Comments on: Continental Airlines

By: Kristin

Kristin — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 22:18:32 +0000

Terrible experience- I rang in the new year in the airport after my flight from montreal to newark was delayed 5 times for a total of 10 hours. CO blamed it on weather in newark, but 3 other newark flights went out while we were still sitting there. We were given a $9 meal voucher after all but one food shop were already closed. The one restaurant still open was closing and the kitchen was already closed. They would not honor the voucher for drinks. Our gate was moved 5 times and at one point we had to wait online and get new boarding passes (the flight was apparently cancelled but no one actually said that outloud)! (Not to mention this was after being frisked 3 times by the FAA due to the hightened security. No carry on’s allowed- my brother had to check his backpack and carry around his laptop in his hand!) All this for a 1 hour flight! Contacted customer service and they aren’t interested in compensating us at all. Too bad I had $150 tickets in the city for the night that were never used! ugh. so frustrating.

By: Andrew

Andrew — Sun, 20 Dec 2009 23:55:26 +0000

I just emailed everyone on this list and zeo.higgins@coair.com bounced back, FYI. With the snow we had this weekend in NY, I had two flights canceled. Both times I called customer service were handled professionally. I do think it helps to be polite: having worked in customer service in the past and despising almost everyone I helped, the few genuinely nice people really make things better. Hopefully they’ll be able to get me on a plane BEFORE Christmas, rather than after.

By: Jeff F.

Jeff F. — Sat, 21 Nov 2009 04:13:36 +0000

We’ve had good experiences with CO, and up until our most recent flights in Sept., everything was fine. Good flightcrews, friendly, professional staff, both on the ground and in the air, so no problems at all. On our recent flights to Florida through EWR, where it was raining when we landed, somehow the contents of our suitcase got completely watersoaked, although the suitcase was undamaged and appeared not to have been unlocked by the TSA. Didn’t discover this until we arrived at our hotel an hour later, and I called CO to report the problem. Lady I spoke to said to just have our clothes laundered/cleaned and submit the receipts to CO on their website claim form, which we did when we arrived home. After waiting five weeks with no response from CO, I called the CO baggage line to find out what had happened to my claim. Was told the claim was denied as we didn’t return to the airport to show the baggage agents the clothing. I didn’t accept that answer, as we had appointments the evening we arrived and for several days later, so I emailed Larry K’s executive assistant the next day (I had spoken with her a few years earlier to praise CO…and it’s not the lady mentioned in the column above of CO contacts), and she called me the next day to say the claim had in fact been approved much earlier and a check was on the way. Don’t know why I was told it was denied, when it wasn’t. Check arrived this week in full payment and some OnePass miles had been added to my wife’s and my accounts, even prior to my calling and email.
So we’re pleased with CO’s (delayed) response and the outcome, and will fly with them again. Clean planes, good crews, and SOME food even in coach, makes sense for us.

By: Jeff Thompson

Jeff Thompson — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 18:02:29 +0000

Worst customer service in the industry. I would never recommend flying this airline. I travel 3 days a week+, and never have a good experience with Continental if I need to make changes to my reservation. They are just difficult to deal with. Must be a corporate culture to be difficult.

By: barbie45

barbie45 — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 19:06:54 +0000

heather; firstly common sense would tell or a travel agencyor a close friend would tell you never travel with valuables;ALSO YOU NEVER PLACE YOUR PURSE IN AN OVERHEAD BIN; Nor do i believe any flight attendant would open your purse. Your jewlery is hardly going to impress the former first lady; now a large donation to her husbands library might; try forming an organization help Heather;

By: Miss Daisy

Miss Daisy — Tue, 13 Oct 2009 17:53:42 +0000

Urgh! I am so unimpressed with any flight in and out of Newark; JFK or Laguardia and am always always delayed several hours. Customer service is terrible, people are miserable and it doesnt seem to be getting better. Just had to vent. I am quite tired of these delays though; at least tell me that it will be 9 hours from now when I finally get my plane so I could use another form of transportations idiots. Maintenance my ars, sounds to me like you do not have enough passengers for this connection so you will wait another 3 flights to fill it up. I am on to yoU!

By: Heather

Heather — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 20:00:59 +0000

Continental Airlines recently lost a bag of mine filled with irreplaceable possessions. This bag was a carry-on bag –not a checked bag, a carry-on –and was moved without my knowledge or permission from the overhead bin. No one has seen the bag since.

This took place on my way to Rhode Island to attend the graduation ceremonies for members of the Initiative to Educate Afghan Women. The First Lady, Mrs. Bush, was scheduled to be there and so, due to the nature of the events, I had packed some good clothes and jewelry and decided to take everything in one carry-on. A flight attendant helped me place my suitcase in the overhead bin a few rows away from my seat
as the bin above me was taken.

After the plane was taxiing down the runway, I was informed that the Continental staff had moved my bag — supposedly to the lower storage area of the plane. In order to find out whose bag it was, the Continental staff had gone into my suitcase and, from my purse, they got my return ticket and my name! Yet they did not have enough sense to at least give me my purse or to see if I needed anything (such as my medication) or wanted
anything (such as my jewelry) from the bag. Although they knew from my ticket that I had a connecting flight in New Jersey, they still didn’t gate check my bag, which would have allowed me to retrieve it upon exiting the plane at Newark to make my connection to Providence. Instead, they told me that they had checked it all the way through to Providence and handed me a handwritten number. Unsurprisingly, the bag vanished, along with my jewelry.

This is the most bizarre action I’ve ever known an airline to take with respect to a passenger’s carry-on luggage, and may well be the most egregious case of airline carelessness you have heard.

Still, it doesn’t stop here. Now Continental is claiming no responsibility and has retained Fulbright and Jaworski to fight me. They asked for receipts of all items over $100, which I told them I did not have, so –per their request and suggestion — I supplied them with credit card statements and personal letters from the store managers who have records of my purchases. I believed that Continental had agreed to honor this information, but absolutely nothing came of it.

They took entirely unnecessary, unapproved, unilateral action over which I had no control and which directly resulted in the loss of my property. There was nothing I could have done to have prevent this, and now they choose to pay exorbitant legal fees rather than compensate me for the loss they caused.

By: Daniel

Daniel — Wed, 26 Aug 2009 13:47:10 +0000

I got back from one of my international trips with Continental last week and they broke my suitcase in Houston International. This was the second time that happen the same within a year. The first time they only gave me 3000 miles. I couldnt do much. This time I sent an email to everyone in Continental. For my surprise, I got a phone call for the person in charge of the Baggage Office Service for Continental Airline Nation System. He got a message from the CEO asking about my email. He offered me to replace my suitcase or $250 travel certificate. This is the first time that Continental does something like that so fast. I like flying with Continental. I know it has a lot of problems, but the service and perks are much betters than other big airlines. If something like that happen with AA it will take around 2 months to solve it. AA lost my two suitcases on 2003 and they only paid me $1500, but they took two months to do it. It is the customer service culture that mkaes continental a good airline, but there is going to be a problem in somewhere.

Thanks,
Daniel

By: John Heaton

John Heaton — Fri, 24 Jul 2009 18:16:20 +0000

Hi Chris,
Many thanks for the Continental contacts, it all worked out like a charm, they got back to me within 15 minutes of my e.mail and an hour later they contacted me again to advise they had located my lost scroll. Can’t beat that!
Cheers! To you and Martin Hand (of CTA)
All best,
John

By: Roy Hunt

Roy Hunt — Wed, 27 May 2009 15:31:20 +0000

Below is a letter I sent to Larry Kellner back in 12/07. No one from Continental had the courtesy to respond. The letter speaks for itself.

Mr. Larry Kellner 12/18/07
Continental Airlines
1600 Smith Street
Dept HQSEO
Houston, Tx. 77002

Dear Larry,
As an Elite Club member for over 14 years and a President’s Club member for over 20 years I felt compelled to write you this letter concerning my recent experience on a Continental flight from West Palm Beach to Newark N.J. I would never write a letter of complaint on a weather issue but this was not weather related.

On Tuesday 12/11/07 I was booked on a flight from West Palm Beach to Newark. The flight was # 1596 with a scheduled departure of 1:35 PM and an arrival of 4:44 PM. The flight was delayed by 1 ½ hours due to air control in the metropolitan NJ/NY area so we took off at 3:10. The flight was uneventful except for the rudeness of the head stewardess.
1) When we were boarding the plane she continued to tell people to step into their rows and store their bags in the overhead. Some people do this ….some people don’t. At one point she got on the mic and said “ if you people don’t start moving we are going to be here for another 2 hours. If that is want you want just keep fooling around with stowing your bags”
2) While in flight, the video didn’t work. It didn’t work on the way down from Newark either. She came on the mic and said “sorry were are having problems with the video………..deal with it “
20 minutes outside of Newark the pilot advised us that air traffic control had put us in a holding pattern. He also advised us that he only had enough fuel to be in the holding pattern for 10 minutes or we would have to go to a nearby airport to refuel. 10 minutes later he announced we were going back to Richmond to refuel. Richmond was 45 minutes south of where we were. Not Philly, not Washington, Richmond. Why wasn’t the plane properly fueled in West Palm? In the past, I have been in a holding pattern over Newark for 2 hours with a problem but not on this trip.

We landed in Richmond around 6PM. We were told we would refuel and take right back off for Newark. The refuel time, according to the pilot was 45 minutes. We pushed back and taxied to the runway at 7. At 7:30 the pilot came back on and said “ladies and gentlemen I have some bad news. I have been flying since 3AM this morning and I have “timed out” my hours. I can not fly this plane to Newark and we are returning to the Richmond terminal. “ I have been a pilot for Continental for 25 years and this is the first time this has ever happened”. Didn’t this pilot know he was time out when we were refueling?

We arrived back at the gate to mass chaos. Everyone deplaned except first class. They were allowed to stay on the plane and drink and eat snacks. No one from Continental was there to help or give us any info on what was going to happen with this flight. Eventually someone from another airline advised us that a new pilot was being flown from Newark with a new flight crew to fly the plane to Newark. He was supposed to be there at 10;30 and we would be in Newark at 11:30. There were many children and elderly people on the flight to make matters more stressful. The airport in Richmond was closed, and we were not allowed to enter the Applebees on the other side of security to get food or beverage.

The pilot arrived at 11:30. We loaded the plane and then sat at the gate for another hour. We taxied to the runway and sat there for another hour. All during this time no announcements we made as to the status of the flight. We took off at 1:30 and arrived in Newark at 2:30.

To add insult to injury it took 50 minutes for the bags to reach the carousel and the Priority Elite bags came out last.

I have been a Continental customer for years. I was severely inconvienced on this trip and had to cancel all my meetings. I also will have to pay for my pick up service for the 3 times they came to pick me up.

I believe, because of the incompetence of Continental personal I am entitled to a several hundred dollar travel voucher for 12 hours of travel from West Palm to Newark on
12/11.

Best Regards,

Roy Hunt