to the gate agent's desk to see what was going on, and found that a long line of angry travelers had already formed. As I contemplated whether it would even be worthwhile to get in the line, I heard a woman near me tell her husband, "They won't put us on the flight that's leaving now because we checked our luggage." Looking down at the carry-on bag that constituted the entirety of my luggage, I put two and two together and raced down to the departure gate to see if I could get on the other plane.
However, it seems I'd waited too long to wise up to the unannounced delay--the boarding agent informed me that the plane was ready to push back from the gate, and there was no way I could get on. No worries, though--as long as my flight left at the newly scheduled time, I still had a glimmer of hope of making the flight to Madrid. So I decided to check with another agent to see what the holdup was. He explained that there was an air-traffic hold placed on Philly, so it was unlikely that our plane would actually leave at 5:22. In fact, he said, I probably wouldn't make it to Philly until at least 8. "That's kind of a problem," I said, "since my flight to Madrid leaves at 6:30." "Yeah, you're probably not going to get to Madrid tonight," he said, and went on to inform me that since Philly is such a busy U.S. Airways hub, I really should have allowed myself a full day to make the connection. OK, no. Just no. I don't think it's unreasonable to expect that U.S. Airways flights should depart and arrive when they say they will. Yes, I realize that airports are busy and flights are often delayed due to overcrowded scheduling, but this should be the exception, not the rule. I should not have to build an extra day of travel into my itinerary to account for U.S. Airways' schedule mismanagement. And furthermore, if an hour and a half connection in Philly is so impossible, why are they even selling flights with that connection time? God.
At this point, I really wanted to scream, cry, strangle this man, or perhaps do all three at once, but instead I forced myself to remain calm and ask what my options were. He informed me that my best option was to wait another day for the next flight to Madrid, which didn't seem all that great to me, as I was due to meet Bri at the Plaza Mayor in Madrid on Saturday, and didn't really have a way to get in touch with her (she was in London for work) and tell her I'd be arriving a day late. I asked if perhaps there weren't any other options, and he did a little more searching on the computer and informed me that there was a flight to Munich leaving Philly that night, and if I could get on that, I could easily get a flight from Munich to Madrid the next morning. "Great," I said, "what time does the Munich flight leave?" "6:40," he replied. Yep, that would be 10 minutes after the Madrid flight. Seriously, dude? When I pointed out that if I could make a 6:40 flight to Munich, I could probably also make a 6:30 flight to Madrid, his only response was that I really needed to get to Philly, where it would be much easier to "work my connections." Once again: No. If all of U.S. Airways' flights to Europe leave Philly before 7, what good is it going to do me to get there at 8? I wasn't about to spend the night at an airport less than 3 hours from my house if I wasn't going to be able to leave until the next day anyway.
Fortunately, the trauma I suffered at the hands of United had taught me a valuable lesson--every person at an airline is going to tell you a different thing, so if you don't like what the person you're talking to is saying, find a new person. This dude was clearly an idiot, so I left him in search of someone more competent. The line at the boarding desk was growing by the minute, so I decided it was in my best interest to work the phones. Even on the phone, though, I got the same answer: That I probably couldn't fly to Madrid until the next day on U.S. Airways, although the rep I talked to seemed optimistic about my chances of making the 6:30 flight if my plane to Philly did in fact depart at 5:22. Since it was only around 4:00 at that point, I told her I'd wait and see what happened before I tried to rebook for the next day.
While I was waiting, though, I decided to go for the long shot: Because of my relentless stalking, I knew that the Iberia flight wasn't scheduled to leave Dulles for several more hours, so I called them up to check on their last-minute fare to Madrid. I was expecting an exorbitant four-digit figure, so I was a bit shocked when the rep quoted me a price of $480. As in $20 less than I'd paid for my U.S. Airways flight. I asked her to hold the reservation for me while I called U.S. Airways to see if I'd be able to cancel my flight and use the funds for future travel (although, understandably, I was loath to ever fly with U.S. Airways again). I was shocked again when, after explaining my situation to the new U.S. Airways rep, she told me that, because of the circumstances, she would be able to fully refund my ticket. She said I'd have to race to make their Madrid flight even if my plane to Philly did leave at 5:22, so although I was still a little skeptical about her refund offer, I told her to go ahead and process the cancellation, figuring I could always fight it out after the fact if need be. I called Iberia back, booked that flight, then waltzed out of the airport and hopped on the Metro to Dulles. Twelve hours later, I was standing on the Plaza Mayor with Bri, and a few days after that, U.S. Airways refunded the $500 to my credit card. Amazing but true.
There are more amazing but true tales to come from this year's Excellent Adventure: Spain & Portugal Edition (including how Bri pilfered the world's tartest orange while riding a bike in Seville, and how a drunk old Spanish woman tried to talk us into giving her some of our food at a seaside snack bar in Cadiz), but in the meantime, you can amuse yourselves with all the amazing but true tales of last year's adventure to Peru.
Two years ago, I vowed never to fly U.S. Airways again when they canceled my sister's flight home from my grandfather's funeral because there weren't enough people on it. (They seemed unable to comprehend that the people who were on the flight had booked it because they wanted to, or in my sister's case needed to, get home that night.) Of course, I've never been very good at sticking to my principles in the face of a major sale, so when I found a flight on U.S. Airways from D.C. to Madrid for $500 for the first week of May--almost $250 less than the Iberia flight I'd been stalking for months--I completely abandoned my "no U.S. Airways" policy and snapped it up.
If only I'd had the willpower to stick to my principles. Not only did the price of the Iberia flight drop to $450 a few days after I'd purchased the other one, but U.S. Airways proved to hold fast to its mission statement of "We'll get you there...eventually. Just probably not when you need to/want to be there." The Friday before last, I was sitting in Reagan National Airport, waiting for a flight to Philadelphia, where I'd catch a connecting flight to Madrid. The fact that an earlier flight to Philly had just started to board minutes before mine was scheduled to take off should have raised a red flag, but at that point I still retained some misguided faith in U.S. Airways. However, that faith soon disappeared when I looked up to see that my flight's departure time had suddenly been pushed back by an hour, with no announcement. I was scheduled to depart Philly for Madrid at 6:30, so the new departure time was going to leave me with a very tight connection. I walked up to the gate agent's desk to see what was going on, and found that a long line of angry travelers had already formed. As I contemplated whether it would even be worthwhile to get in the line, I heard a woman near me tell her husband, "They won't put us on the flight that's leaving now because we checked our luggage." Looking down at the carry-on bag that constituted the entirety of my luggage, I put two and two together and raced down to the departure gate to see if I could get on the other plane.
However, it seems I'd waited too long to wise up to the unannounced delay--the boarding agent informed me that the plane was ready to push back from the gate, and there was no way I could get on. No worries, though--as long as my flight left at the newly scheduled time, I still had a glimmer of hope of making the flight to Madrid. So I decided to check with another agent to see what the holdup was. He explained that there was an air-traffic hold placed on Philly, so it was unlikely that our plane would actually leave at 5:22. In fact, he said, I probably wouldn't make it to Philly until at least 8. "That's kind of a problem," I said, "since my flight to Madrid leaves at 6:30." "Yeah, you're probably not going to get to Madrid tonight," he said, and went on to inform me that since Philly is such a busy U.S. Airways hub, I really should have allowed myself a full day to make the connection. OK, no. Just no. I don't think it's unreasonable to expect that U.S. Airways flights should depart and arrive when they say they will. Yes, I realize that airports are busy and flights are often delayed due to overcrowded scheduling, but this should be the exception, not the rule. I should not have to build an extra day of travel into my itinerary to account for U.S. Airways' schedule mismanagement. And furthermore, if an hour and a half connection in Philly is so impossible, why are they even selling flights with that connection time? God.
At this point, I really wanted to scream, cry, strangle this man, or perhaps do all three at once, but instead I forced myself to remain calm and ask what my options were. He informed me that my best option was to wait another day for the next flight to Madrid, which didn't seem all that great to me, as I was due to meet Bri at the Plaza Mayor in Madrid on Saturday, and didn't really have a way to get in touch with her (she was in London for work) and tell her I'd be arriving a day late. I asked if perhaps there weren't any other options, and he did a little more searching on the computer and informed me that there was a flight to Munich leaving Philly that night, and if I could get on that, I could easily get a flight from Munich to Madrid the next morning. "Great," I said, "what time does the Munich flight leave?" "6:40," he replied. Yep, that would be 10 minutes after the Madrid flight. Seriously, dude? When I pointed out that if I could make a 6:40 flight to Munich, I could probably also make a 6:30 flight to Madrid, his only response was that I really needed to get to Philly, where it would be much easier to "work my connections." Once again: No. If all of U.S. Airways' flights to Europe leave Philly before 7, what good is it going to do me to get there at 8? I wasn't about to spend the night at an airport less than 3 hours from my house if I wasn't going to be able to leave until the next day anyway.
Fortunately, the trauma I suffered at the hands of United had taught me a valuable lesson--every person at an airline is going to tell you a different thing, so if you don't like what the person you're talking to is saying, find a new person. This dude was clearly an idiot, so I left him in search of someone more competent. The line at the boarding desk was growing by the minute, so I decided it was in my best interest to work the phones. Even on the phone, though, I got the same answer: That I probably couldn't fly to Madrid until the next day on U.S. Airways, although the rep I talked to seemed optimistic about my chances of making the 6:30 flight if my plane to Philly did in fact depart at 5:22. Since it was only around 4:00 at that point, I told her I'd wait and see what happened before I tried to rebook for the next day.
While I was waiting, though, I decided to go for the long shot: Because of my relentless stalking, I knew that the Iberia flight wasn't scheduled to leave Dulles for several more hours, so I called them up to check on their last-minute fare to Madrid. I was expecting an exorbitant four-digit figure, so I was a bit shocked when the rep quoted me a price of $480. As in $20 less than I'd paid for my U.S. Airways flight. I asked her to hold the reservation for me while I called U.S. Airways to see if I'd be able to cancel my flight and use the funds for future travel (although, understandably, I was loath to ever fly with U.S. Airways again). I was shocked again when, after explaining my situation to the new U.S. Airways rep, she told me that, because of the circumstances, she would be able to fully refund my ticket. She said I'd have to race to make their Madrid flight even if my plane to Philly did leave at 5:22, so although I was still a little skeptical about her refund offer, I told her to go ahead and process the cancellation, figuring I could always fight it out after the fact if need be. I called Iberia back, booked that flight, then waltzed out of the airport and hopped on the Metro to Dulles. Twelve hours later, I was standing on the Plaza Mayor with Bri, and a few days after that, U.S. Airways refunded the $500 to my credit card. Amazing but true.
There are more amazing but true tales to come from this year's Excellent Adventure: Spain & Portugal Edition (including how Bri pilfered the world's tartest orange while riding a bike in Seville, and how a drunk old Spanish woman tried to talk us into giving her some of our food at a seaside snack bar in Cadiz), but in the meantime, you can amuse yourselves with all the amazing but true tales of last year's adventure to Peru.
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