More crazy flight stories!

Parent Cafe
1

<p>My daughter travels internationally for work about 50-70% of her time; she spends more time in the air and in hotels than her own apartment! In the two years she has been flying, I only remember one time where she was going to miss her connecting flights, and United rebooked her before she even landed on the first leg. This week has made up for the two years of uneventful travel!</p>

<p>Last Sunday she was due to leave Baltimore to come home to Atlanta on Delta. While we used Delta or Airtran from Atlanta, all her work travel is with United/Star Alliance. Due to all the weather and holiday travelers, her flight was overbooked by 11. Delta asked for volunteers and my daughter actually thought about it, but wanted to come home as she has been in London for 6 months and hasn’t seen family. After my daughter is seated on the plane and reading a magazine, she is told she has to get off as well as other passengers. Seems a family of 5 that was going to be bumped was less than happy; security was called to board the plane and somehow they removed some passengers, including my daughter. I still don’t understand how a passenger that is already in their seat gets bumped, but Delta obviously thinks differently. My daughter thinks they bumped the last on, instead of those that booked last. Delta rebooked her on the first flight out the next morning, but put her on standby for the flight that was to leave about an hour after her original flight. Luckily the two flight were at neighboring gates. Turns out my daughter was able to get on the next flight which ended up landing in Atlanta only 15 minutes after her original flight because of all the problems on the first flight. She also received a $400 credit voucher for another flight, so not a bad deal. What I don’t understand is how you oversell a 50 seater plane by 11 when the airlines not have cut flights and most planes are filled. And when a flight is over sold, how do they decide who to bump? My daughter had a seat assignment from the time she booked the flight; I am assuming another passenger wasn’t assigned the same seat.</p>

<p>Today daughter is scheduled to from from Atlanta to London through Newark on United where she is a Platinum member. Last night I was putting her flight info into my phone on flightaware as I like to track flights. I see that her flight from Atlanta to Newark is cancelled, so I tell her to check her account. United has rebooked her on the later flight which is the last flight out of Atlanta which in turns puts her on the last flight from Newark to London. One little potential problem, she only has a 50 minute layover, and her plane comes from DC and then Cleveland before arrive in Atlanta. With today’s snow we are thinking there is no way she will make the connection to London. I have been watching the flight all morning and afternoon and the flight from DC arrives late to Cleveland, and then the flight to Atlanta leaves Cleveland an hour late, but still might leave Atlanta on time. After dropping my daughter at the airport she calls me 30 minutes before her flight is to depart to tell me United has double booked her and she has a chance to go nonstop to London on Delta; only problem is the flight leaves in 30 minutes and she is at the domestic terminal and has to get to the new international terminal that is a bus ride or moving sidewalks that I believe someone said was 4 miles! She has no idea if her luggage will make the Delta flight, but she is running to see if she can get it. If she goes there and can’t get on, there is no way to get back to her domestic flight as it leaves at the same time. As luck would have it, she was able to the Delta flight, she has no idea where her luggage is; guess she will find out when he gets to London :)</p>

<p>I find it interesting that United put her on the Delta flight; I am wondering if it was due to her status and they realized she couldn’t make the connection in Newark. The other thought I had was that because her earlier flight was cancelled I noticed there was 13 people on the waitlist for the flight to Newark. I guess it was easier to toss a platinum member on Delta for an international flight and get some of these other people on the domestic flight. Maybe her status had nothing to do with it as I don’t know if others were in the same boat.</p>

<p>Oh, so I tracked her United flight to Newark to see when it left Atlanta figuring it might leave late; seems it will arrive 25 minutes early which would have given my daughter 1.5 hour layover, enough time to make her connection :slight_smile: While my daughter was happy to have a non stop flight and not have to worry about the short connection time, she was not happy to lose her aisle seat with extended legroom unless Delta was able to accommodate her. Delta is not part of Star Alliance so again, I have no idea why United decided to book her on that flight. I might find out more tomorrow when she lands.</p>

2

<p>My husband was a big business traveler at a previous job. He called me one night from Charlotte and he was hopping mad. He was platinum with U.S.Air, and had actually booked this particular trip more than a month in advance. Well…he was sitting at the gate and his name was called. Usually this is because they are moving him to first class…but this time, he got bumped from the flight. It was overbooked and no one on the plane was willing to give up their seat…so the computer chose…and it chose my husband. They gave him a voucher for meals and hotel, and a $400 voucher that anyone could use. And he was on the first flight out the next morning in first class. But still…he had been traveling all week and did NOT want to spend a night in Charlotte.</p>

3

<p>I think it’s rude to come onto the flight and force already seated passengers off for the sake of someone not even on the plane yet. It’s bad enough to be bumped at all. Who’s to say their need for the flight is any greater than those already seated and whatever happened to first-come first-served? </p>

<p>I’ve flown a lot but have never been literally kicked off of the plane like that. I wouldn’t be happy at all despite the compensation.</p>

4

<p>Just before Christmas we were due to fly out on a 4:00 pm flight from the East Coast to LA, connecting with a flight to Hong Kong after a layover of a few hours. The night before we were due to leave DH, being a little anal, checked the flight one last time…only to find our flight to LA had been cancelled, and without as much as a phone call, the airline had rebooked us on a flight the next day! We would have missed our US-Asia flight, and despite the fact that DH is the highest status with the airline, the fact that we’d booked with frequent flyer miles and the Asia flight was with a different carrier meant we were going to be s*****d. Enterprising DH was somehow able to get us on another carrier at 6am and after a mad scramble to pack and prep the house overnight I’m writing this from a beach in Cambodia. :)</p>

5

<p>GGD-My daughter said the reason security was called is Delta was trying to bump a family of 5-mom, dad and 3 young children. Seems mom made a scene, which I don’t blame her; her luggage is checked, she has 3 little ones, and you are telling her she can get on a flight at 6:30am the next morning? They would have needed more than a couple of security guards to take care of me if I had been in her place :wink: My daughter was ok with it, but she could have been more assertive and asked for more than a $400 voucher to get off the plane. Like thumper’s husband, my daughter could skip another night in a hotel or airport.</p>

6

<p>snowball, for her first flight—BY LAW, they are supposed provide cash/check payment for that $400 if she was involuntarily bumped. They might try to offer a voucher, but she should get the cash for it. I would have her go online, and email the customer service dept at Delta to get that money. Even if she wasn’t that inconvenienced. They should be bumping people who don’t have assigned seats, not going onboard taking seats away from people onboard (unless they are jumpseating, or airline passes). Crazy.</p>

<p>I can’t believe USAir bumped thumpers husband. It isn’t supposed to be computer generated, random. Status should stop him from being bumped.</p>

<p>They should be offering takers a whole lot of money before they start involuntarily bumping people. I would be enraged in all of these situations.</p>

<p>Everything the pointsguy says is useful. This link is a bit dated, but still might herlp…
[Points</a> Guy Pointer: Anatomy of an Airline Bump (and Tips for Success) | The Points Guy](<a href=“http://thepointsguy.com/2010/08/points-guy-pointer-anatomy-of-an-airline-bump-and-tips-for-success/]Points”>Points Guy Pointer: Anatomy of an Airline Bump (and Tips for Success) - The Points Guy)</p>

7

<p>Busdriver, my husband couldn’t believe he was being bumped either. But he was. </p>

<p>The only other time DH was “inconvenienced” was when U. S. Air cancelled a flight out of Charlotte supposedly because of weather. The weather was fine…and other flights out of Charlotte to here were flying just fine. DH and three coworkers all spent the night in Charlotte. </p>

<p>My husband hates flying through Charlotte…and Philadelphia which we call the US Air black hole.</p>

8

<p>Another reason for me to avoid flying USAir! I always fly Delta, I am diamond now with a reserve card, so they are really kind and helpful to me. It is a good place to be, and I stay away from the others if I can.</p>

<p>So I looked online, and here is USAir’s bumping policy:</p>

<p>“When US Airways does not receive enough volunteers, US Airways may deny boarding involuntarily to passengers holding a confirmed reservation. US Airways may assign and release seats based upon special needs, time of check-in, product purchased, frequent flyer status and/or ease of re-accommodation.”</p>

<p>So it seems to me that the “computer” could decide that the party of 5 with kids had special needs, and that your husband was the easiest to re-accommodate. That they could ignore his frequent flyer status and use other factors like time of check-in or whatever. Wow, that means to me that they could pretty much decide to bump anyone randomly that they chose. Most airlines would never consider bumping a high status passenger over the other reasons listed, that is way beyond tacky. I had thought maybe the gate agent wasn’t telling the truth, but it sounds like their policy allows them to do whatever the heck they want. Not a way to treat the people who fly on your airline the most, and spend the most money.</p>

9

<p>S’s flight home was cancelled early morning 12/23 due to electrical problems on the plane. (This was a connecting flight–he’d already flown long-distance overnight). First seat they could offer was the following afternoon! Had to make a split-second decision to fly to another airport (3 hours from here), and his sis spent all day driving back and forth to pick him up there. We were happy they got home safely–but feel the airline should have provided more (like gas $ or voucher for the inconvenience?) What would you do? It seems that normally they would have flown him somewhere else, and back into our home airport–but no seats to be had on Dec. 23.</p>

10

<p>I would send a message via the customer service dept online (they always have a format for that) telling them about all the difficulty he and your family had to go through over the holiday, atomom. Be polite, detailed, and ask for some sort of compensation (whether you want a voucher or airmiles). That is a massive inconvenience. And now they didn’t even have to pay for the hotel. Every time I complain to Delta, I get 10-20K miles, it’s better than nothing. They really should acknowledge the trouble he experienced.</p>

11

<p>The Star Alliance LOST 10,000 flight miles of our trip last year…each of us. DH sent in an appeal…we had checked into their gold lounge so they did have a record of our flight and boarding passes. We never heard about the appeal at all. It was over a year ago.</p>

<p>Sorry for the digression…</p>

12

<p>^^Are you serious?? I would start screaming, now. Or maybe, start sending those emails in to customer service, telling them to deal with it now, otherwise they never will. They probably lost your appeal too. Send them a copy of it, and demand more miles in addition to the ones they lost. That should have been taken care of in a day. How incredibly incompetent.</p>

13

<p>Few years back, we were going to Paris on Christmas night and our flight was cancelled. I asked if they would give us a pass to their VIP lounge, the rep agreed because I was visibly upset by the change. Since it was Christmas, the lounge had premium Champagne and amazing food (large shrimps, cheese). We had a great meal at the lounge. The best part was due to the cancellation they didn’t have enough economy seats, so they upgraded everyone at the VIP loung to business and first class.</p>

14

<p>DD was flying home from Europe last year when a passenger had a medical emergency and the plane had to land in Romania at a summer resort. It was December, they were the only plane there and it was snowing, which was not normal. The field had no deicing equipment and there were literally no other planes there. They had to wait until the next morning to take off, but put them up in a deserted resort hotel and somehow managed to get the passengers food. Then she got to Munich and caught up in the snowstorms that crippled the airports, but was again put up in a hotel and fed. She ended up getting home more than two days late and flew into a completely different airport. The return flights were non-eventful. </p>

<p>Our local airport has so many problems with luggage not making the last leg that the person who delivers the luggage knows our name and where to leave it at the house.</p>

15

<p>Despite confirming, I got to Rome airport and learned the Alitalia flight was cancelled. They got me on the same trip the next day, bumped it to 1st class- and fortunately, DH was still in the city, with a hotel room, so I just retraced my steps. Only problem was this flight went to JFK and I had to puddle jump to Boston. First class was sweet, nearly empty.</p>

<p>D1 barely missed a 10 am connection in Paris (for reasons beyond her control, a whole tale in itself.) The airline rebooked them- for 6pm the following day. I can’t think of a better city to be forced to spend a day in- and D1 had a close friend living there. Instead, the group opted to spend 30+ hours in the airport. But, they did have some funny tales to tell about what goes on overnight- and the sketchy characters.</p>

16

<p>I was surprised to hear any airline would bump a platinum member. But I’m wondering if the reason was that they had to struggle to put the 5 family members together?</p>

<p>When our kids were little, we checked into our international flight to find that instead of being seated all together, they had changed my daughter’s seat so that she was seated 10 or 12 rows in front of us, all by herself. She was 5! I told the steward on the flight that it was just not acceptable to move a 5 year old away from her family. They shrugged and said it wasn’t their problem, if she was old enough to fly she was old enough to be in any seat they put her in. I advised them that it wasn’t happening, period, especially on such a long international flight. </p>

<p>The passenger next to my daughter heard all this and told the steward she was out of her freaking mind. He said he would switch seats with me, so that while our family would be split up, one parent would be with each child. What a saint! To this day I remember that man’s help. And I still think the steward was in the wrong industry, to have so little appreciation for the situation.</p>

17

<p>We were flying home from Disney with a 6 year old and a 9 year old. We had confirmed seats AND boarding passes. One parent with each kid, and we were adjacent rows. For some reason, I went to the counter at the gate to make sure all was well. The counter person told us that our seats had been changed, and we were spread out all over the plane. I told her that was FINE with me, but that meant my kids were essentially unaccompanied minors on the flight and I insisted on escorts for both of them. Son of a gun…they were able to switch our seats so we could be together. I always have wondered what would have happened if we had just boarded with our boarding passes. Clearly they had given two people the same seats.</p>

18

<p>Hayden, similar experience here:<br>
Moving to another state with my 1 & 3 yr. old. (H already there) and we had business class seats (due to H’s frequent travel).
Get on plane…to find they had split us ALL up! Huh??? Crew found us two seats and wanted to put 3 yr. old a row behind on other side of plane, between two large businessmen. Well, 3 yr. old just blew a gasket—and she has lungs. Scared the 1 yr. old, who started wailing, and then domino effect with 3 other kids nearby. Got quite noisy! Snotty FA made comment about “another one of those flights”. 3 yr. old is still screaming, now standing on seat and kicking seat in front of her. Two business men then hopped up and “volunteered” to move so that we could sit together. In an instant, D turned all smiles, said “bye” and “Hi Mommy!” But Really? They actually thought it was a good idea to put a 3 year old on opposite side of plane between two unfamiliar men for four hours???</p>

19

<p>hayden- if you were referring to my daughter, she was not a platinum member on the flight she got bumped from; that was a Delta flight and she is platinum with United, sorry for the confusion. The family of 5 was also told they would be bumped after being seated on the plane. I am not sure what happened with them as my daughter didn’t hang around to find out; she was trying to get to the next gate to try to get on the standby flight. According to my daughter the mother was pitching a fit and swearing, although truthfully I can’t blame her.</p>

20

<p>I can’t get over what the airlines do to all of us poor passengers…sometimes I feel like the airlines would like to go to standing room only/steerage class and then also charge for each bag etc.</p>

<p>Although sometimes I do feel bad for the flight attendants.</p>

<p>Last week I was on a flight (only about 75 minutes)…a very morbidly obese woman boarded the flight…wearing a t-shirt bearing the slogan “FAT…PROUD…AND LOUD”</p>

<p>And she was.</p>

<p>Luckily there were a couple of empty seats on the flight, I think because another flight was not able to make it in and connect.</p>

<p>They moved people around to get her two adjacent seats and were just barely able to buckle her in using the left seatbelt from one seat and the right seatbelt from the other, both fully extended, plus an extension belt. The FAs moved the person that had been in the aisle seat to business class. The woman loudly complained that she should have been given seats in business class instead…the FA explained to her that there had been only one available seat in business class, and they would have had to demote a customer who had paid for the business class seat. She did not care… it was the FAs’ fault that she was not traveling comfortably.</p>

<p>I felt so sorry for the man trapped in the window seat.</p>

<p>So then the FAs begin the distribution of snacks, with a PA announcement that only pretzels were available because their delivery of additional snacks did not arrive as planned. So the FA comes down the aisle and hands the woman her packet of pretzels…and she just loses it! Screaming about how is she supposed to survive on just one paltry packet of pretzels !!! (remember, the flight is all of maybe 75 minutes…) FA said she would come back to her if there were any packets left after she finished distributing them to all the other passengers…it wasn’t good enough…she just kept making a scene. The FA returned with two additional bags of pretzels…and she still complained loudly about how they expected her to starve.</p>

<p>Then some boy on the plane (maybe 12 or 13?) made an audible crack about how she could be stranded on a desert island and she would not starve to death for at least a year…huge uproar followed. Mother had boy apologize.</p>

<p>Then came the cart with the drink service. The guy in the window seat declined a drink. The woman took a drink…and then demanded that the man in the window seat put down his tray table for her to use, because obviously she could not access her own! And out of her purse she pulls out a big mac and fries. And eats off of her neighbor’s tray table.</p>

<p>This woman’s sense of entitlement was unreal. And she was not at all shy about expressing it…loudly. </p>

<p>The worst was yet to come.</p>

<p>The plane lands, and people start to get off. She did not want to wait for others to go down the aisle when it came the turn for her row.</p>

<p>So, with the help of the FA, she is unbuckled, and stuggles to get up and in to the aisle.</p>

<p>Where it becomes apparent that there is a huge, wet stain on her peptobismol pink sweatpants…</p>

<p>and then she just lost it…and started screaming about how was she supposed to get out of her seat, and down the aisle, to a bathroom that she could not possibly fit in to anyway…</p>

<p>It was just so sad. I could not even begin to sense the depth of her humiliation. But that was still no excuse for her taking a swing at the FA with her walking stick.</p>

<p>I also felt sympathy for whoever was going to have to clean her seat, and for whoever might be unlucky enough to have to sit in it after her…same for the wheelchair that picked her up at the gate.</p>