Je déteste Delta

I ended up squeezing a $50 voucher out of Delta for my disastrous experience with them, so I plan on applying that toward a visit up to Chicago sometime. You've already heard all about my trip up, what with the fog delay, missed connection and lost luggage. I would have preferred being shipped home via that same itinerary and under those same circumstances, had I known what would end up transpiring on Saturday. The short story is that I got home a day late due to nothing other than a series of airline employees' ineptitude. It's a good thing I'm just Joe American (with a twist of Nancy), otherwise I might have succeeded in ruining everyone else's day as well.

My flight was not scheduled to depart Indianapolis until 4:25pm on Saturday - and indeed it would have, had I not gotten in its way - but I had to check out of the hotel by 11:00am. I suppose I had figured in booking my tickets that a late afternoon flight would give me time to see Deb and Phil, whom I had already met for dinner earlier in the week; or at the very least grant me a few hours more to explore the city, which I found I was able to do in a fifteen-minute car ride with Deb and Phil. I'm not being sarcastic when I say that they are quite the couple to guide one through a place; I actually learned some interesting things about the town. We even had ambient classical music wafting from the car stereo - a perfect compliment to the cold rain that fell over the seemingly endless variety of monuments we passed at 10mph. Just for excitement, we even drove the wrong way down a few streets. Their reaction was priceless, although amazingly calm.

After I watched the rest of the Auburn delegation board the 2:20pm flight to Atlanta, I settled in with my book, Stories by Ray Bradbury, and nibbled on fruit-flavored Gummy Bears. I boarded the plane shortly before 4:15pm and began to settle in for the short flight. A woman approached me a few minutes before takeoff and insisted that I was in her seat. After a flight attendant overheard and had us produce our seat assignments - both of which were indeed for the same seat - we were told to wait a minute while he investigated the situation. Two minutes later, the flight attendant reappeared and told me that I had to get off the plane. Delta had change my itinerary between when I checked in earlier that afternoon and that moment due to having canceled my connecting flight out of Atlanta, but never made an announcement at the airport and didn't stop me when I tried to board the plane. They did, however, make sure to get a few extra hundred dollars by giving away my seat.

Livid, I grabbed my bag and walked off the plane. The gate agent met me at the jetway and proceeded to tell me that I would need to stay another night in Indianapolis because all later flights to Montgomery out of Atlanta were overbooked due to the earlier flight having been canceled. I lit into him for letting me board the plane to Atlanta knowing that my seat was double-booked, for not informing me during the four hours I was sitting at the departure gate that my itinerary had changed, and for causing me to lose a day of my life. He in turn became irate and told me to get out of the jetway so he could send the plane off to Atlanta, and I refused to budge until I had a solid plan in place for my return home. Ten minutes later, they angrily shoved me back on the plane to Atlanta (which had a few free seats!!!) and told me to work it out once I got there.

After having to explain my story to everyone at Delta customer support beginning at tier one and ending at tier 5,000, they tried to tell me that it was my fault for not checking my voice mail to see that they had called me shortly before 1:00pm.

"Oh, really?" I said, "What number did you call?"

They proceded to give me my cell phone number, from which I was calling at the time.

"Don't lie to me," I accused the tier 5,000 woman, "I'm calling you from that phone right now, and it hasn't even recorded a missed call. I was in the airport when you 'called,' and had made and received several calls already. You did not call this number to inform me of anything."
When I pushed her to ask why, knowing I was somewhere in the airport, no one made the attempt to contact me in person, she had no answer. They tried to give me frequent flyer miles for my plight, but I wouldn't accept them, worthless as they are. Delta had just sent me a letter a few months ago telling me that since I flew so infrequently, they were going to cause all of my accrued mileage to expire. I had donated all of my miles to AIDS Atlanta to at least force Delta to pay for something. 3,000 miles on my new balance of 1,300 would get me nowhere. A $50 voucher was all the agent was willing to do.

I squeezed onto the 11:00pm flight to Montgomery, and was home and in bed at 2:00am on Sunday. I took today off to help reset my sleep, and will deal with the wrath of my boss when I show up tomorrow morning. I needed a break!!