Orbitzing Hell
One man's story about a travel company, Orbitz, that allegedly was going to make him do the peasant schlep from San Jose to SFO to make his international flight -- in an impossible period of time:
I was booking a ticket a while ago and decided to try Orbitz instead of Travelocity or Expedia for a change. I was connecting in San Francisco for an international flight, and found two tickets that were almost identical, except one cost about $30 less and had a stop in San Jose. I figured that the extra stop wouldn't make a huge difference, so I might as well save some money.WRONG.
After I booked the ticket, I noticed something strange: there were no travel details on how I would get from San Jose to San Francisco. I called Orbitz and they told me that I would have to provide my own transportation from San Jose to San Francisco. What?
So I did some research and found the following:
9:35 AM - Flight arrives in San Jose, California
9:50 AM - It takes up to 15 minutes to exit the plane and collect luggage.
9:55 AM - Up to 5 minutes to hail a cab or shuttle.
10:45 AM - Up to 50 minutes to travel to San Francisco with heavy morning traffic.My flight departed San Francisco at 12:26 PM, so I should have had plenty of time, except for one major detail: YOU NEED TO CHECK IN AT LEAST 2 HOURS EARLY FOR INTERNATIONAL FLIGHTS. This isn't even taking account the time it would take to get through long lines and security. Orbitz made a mistake: they sold me an impossible itinerary. Having a delayed flight was not an option because I was on a tight schedule. There was no way I was going to miss this plane.
So I called Orbitz back, they told me to call Delta and United. I did, and I spoke to managers at both Delta and United who confirmed that the itinerary was impossible to fulfill, and both of them referred me back to Orbitz. Before I called to tear Orbitz a new one, I checked the fine print of my itinerary to make sure it didn't mention anything about having to break the laws of physics for all or part of my trip. The email notification made no mention of this either.
...Orbitz flat-out refused to help me. So I ended up having to buy a one-way ticket to San Francisco for $144 just so I could make my flight on time. After numerous complaints to customer service, I finally got a response about a month later: Dear valued customer, blah blah blah, we don't really give a shit about your plight, so here's a slap in the face in the form of a coupon to save $50 off your next flight with Orbitz.
No. Not good enough. I shouldn't have to pay 1 cent extra for their mistake. I wrote back and told them that I wanted the full $144 refunded and they never responded.
His form of revenge? Printing the story on his Web site, along with all the emails of support he's gotten in response. Click on the above link. I don't know whether the story is true or not, but it sounds like it could be (I once had a similar experience where Cheap Tickets left me without enough time between my BMI connection from Paris and my Virgin Atlantic flight back to LA in London). Let's just say I'm such a big pain in the ass, I usually don't get stuck with the injustice end of the stick. I've sent the link to Chris Elliott, a syndicated travel columnist, in hopes he'll investigate.
Hey Amy - I didn't know you read Maddox. Are you a fan of ninjapirate, too?
Andrew at March 8, 2005 11:02 AM
I must confess I'm only a recent Maddox fan -- as of this morning! Ninja pirate? Not quite sure what that is, but I'm friends with a number of butt pirates!
Amy Alkon at March 8, 2005 2:10 PM
Presumably this was charged to a credit card, and you can always reverse the charges for unsatisfactory situations. I doubt the credit card company would have argued about this one.
Cathy Seipp at March 8, 2005 5:17 PM
Very good point, Cathy. It's completely ridiculous...drive from San Jose!
Amy Alkon at March 8, 2005 10:27 PM
Your post has made me think about an argument from another perspective. This is quite rare when I change my idea about such subjects but it looks that you’ve done it. The day has started with something new! Thank you!
Megan Troost at August 27, 2011 11:40 AM
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