Airline HELL

Okay. I thought about this for a couple of hours yesterday and slept on it, but I'm still so ticked off I can't help myself.

Yesterday I was asked to make travel reservations for three colleagues. All they want to do is fly from San Francisco, California to a location in the Eastern third of the country. Nothing but state borders involved. No customs, nothing beyond ordinary domestic travel.

Simple, right? HAH!

I get the hotel rooms reserved - piece of cake. No problem with the car rental, either. All that's left is the flight.

Okay. I fiddle around and check American Airlines. Only two seats were available on the date and at the time requested for this destination. I check Kayak and a couple of other sites and the best "fit" appears to be United.

I check the United website. Doesn't look complicated or like anything resembling rocket science, so I get started.

I find the flight that I had seen - departure time at about the same time as the American flight. Cool! Seats are available and everything. I find a return flight. Great! Seats are available there, too.

Get confirmation that the change in airline is okay and go online to book the seats. This is as soon as I get back from lunch at about one o'clock.

All is well, right? So I start making the online reservation. I get through the first screen where I pick the flight. I pick the seats for all four legs. I get to the payment information. I enter all of that - so far I'm into this project by about an hour - just for one reservation. I think I've got the reservation made, but I never get an e-mail confirmation.

Hmm. Okay. Do I try again, and possibly double-book? Or do I go to the next reservation? I decide to go to the next reservation and see if the first one will pop up in my e-mail.

I pick the flight - out and back. I pick the seats for all four legs. I enter the passenger information, payment information and... Right in the middle of it, I get a "You have been Redirected" message.  What!?? Redirected to where? For what reason?

I don't know - I haven't got a clue and the website isn't telling me a thing. So - do I start over and hope that I'm not double booking this one, too?

No. I decide it's best to play it safe and call United.

Oh. My. Effing. GAWD!!!

It takes an act of God to get to an agent.

No. I don't want to talk to the automated system. No! I really don't want to talk to the automated system. NO! DAMMIT! I want to talk to a person - hopefully someone with a brain!

Get through that, then I'm warned that it's going to be a twenty-plus minute wait. I'm both irritated and persistent, so I stay on "rot" listening to their music (thank goodness they're not trying to sell me on how wunnerful United Airlines is at this point).  So I wait.

Finally, at twenty-two minutes I get to talk to Rocky.

I explain my problem, including the problem with the website. He says, 'No, the first reservation wasn't booked. Let me transfer you to our other department so you won't be dinged $35 per passenger for talking to me.'

Okay - so I am trying really REALLY REALLY hard to spend nearly $2,000 with this company and this is their customer service?

Needless to say, I am not impressed. But, he offers to transfer me, I accept and after about fifteen seconds of more music, nothing. I mean I could have been in deep space for all I could hear. Still, I wait because I am determined. Five minutes... ten... I give up. I call back.

I re-wrestle with the automated system that doesn't believe me when I say 'Agent' with increasing force.

It finally agrees to allow me to speak to a representative.

By this time I am about to come unglued. Especially when I hear the cheerful automated voice say words to the effect of, "Your wait time will be between fifteen and twenty minutes". So - I've already spent over an hour-and-a-half on this exercise, plus the thirty minutes trying to talk to someone and then waiting while they cut off my call. Another five minutes mud wrestling with the damned automated system and... I get to wait some more?

This is NOT how a successful company deals with its customers who just want to spend their money with them. Or is it?

Gritting my teeth I warn the very nice lady on the other end of the phone that I'm livid and ask her pardon for being short with her, and then I outline my tale of woe. She listens, as she's trained to do. She doesn't get upset - she even offers to waive the $35 per person 'talk-to-me-fee'. Professional. Not delightful. Not pleasant from my perspective at this point, but she was professional.

Unfortunately, the tickets are non-refundable unlike on the website that didn't work.

I don't care. At this point I really do not care. I book the damned tickets which now cost, on top of the airfare, better than three hours of my time. Really?!???

The saying used to be, 'Is this any way to run a railroad?' That's out of date. Now I think the question is: 'Is this any way to run an airline?' Apparently so because the airlines are still in business, still making money.

Personally, after my experience today, I cannot help but wonder how.

Pain, agony and frustration trying to spend money.

Then my colleagues will get to the airport, have to strip off every piece of metal they are carrying. Subject their bags to being x-rayed, and stand with their hands in the air - in the international sign of surrender (as in police scenarios) - so they can have the privilege of being shoved into a space smaller than California allows chickens to occupy.

Really?

All I can do is shake my head and wonder.

At least it isn't me. Yet. Maybe that year-long bucket trip I dream of is not worth the nightmare of booking flight reservations. I wonder if there is a Cunard Liner still plying the Atlantic...

Best~
Philippa

Follow me on Twitter: https://twitter.com/PhilippaStories