Bristol to Orlando via Newark with Continental airlines

mayhem.music

The following is a true account of what happened to us on the 9th October 2008......
Dear Sir/ Madam,

I am writing in the vain attempt that the experience that happened to our party does not happen to anyone else while travelling to their holiday destination.

There were six of us travelling 4 adults and 2 children aged 3 and 7, all started well and we left Heathrow airport on time on the 9th October, flight number UA1949, fully excited for our holiday in Orlando, Florida which we had booked in September 2008.

We had booked these flights following the collapse of the Excel group our travel agent had recommended flights with your company although it would mean we needed to travel to Chicago’s O’Hare and take an internal connecting flight with TED down to Orlando, not a problem we thought this happens everyday so why should it matter.

We actually landed 20 minutes early in Chicago which gave us over 2 hours to catch our connecting flight, unfortunately whilst we were waiting in the immigration queue for our documents to be processed the immigration computers crashed, the processing officers at this point closed the border to anyone but US citizens, it was this 1½ hour delay that was directly responsible for us missing our connecting flight, 16:55 9th October.

Under normal circumstances I understand that this would have not been a problem as we would have been placed on the next available flight, unfortunately in this case it was a huge issue because according to your customer service representative it was the start of a holiday weekend and all further flights that day and the next day were fully booked, it was looking bleak for us and around 30 other British passengers who also missed this flight.

The representative was helpful and made some telephone calls and managed to “secure” flights for us on another airline (American Airlines) the following day at 11am he apologised for the inconvenience and offered us a “pink” ticket which got us a hotel room for the evening. We were all tired and the children especially were very restless.

We arrived back at terminal 1 in Chicago airport at 9am the next morning to check in for the re-arranged flight after some computer work we were told that we had actually been rejected for travel with them as American Airlines had over-sold the flight and we would have to go back to the United Airlines customer service desk which was at I believe was in terminal 3.

When we get to the United Airlines customer service desk the queue was extremely long with only 2 advisors helping passengers, it took over an hour to get to me. When I eventually got to explain the problems we were having the advisor was sympathetic and told us that United have plenty of fights leaving for Orlando that day and that he guaranteed (exact words) that he would be able to get us to our destination. He asked to check in our luggage, which I questioned as if we did not travel we would have no luggage but he repeated that he guaranteed that we would get to our destination later in the day and not to worry. This guarantee as we now know was absolutely worthless, this seemed to be a “tell them what they want to hear” situation.

Additionally a side effect of our names being run multiple times through the airports computers meant it highlighted us as a security risk and we had to be screened to ensure we were not a threat of any description (Even the 3 year old was frisked which was an extremely unpleasant experience for him) obviously security also do not get training to deal with children as the children were treated with the same contempt as the adults.

Following the ordeal at security we made our way to the departure gate and I spoke to the United Airlines representative at the gate as advised to ensure the children were not placed next to an emergency exit, this was when she broke the news that these tickets were standby only and there would be little to no chance of getting us on this flight or any other flight that day due to it being a holiday weekend. The holiday of a lifetime was at this point was becoming a total disaster with thousands of pounds going down the drain.

We were advised again to either wait to see if the odd person did not turn up at the gate for the flight (which was fully checked in) or to go to the customer service desk, so we embarked on another hike through the airport we were at gate 22 concourse B and customer service was concourse C at gate 18 which was virtually the opposite side of the airport.

After arriving at the United Airlines customer service desk it was found that there was only one advisor working and a queue of easily 30 people. The queue was so long we even got asked to move by an airport official as it was blocking the concourse. It took me over 2 hours to reach the front of the queue and when I relayed our story the advisor said well it is a holiday weekend. I was really getting sick of hearing about the holiday weekend!!! She looked at her computer and told us the horrific news that United Airlines would NOT be able to get us to Orlando until the Monday at the earliest, the time was currently Midday on Friday, you can imagine our despair, my partner and our friends partner were reduced to tears, our holiday was ruined, no luggage no flight and stuck in an airport “Welcome to America”.

The advisor started relaying me a story about her problems with travelling in the past which to be honest I was really not interested in. In fairness I told her this was unacceptable and some sort of solution needed to be found even if it meant going home, she worked hard and eventually came up with 3 additional options 1st being she could get us to Jacksonville that evening and we could drive the rest of the way, again with 2 small children the was unacceptable, the second option was to fly us to Washington that afternoon we would spend the night and she could get us to Orlando on the Saturday morning using US Airways finally we could fly somewhere else and then get a flight to Orlando I really cant remember, the second option seemed the lesser of the evils. I asked if we could re-claim our luggage from the Orlando flight but she told me this flight had already left and our luggage would be waiting for us in Orlando….great!!!!

We flew to Washington that afternoon and had to spend another night in a hotel, this time without luggage, extremely tired and depressed. The following morning (Saturday) we arrived at the airport at 5am to check in for the US Air flight down to Orlando, during the check in process it was then noted that only 5 places had been booked on the flight not 6 and we were told yet again, “Go to the United Airlines customer service desk”.

Again there was only 1 person working and about 5 people in the queue, when we asked the lady who was walking around checking the queues if she could help she was extremely rude and told us “everyone has problems you need to wait in line and be patient”, that is just what we needed at 5am in the morning. When we got to the front and explained the story for what seemed like the hundredth time we finally got some action and the advisor managed to get us all on the US Air flight. The final issue was with security as we were still deemed a security risk and were screened yet again.

We arrived in Orlando on the Saturday, two days late!!

Now although I understand the original problem was not a United Airlines problem but what makes me angry is that United Airlines knew there was a problem at immigration and that a number of passengers were stuck, United Airlines knew that passengers from a transatlantic flight were due to fly on a connecting flight but still this flight left. If that flight had been delayed for 30 minutes then the above would not have happened, I understand it is not normal policy to delay flights but this was NOT a normal circumstance and no thought or consideration for the consequences was deemed necessary by United Airlines, causing us and others to become stranded. I also feel that your staff are not trained adequately in how to handle the situation as they (although mostly polite) had no idea what to do.

Our costs for the hotels will be covered by insurance but they will not recover the two lost days nor will it remove the stress and despair that was caused by this. * UPDATE * OUR COSTS ARE NOT COVERED BY INSURANCE AS THE MISSED DEPATURE AND DELAY WERE NOT AT OUR ORIGINAL DEPARTURE AIRPORT. I am sure with a little insight if this situation arises again, United Airlines would look at it differently and delay the flight for the short period required, incidentally the pilot of a United Airlines flight on the Friday could not move his seat backwards it was stuck so this flight was delayed by an hour, we did not even need an hour.

A response to this letter/email would be appreciated, even if to confirm what I have written here for our insurance company, although I am only expecting a standard reply telling me how sorry you are but that it’s not your fault. I felt that I needed to bring this to your attention so you can implement a policy in the future to avoid this situation occurring again.