Delta Air Lines

Thanks to Chris Elliott’s quick reply today to my email asking advice on reinstating Delta SkyMiles. He gave me a link to his fabulous, fact-filled website in general and to his Delta information in particular.

Thanks to Fran Shapiro’s blog entry containing Richard Anderson’s email address, and Greg Ingram’s name.

Thanks to Delta…..within 2 hours of my email to Richard Anderson this morning, his assistant Greg Ingram called me…very, very impressive. Honestly I was amazed and nearly speechless at how quickly he responded. And he had the happy task of telling me the miles were already reinstated.

The rest of the story is that those miles were reinstated a few days after I faxed SkyMiles Customer Service Center a polite, factual letter August 20th…but they didn’t notify me so I’ve assumed these last 11 weeks that Delta was ignoring me, and got myself stirred up this morning to write the emails to Richard Anderson, Lee Macenczak and Daiquiri Gleaves.

I was a loyal Delta customer when I lived in Atlanta and flew on business frequently. Now that I live elsewhere and am retired I do not have the same opportunities. But I have a large network of friends and former business colleagues who will all hear again and again how Delta resolved my issue promptly and to my satisfaction. I will go out of my way to make certain everyone I can reach knows how happy I am with Delta. And how to find Elliott.org…..

Linda R,

It would be interesting to hear of the respoution of this snafu. THX GDZ

Want a pretty good idea of how Delta works? Here’s a story.

Last weekend, I was in Austin for South by Southwest. I had two friends coming into town. One of them was planning on flying from Philly to JFK (#5200), then to Austin. The other was flying direct from JFK to Austin (#5202).

Flight 5200 to JFK was delayed because, according to Delta, they “overfueled” the plane. I’ve never heard of such a thing.

Flight 5202 to Austin was delayed because, after taxiing to the runway, they realized they didn’t have enough fuel. The flight had to stop in Knoxville, TN for fuel, and was delayed over an hour.

My friend from Philly missed his connection and never made it to Austin. Delta gave him a full refund, but he was stranded in NYC and had to figure out how to get home on his own.

My other friend made it; but her return flight on Sunday afternoon was canceled. Delta told her that the best they could do was get her out TUESDAY morning. Plus, since the reason for cancellation was “weather,” they couldn’t put her on a codeshare or partner airline’s flight. She had to end up getting a one-way ticket on JetBlue, which worked fine.

Moreover, she bought her ticket using miles – and Delta wasn’t going to refund ANY of the miles, originally. I got on the phone and talked them into refunding half of the miles she used to book her flight.

Lesson learned: DO NOT FLY DELTA. Contrary to what I’ve read on this website, their customer service has not improved since emerging from bankruptcy; the whole “change is…” ad campaign is a farce. I’d rather have dependable, clean travel than a martini. But that’s just my opinion.

And just FYI, I’d recommend Continental Airlines. They have one of the youngest jet fleets, clean planes, and professional staff.

I stopped flying Delta about 4 yrs ago because of the incredibly bad customer service. Yesterday, i had a flight cancelled on NW and was forced to fly Delta from Raleigh/Durham to Gulfport/Biloxi. Wow!! Nothing has changed. The flight was late leaving, toilets did not work, flight attendant was rude and they lost my bag. To make matters worse, I was told my bag would be delivered by 10:00 a m the next morning, then by 3:00 pm, then within 12 hrs of 4:00 pm. When I called Delta I spoke to a “Baggage Floor Mgr” named Lona who informed me in no uncertain terms that Delta has 12 hrs to deliver bags and the 12 hrs does not begin to run until the bags are handed over to the courier service. So, according to Lona, Delta could keep the bags for 3 or 4 days if they so desired. Lona then hung up abruptly. No, the same old Delta is still there!!! I don’t think I have ever seen any business that is as customer hostile as Delta–and people know it. In my opinion, the best thing that could happen is for Delta to be taken over by another airline or file a Chapter 7 liquidation. The irony is that no one at Delta even cares. I fly maybe once every 3 weeks but it is always first class and many times international. Last yr alone Delta probably lost about 150k just off me. But, hey, they don’t care!!!!!

There are times in working for an airline that there are service failures. And I know how very frustrating things can become. I believe overseas agents should be off the phones soon. Also I field customer complaints all day and try to make things work. It is hard on people to make travel plans and then have something go wrong. I have talked to customers traveling on emergency travel, military or government, minors, weddings, funerals, court hearings, people who put their elderly parents or grandparents on flights that needed to be accompanied, business and vacation travelers just to name a few. And at times there are service failures that cannot be fixed. For that I am sorry. Delta is a great airline and I am proud to work for them. These are personal comments only.

Delta gave me voucher for a July 2007 flight to Toronto that I could not take because my passport failed to arrive. I asked the Delta representative twice how long the voucher was good for: “Tthe voucher is good until the 7th month of 2008.”

Tried to use the voucher May 6, 2008 to book a flight. The Delta representative stated that the voucher had expired, is not availible, end of discussion.

Basically stealing money. I’m done with Delta. Scott Huber

So What was the link to Delta Airlines to contact them and get my SkyMiles re-instated. (Exp Jan 2008), despite having partner (hotel, auto rental) activity the past year.

It’s a shame that Greg Ingram doesn’t seem to be employed by Delta anymore, as I’m receiving an error from the Delta postmaster.

This is an automatically generated Delivery Status Notification.

Delivery to the following recipients failed.

Greg.Ingram@delta.com

Final-Recipient: rfc822;Greg.Ingram@delta.com
Action: failed
Status: 5.7.1
X-Display-Name: Ingram, Greg

I’d love to know who took his place!

Hey there!
I just wanted to thank you for posting this info. You are a life saver… I emailed the following:
I sent the following email to Delta. I tried normal channels first and they failed so I decided to email the CEO’s etc…. customer-care@delta.com, daiquiri.gleaves@delta.com,
lee.macenczak@delta.com, richard.anderson@delta.com . If you have an issue with Delta, email the dudes above.
Hello,

I am writing to inform you of a horrible experience flying Delta and their respective operators. I wish to preface this email by saying I fully prepared myself for numerous mistakes Delta and their operators make during the holidays. This, I am not upset about. However, what I am upset about is how it was handled by customer service.
My company has Delta as one of their clients and surely Delta would even hold us to higher standards than what I received from Delta this past week so it’s only fair I can expect the same in return.

Here is how it all started:

My co-worker Chris C. raves about how awesome Delta is and how well they treat her. So much so that she insist that I sign up for a miles card and come out and visit her in Cincy via Delta Air. I honored her request. The flight out was fine but the flight back was horrible. Here is my story:

6:05pm 12/22/08 EST I arrive @ Cincinnati airport to board Delta flt 6059 only to find it was canceled due to “Lack of staff” as the lady at the counter put it. NOT DUE TO WEATHER.
She instructs us to go to Customer Service between Gates 5-6 only to find out they are not there.
7:20pm 12/22/08 EST I finally get a nice woman on the phone with customer service, after 10mins of hold, she tells me I can leave that night into Atlanta and depart in the morning for Raleigh. I accept. She puts me on Delta flt 1713.
9:15pm 12/22/08 EST approx I arrive in Atlanta where I have to pay $119.00 for a room at the Westin.
5:50am 12/23/08 EST I wake up, get ready, and board a shuttle back to the airport. I am nervous at this point because you/Delta still has my luggage so I ask a nice lady at the airport who is employed by Delta, “I was rescheduled last night, they said my luggage would be on my flight this morning. Is that true?”. She responds with, “Sir, if they told you your luggage would be on that flight, then it will be”. I left with huge doubts.
9:10am 12/23/08 EST I arrive in Raleigh NC, I bypass baggage claim and go to to lost luggage and explain my situation and they tell me my luggage is in Knoxville TN(Read= I already know Delta messed up). The lady rolled her eyes in embarrasment and gave me a claim # of RDUDL27382.
5:21pm 12/24/08 EST I decide to check on my lost luggage online @ http://www.delta.com/baggage and am told it would be delivered today between 11:30PM(READ PM) and 11:30am(Read AM) today. However, your website says you only deliver up to 10pm to residential addresses. Does this make sense to you?
This is what I have a problem with:
I incurred $119 in hotel expenses due to something beyond my control(READ- LACK OF STAFF as stated by Delta).
I incurred another $40 to have my dog stay an extra night at the boarding establishment.

So in closing, see below for the correspondence with your customer service associate. While I found it quite clever, it never addressed the issue. I hope you can make everything right by my friend Chris and I.

Sincerely,

Joel Bazonski

PS: My baggage is still missing.

——————-
I will keep everyone posted.

January 3, 2009

Losing one’s luggage is always a hassle, but when the luggage gets lost when a family is traveling to a funeral, it’s particularly distressing.
My mother passed away on December 20th, 2008 (see enclosed obituary). Our family—Peter and Maureen (parents) and four children: Andrew, Grace, Claire and Sam—left for Rancho Mirage, California, the day after Christmas. We weren’t scheduled to arrive until late in the evening and had to be at the church by 10 a.m. Needless to say, when our luggage didn’t arrive at the Ontario airport, we quickly realized that there was no time to purchase anything. (Remember: we were traveling to attend the funeral of a beloved mother and grandmother; this was not a vacation). Fortunately, our hotel provided us with toiletries, but our casual clothing was wrinkled and malodorous from our travels. Several of us had on jeans and sneakers; others had spilled something on their shirt or pants. We certainly were not in proper attire or state of cleanliness to attend my mother’s funeral. All of the children played a part in the service, and had to walk to the altar in their grubby travel clothing. It certainly wasn’t the end of the world, but it was a tremendous inconvenience.
We still did not have our bags that afternoon, so I made a trip to Target to buy essential clothing. I also arranged for a few prescriptions to be transferred to a local CVS, and purchased toiletries and the like. The following day, three bags arrived at our hotel. Countless calls to the Delta baggage claim number yielded nothing: we were put on hold for an interminable amount of time or told to check the website. When we did check, only five of the six bags were listed as having been located; one bag was nowhere to be found and the claim number wasn’t even listed.
We’re now on day three of our trip. My daughter, Claire and I were muddling through family events, dinners, etc. with what clothing we had. (Both of our bags were filled with numerous Christmas items: jeans, sweaters, pajamas, lingerie. We were looking forward to wearing our new clothes, given the solemnity of the occasion.) We were increasingly frustrated with our inability to contact someone at Delta. We finally got in touch with a very kind woman at the Ontario Airport who said she’d do her best to locate our luggage. One more bag arrived that evening; we were now down to two missing suitcases.
It’s day four and we are leaving early the next morning. Claire and I were still wearing our Target purchases and recycling the other clothing we had. Claire was particularly upset because she received some great items as gifts and they were now lost, along with her orthodontic retainer and my dental mouth guard, two items that would take several weeks to replace.
We are now home and working to recall all the items we lost. Some are irreplaceable (the antique linens and photographs) while others are no longer available in stores. I realize that what we lost is just “stuff”, but it’s our “stuff” and we lost it at a time of grief and worry. The loss of my mother is far more significant to me than the loss of my clothing. But I will forever associate the following events: My mother died and Delta lost our luggage.

My case….I have not yet received response:

January 13, 2009

Mr. Richard H. Anderson
Chief Executive Officer
DELTA AIR LINES, INC.
1030 DELTA BOULEVARD
ATLANTA, GA 30320-6001

Dear Mr. Anderson,

On September 2008, I purchased two round-trip airline tickets to fly
with your company from Monterrey, Mexico to Madrid, Spain (via
Atlanta, GA) on December 26, 2008, and back, on January 11, 2009, for
me and my wife’s christmas vacations.

On Dec. 26, 2008, we arrived at Monterrey’s airport 3 hours in
advance, to avoid any problem with the check-in; and this is when the
nightmare began.

The plane had a 2 hour-delay, eventhough both Atlanta’s and
Monterrey’s weather conditions were ordinary. We left Monterrey at
approximately 15:50 hours, instead of the original time, which was
13:00 hours. This delay caused us to lose our connection to Madrid.
Just like us, many other Delta clients lost their connections in
Atlanta, all due to the obvious lack of organization of your company,
since we verified that other airlines were not having the same problem
(i.e. American Airlines).

Once we lost the plane, we unsuccesfully tried to contact a Delta
agent, both personally at the airport and through the 1-800 telephone
line. We lost almost 4 hours in a line of about 50 people, where there
was only one person attending all the affected customers (needless to
say that the line did not advance during all 4 hours). After finally
contacting an operator by phone (after hours of trying), she informed
us that we were booked for the next day flight, but that we had lost
the seats we were assigned since our purchase three months back.
Additionally, we had to spend US$70 dlls. for an hotel at Atlanta. The
next day, we had to stay another 5 hours in line in order to get our
new boarding passes. As we stood in line watching the mess, people
were losing their flights all over again. Thankfully, we took
precautions and arrived at the airport at 9:00 hours, eventhough our
plane left at 18:30 hours. After spending all day at the airport, we
finally flew to Madrid, but we lost a full day of our vacation, as
well as $120 Euros corresponding to the night we lost at Madrid’s
hotel.

During our stay in Europe, we flew with Vueling and Spanair (within
Europe), and, although the weather conditions were terrible, we had no
major delays of our flights. This made us realize the poor quality of
Delta’s service.

On January 11, 2009, at the Barajas airport in Madrid,we had to stand
in line, all over again, for up to one and a half hours to check-in
for our Delta flight back home. Looking around other stands at
Barajas, we clearly noticed that no other airline had the same
organization problem as Delta. Once in Atlanta, our plane to Monterrey
- again – was delayed for two hours and a half, and I must add that
there was not a cloud in the sky in Atlanta. In the meantime, no one
was able to inform us about the cause of the delay. We finally arrived
home at 23:00 hours, instead of the promised 21:00 hours. The balance
of our trip was almost 29 hours lost either waiting in line or at a
terminal, due to unnecessary delays, and more than $250 dollars spent
all due to your company’s fault, and nobody even offered an apology,
much less an offer to reimburse the losses and damages it caused.

I am sorry to inform you that our instant reaction when our friends
and family ask us about our trip is: “NEVER fly with Delta”. We made
this mistake once, but surely will not make it again. We feel cheated
and impotent. Eventhough we have considered legal action, for now, our
only defense is to tell as many people as we can: “NEVER fly with
Delta”. As CEO, I thought maybe you should know the feeling of a
regular client of Delta, since surely you will never have these
problems.

Sincerely,

Marcelo Vallecillo

I just wanted to thank everyone for their helpful posts. After a horrible experience at the Delta counter at Bradley International in Hartford that caused us to miss our flight the day before Christmas Eve due to an understaffed counter and one extremely rude employee, we tried several things including contacting customer service and the Better Business Bureau. After that got us nowhere I did an internet search and stumbled across this website and your helpful posts. We wrote a short and to the point letter and emailed it to the CEO, copying all executives that were suggested in the comments. We did this this morning and this afternoon Diane Russell called my husband and sent us email vouchers good for $400 each, which coveres the cost our our roundtrip flight. I can only hope that they will run the Delta counter at BDL more smoothly when we use the vouchers.

I had hopes, when I first read a good comment about Greg Ingram in your blog, that I might be able to contact an individual who actually had Mr. Anderson’s attention. Upon scrolling down the pages, however, I learned that he apparently no longer fills this capacity. Do you know the email of a currently reliable contact that high up?
Alan

I received a form letter reply to my e-mail below. I will be following up with the info above. Thanks!

I am writing in regard to my travel on Delta airlines on 4-3-09. There
are several issues that I
need resolved.
1. We were scheduled to depart from Pittsburgh on the 6am flight to JFK.
This flight was delayed
due to crew scheduling errors. The gate attendant, who was working from
another gate and
coming over to ours to update us, announced on the loud speaker that the
plane was delayed
because we were waiting for the fight attendants to arrive. He then went
on the explain that he
was unable to get in touch with them on their cell phones and went as
far as to call their hotel
rooms to try to “wake them up”.
2. At this time (currently 5 minutes past take off time) I approached
the gate agent and told him
that we had a tight connection and asked if I could rebook on a later
flight so I could be sure I
would not miss it. The gate agent then told me to “sit down” that he was
working on getting
someone to crew the plane and we were only 5 minutes late and all
connections would be fine. I
said I did not think ours would be okay and he told me that I was being
ridiculous and not to freak
out so soon.
3. The flight crew showed up and we departed to arrive over 45 minutes
late. My connection to
Miami had already departed so I immediately went to the customer service
desk to rebook. I saw
that there was a flight around 10:20am that I would easily be able to
make. I asked the customer
service rep if we could get on that flight and he said it was completely
booked and the standby
line was too long. He then told me that the earliest I could possibly
get to Miami was 11:30 pm
that night through a connection in Atlanta. That was a full 12 hours
later than originally
scheduled. I did not know at the time but there were several other
options available that were
available that were not offered, including a direct flight to Miami.
4. I checked the customer service desk every 2 hours as they suggested
and was never offered
another flight.
5. At this point the weather in the airport became foggy and flights
were being delayed. The
flight we were supposed to be on to Atlanta was delayed and I was sure
we would miss our
connection. I attempted to go to our gate to speak with an agent but no
one was anywhere to be
seen.
6. I then traveled to the gate 11 customer service counter and witnessed
the worst example of
customer service I have ever seen. The woman behind the counter looked
at the line and yelled at
one of the passengers that she would not help her here and she had to go
to the gate as she had
told her before. The customer in line tried to explain that she had
gone to the gate and they sent
her back to customer service. The agent did not believe this and there
was a large confrontation
that included the gate agent yelling into the face of this woman.
7. It was finally my turn in line and the woman asked us to tell her
what was happening. In the
middle of my explanation 2 Delta flight attendants walked up and the
agent walked away from me
to talk to them in the middle of our conversation. She then began
yelling at another customer. I
realized this was going nowhere and the flight I wanted to catch was
leaving in 30 minutes so I
left and decided to call customer service instead.
8. I spoke to an employee on the customer service line who then told me
the Atlanta flight was
delayed even longer and there was no way I would make the connection and
there was no other
flight that night. I could be booked on a flight the next morning but
that was all he could do.
After I explained the entire ordeal and the point that we were delayed
due to circumstances that
were in Deltas control he offered me $100 vouchers. Unfortunately
compensation does not even
come close to covering the expense of the hotel and the loss of
vacation. He eventually found 2
seats that had opened up on the direct flight that was to leave around
6:30pm. We were booked
on that flight and went on our way.
9. After arriving at the gate we were then informed that the flight had
been delayed and would
be taking off closer to 10 pm. We were just happy to get out and took a
seat to wait.
10. The flight was then cancelled. We went to customer service once
again to try to rectify the
situation. After waiting 45 minutes we approached agent Quigly and once
again explained the
situation. As he was going through the system he said he could not
confirm what happened in
Pittsburgh because it was not put into the system yet. Of coarse it is
to Delta’s advantage that the
information not be filed. He then went over the record of what we had
been booked on all day and
saw that there were several chances for us to be on earlier flights that
had been overlooked.
11. Because of the weather delays and all the customers trying to get to
Florida he said there was
no way he could get us there before Sunday late afternoon and since we
were flying back Monday
it did not make sense. I was completely shocked that because of a Delta
error we would not be
able to get to Florida within 2 days! After trying every possible
solution we asked to speak to a
supervisor and were told one would be down in a moment to speak with us.
12. We waited approximately 45 minutes without anyone coming to speak
to us. At that point I
pulled aside a woman who looked like she was in charge. She was not a
supervisor but after I
explained our situation she found a supervisor for us to speak to.
13. We were told to speak to Supervisor Norman. We approached him and
began telling him our
situation when he stopped us and told us we had already talked to a
supervisor and he was not
going to be able to help us because we already spoke to someone. We
explained over and over
that we had not and finally convinced him that though we were waiting
for 45 minutes to speak to
someone no one ever came down. He then decided he would try to help us.
14. Again he poured over the list of the changes we had gone through
that day and kept asking
us questions like “why were you given a voucher” and “why is there no
record of what happened in
Pittsburgh”. He then told us that because it was weather related he
could not do anything. We
explained that our specific situation was not weather related. I think
he finally got the ridiculous
situation at that point. He told us he just had to be sure because it
would require a lot of
paperwork for him at the end of the night! Norman then went on the hunt
to find us a flight.
Eventually he was able to book us on a 8:15 flight the next day (the
exact flight we should have
been on 24 hours earlier). By this time it was very late and Norman
asked what we were going to
be doing that night. He said because of the weather they did not have
any rooms to offer us but
that he would keep trying and let us know.
15. Norman found us and told us he had a room for us at the Hampton Inn
JFK. He gave us the
room voucher and told us where to go to catch the hotel shuttle. We
boarded the train to the
shuttle and were happy that we would get some sleep so the second day of
our vacation would not
be ruined. Upon arriving at the shuttles we called the hotel to request
they pick us up. They told
us we did not have a room, Delta had used all their rooms and they kept
sending people there that
were being turned away. I asked if we could book a room to pay for it
ourselves but he said they
were totally booked. We called each hotel in the area with the same
result. Defeated we headed
back to the airport.
16. By this time the airport was closed and we were unable to get in
anywhere but baggage claim.
We went to the office and explained what had happened and asked if there
was anyway we could
speak with Norman or anyone who could help resolve the situation. The
Delta employees at
baggage said they could not help us and we would have to wait for the
ticket counters to open. We
realized we would be stuck in baggage until 4:30 am when the counters
opened and decided we
would try to sleep there. We asked for any kind of blanket or pillow and
were told they were
unable to help us because they only dealt with baggage. The doors in
baggage claim were
partially open the entire night causing it to be freezing in the room.
At 4:30 we left to go upstairs
and wait for our flight.

As you can see in the 16 points above we encountered horrible service
every step of the way. From
the gate attendant in Pittsburgh who refused to help us to the
supervisor in JFK who did not want
to speak to us so he could avoid paperwork. These gross examples of
incompetence caused us to
miss a full day of our trip and left us exhausted for the the remaining
days. We wish we could
have been more concise in this letter but we feel that all of these
points needed to be addressed.
We will be awaiting your reply letting me know your plans to resolve
these situations.

December 19th and 21st, 2008, I flew from Orlando, Fl. to Cincinnati, Oh for a connection flight to Scranton, Pa. Since I am a member of Ax Delta Sky Miles, I paid part of the trip with Ax and 25,000 ff miles. Since the flights to Scranton, Wilkes Barre were cancelled on both days due to inclement weather, I had to fly back to Orlando both times. I finally cancelled the flight as I did not want to
repeat the same scenario. I was told by the agent in Cincinnati, my miles would be reinstated. I started calling on January 12, and spoke to various supervisors, agents, sent e-mails, wrote to VP of the Sky Miles Department still to no avail.
One agent told me since I had flown from Orlando to Cincinnati, I would only get half my miles reinstated. I finally wrote to Chrisopher Elliott and sent e-mails to the addresses he gave me. It is now May 19th. Let’s see if anyone answers as it does not seem customer serivice is non existant with Delta.

try this one Larissa….lee.a.macenczak@delta.com)

I’m pretty sure Lee Macenczak is no longer with Delta.

Delta sucks, plain and simple. Worst airline in U.S. history.

Thanks for the useful information on your site! My family just traveled with Delta airlines and had issues with flights being cancelled. I used the customer-care and beth.reed emails to send my complaint and received a response in less than 24 hours where they offered us travel vouchers. I’m very pleased!!

email sent below, hoping to recieve an answer hopefully! stay tuned!

Dear Beth,

Back on the 1st March 2009 we flew Delta Airlines from Orlando to Las Vegas, myself, my wife and our 2 yr old. We travelled all the way from Australia to visit. During this flight our baggage was lost and has since never been recovered. When arriving back in Australia we contacted Delta to start the process of reimbursement for our lost baggage. Below is timeline of trying to get reimbursement :

14th March 2009 – Delta advises us you do not have a representative in Australia, we need to fill out appropriate forms and send via mail to Corporate Customer Care-Baggage in Atlanta, Georgia.

15th April 2009 – After initially putting in a claim to our travel insurance company, they advised we need to go through Delta Airlines direct, all paperwork is completed and sent via mail to Atlanta, Georgia.

14th May 2009 – We sent email to Delta asking how our claim was progressing and to see if they you had received this via mail and in the system.

15th May 2009 – Received email reply stating that at this time, this office cannot confirm receipt of your claim form. If you sent your claim via U.S. Mail, we would not acknowledge receipt of the claim form until the claim is assigned to a Claims Manager. We are currently working on all claims received on or before March 20, 2009.

23rd June 2009 – We sent another email to Delta again asking if you had received our claim as we have not received any notification at all that it has been recieved (this is now 4 months since losing our luggage!).

June 24th 2009 – We actually received a letter in the post (dated 9th June 2009) from Delta stating that the claim had been received and processed and that I would be receiving a check by mail in a seperate posting.

6th July 2009 – Received email reply from Delta (reply to our email on 23rd June 2009), stating that our claim form was received in your office on April 27,2009. We have documented your concerns regarding the delay.

30th July 2009 – We sent another email to Delta following up on this claim (now 5 months since our luggage was lost!), stating that we received your letter back in June which mentioned we would be receiving a check by mail in a separate posting (this is now 2 months since we received this letter!).

7th August 2009 – Received email reply from Delta (in reply to our email on 30th July 2009), stating, I apologize for the delay in receiving your check.I will forward your e-mail to the Claims Manager who processed your claim so that we can verify the status of your payment.

12th August 2009 – We sent another email following up on this claim (now nearly 6 months since our luggage was lost and over 2 months since receiving a letter from Delta stating that a compensation cheque will be sent via mail!!).

It was unfortunate that our luggage was lost with your airline and there was a number of sentimental items in the lost luggage as well as thousands of dollars worth of luggage, and this was a massive inconvenience at the time as we were on the other side of the world without any luggage, clothes, etc!!

We travel annually to the United States and with your recent introduction of your airlines commencing flights into the Pacific route (Australia – USA), we have welcomed increased competition to Qantas, which we have used on every trip to the United States, as well as being a member of their Frequent Flyer Club. Looking at booking our next annual trip to USA and with the competitive prices Delta has offered, we were looking at becoming a member of your frequent flyer program and book our next trip on Delta to USA. With the poor customer service and communication we have experience to date, flying with your airline has become a very distant option and I will certainly convene this service to the Australian public and friends of this.

Looking forward to hearing from you

All relevant communication history is listed below.

Letter I wrote to Delta below. They have not resolved this issue with me. Offered a $125 voucher for future travels… ridiculous. I am filing a lawsuit and I have made a claim with the BBB.

My wife and I have been dreaming of going to Australia for years.
However, we always felt that with our busy schedules and time constraints, the country was out of reach. After much deliberation, we finally decided, this year, to take the plunge and go on that trip of a lifetime that we’d always dreamt of. We trusted Delta Airlines to provide our transportation and make the long, arduous voyage as painless and trouble free as possible. It appears that we misplaced our trust.
I can’t emphasize enough how important this trip was for us. We had wanted to come here (yes, here, because I am writing this letter from our hotel [The Intercontinental in Sydney] for years. We dreaded the 24 hour travel time, but figured, we’ll suck it up and do what we have to do to visit this wonderful city. My wife and I love to travel and we’ve been all over the world. As a matter of fact, our goal is to visit every continent and this trip was intended to cover one of the remaining two on our list.
We arrived at Miami Int’l Airport, on Friday afternoon, 2 hours before our 5:17pm departure time, with great expectations. The flight was on time and things were looking great. After boarding, the plane took a little extra time to take off but we were still on pace to make it for our connecting flight in Atlanta. Although we arrived on time, there was a terrible amount of congestion in the runway and we waited anxiously as we watched the minutes tick closer to our next departure time while the plane taxied on the ground. They switched our gate twice and when we finally got off the plane, we were just 15 minutes from our next departure time. My wife and I had to literally run across the airport to our terminal just barely making the flight. When we got to the gate we asked the lady if we had any time to grab a quick bite to eat because we had not had a chance to get anything before our previous flight and the flight to LA did not serve any meals despite the nearly 5 hour travel time. She explained that we were already late and had to go inside or she would close the doors.
We got on the plane, a little hungry but happy to have caught the plane.
However, we taxied for an extra 30 minutes because we couldn’t get the plane off the runway for some reason. After several apologies from the captain, we were off to LA. It wasn’t exactly a comfortable flight. We were starving and anxious about the delay because we knew that if we missed the connection in LAX, we would probably miss a day in Sydney.
The plane made up a good amount of time in the air and we purchased a couple of snack boxes to hold us off till later. We landed just a little late and my wife and I thought everything would be ok, but we did not have much time to celebrate. Unbelievably, once again, our plane could not let us out for some reason and we taxied for almost 40 minutes. And again, when we got off the plane, my wife and I had to sprint to the next gate, unable to get anything to eat this time either.
When we got to the departure gate, it turns out they had changed that too, so we had to run to another gate. After one of the most stressful flight combinations that we have ever experienced, we were finally on the plane to Sydney. Now we were really starving, but at least there would be some meals served on this flight. We let out a sigh of relief and were thankful to have made all the connections. I said to my wife, “I just hope the bags made it on the flight.” And boy, were my fears justified.
We arrived in Sydney at approximately 7:30am, Sunday morning, just 36 minutes late. No big deal. We were happy to be here, but we had a bad feeling about our luggage. Sure enough, our bags did not make it on the flight. We tried to resolve the issue with some of the lost baggage personnel, but were not getting anywhere. They were rude and treated us like this happens all the time and we just have to deal with it. BOTH BAGS! We had nothing. We had only carried on our laptop. Here we are, half way around the world, on what is supposed to be the trip of a lifetime for us and we have nothing to wear. We would find out soon enough that things could only get worse.
The baggage attendant explained to us that the bags had been rerouted to Honolulu and that they would not be arriving in Sydney till 10pm that night. We would not be getting our bags till the next day, Monday at around 12pm. It was all very disappointing. We had every day in Sydney
booked with activities and had everything planned out perfectly.
Without our clothes or essentials, things would become much more difficult. They took down our information and explained to us that the bags would be sent to our hotel, by courier.
When we booked our trip, we were excited about our early, 6:45am arrival on a Sunday morning in Sydney because that meant we would be able to enjoy the beach all day. Without our luggage, we still headed out to Manly beach, but of course, we did not have bathing suits. We spent the day there and had a relatively good time, but were disappointed that we were unable to enjoy the beach as planned. We had a reservation for one of Sydney’s finest restaurants, for that evening. Unfortunately, without the proper evening wear, we had to cancel and instead, ended up eating some very ordinary Chinese food.
Monday morning, we woke up, eager to get our trip going, anticipating that our luggage would arrive at around noon, as promised. With that in mind, we decided to stick around our hotel and enjoy some activities nearby, with the intention of going back to the room at midday and finally being able to change from the clothes that we had been wearing since Friday. To our utter dismay, when we arrived back at the hotel, we found out that our suitcases were still missing and there was absolutely no contact at all from Delta. I then went on a mission to get someone from your airline on the phone. I had the concierge calling every number they could find and I was doing everything I could from my room, but neither of us could speak to a human being at your lost baggage department. I spent hours trying to get this issue resolved and even took a moment to physically go to what I was told was a Delta office, nearby, only to find that you had moved 4 months ago. Now, is this a way for my wife and I to be spending our vacation???
Finally, after three hours of effort, the concierge was able to get someone on the phone for me and I spent about an hour going back and forth with them, trying to figure out what happened to our suitcases.
Finally, I received an explanation and it was certainly not what I wanted to hear. It turns out that once again, your flight had been delayed, only this time, it was the plane carrying our luggage to Honolulu. Because of the delay, it arrived after the departure time for the connecting Sydney flight. Meaning, my luggage stayed in Honolulu and was never put on a plane. The representative on the phone explained to me that not only were my bags still in Hawaii, but they hadn’t done anything about it, to that point and it wasn’t until she finally spoke to someone there that they decided to put the bags on the next flight BACK TO LA, after letting them sit there for over 24 hours.
I had my wife in tears. The trip of a lifetime had become a nightmare for the ages. Our bags were scheduled to arrive Wednesday afternoon.
After a hundred apologies, the representative advised that we should go shopping for some clothes and that we would get an allowance of only $150. What are we supposed to buy with $150? Sydney is one of the most expensive cities in the world! You cannot purchase a t-shirt for less than $100. What are we supposed to do about shoes? I’m not trying to sound like a snob or anything, but we don’t exactly shop at Kmart ok?
When we travel, we stay at the best hotels, we dine in the best restaurants and we fill our suitcases with the best of everything.
Ferragamo, Prada, Giuseppie Zanotti, Hugo Boss, True Religion, Gucci, etc… $300 jeans. $900 shoes. I mean, what the heck are we supposed to do with $150? And if you’ve been to Sydney, you know that as much as we spend on this stuff in the states, we’d have to spend double or even triple here. So am I supposed to buy a bunch of junk that I will never use again because of your negligence?
So after spending the morning near the hotel in anticipation of our lost luggage and wasting our entire afternoon trying to figure out what happened to our bags, we had to go find some replacement clothes for the next two days. The shopping experience was a bitter one indeed, as neither of us could justify spending $518 on a pair of True Religion jeans that my wife already had (and paid only $250 in the states). Or buying a cheap pair of replacement jeans that she will never wear again, only to find that those were $250 as well, when in the states they
wouldn’t even be a hundred bucks. We couldn’t justify spending
thousands of dollars on buying shoes and a dress or a sports jacket for our dinner reservation that evening, when we’ve got all we needed in our suitcase and we know that we won’t be compensated for it by the airline.
Do you understand the predicament you have put us in? My wife picked
up some of the least expensive shoes she could find at $150 and a t-shirt, also the cheapest she could find to be wearable, for $50. I bought the two least expensive pairs of underwear and two undershirts for $90. We were so overwhelmed and exhausted after hours of looking for something that made sense, that we just went back to the hotel, cancelled the reservation, once again, ordered room service and stayed in for the night.
The next morning, Tuesday, we were washing socks and underwear in the bathroom sink. This is what our vacation came down to. Scrubbing socks on the sink at a 5 star hotel that we paid an arm and a leg for. I know you might be thinking, “Well, why don’t you just go buy some cheap shirts and pants at a cheap store to wear until your luggage arrived?”
Because that’s not what we came here to Sydney to do!!!! The places we go to have dress codes. We’re here to enjoy this city to the utmost capacity. We did not fly half way around the world to hold off on a couple of cheap T’s till our bags arrived. But here we are, doing just that. We booked a cheesy tour early in the morning and spent the entire day site seeing in, wearing our new T-shirts and the same pants we had been wearing every single day for 5 days straight. We had an OK time, again, not what we came to Sydney to do. By the time we arrived back at the hotel, our feet were killing us. We had been walking around since last Friday on the same shoes, and they were not the most comfortable—our sneakers are in our suitcases.
Although my wife and I are handling the situation as best we can, everybody has a breaking point. That night, when trying to figure out what to do for dinner, since we had to cancel our reservations once again for lack of proper attire, we finally got in an argument. The stresses of a situation such as this can weigh heavily on a couple. The night was over. Hopefully, Wednesday will be a better day.
Today is Wednesday, and we expect our bags to arrive at our hotel this afternoon. We are going on a wine tour, wearing some of the same clothes, once again and we won’t be back till approximately 6pm. The anxiety that we are feeling at this point is immense. If we return to our room at that time and find that our bags have not arrived, I don’t know what I’m going to do. It has been very painful to look my wife in the eyes and see her disappointment all trip long. I do not wish that upon anyone. But till then, we are going to try to enjoy our day and hope that we will have our luggage for the remaining 3 days of our trip.
I don’t know what kind of compensation you hope to offer us, but I spoke to reservations yesterday and explained this whole situation to them. I told them that the least they could do is put us on a comfortable ride back home and upgrade us to business class. I felt this was a reasonable request, considering that you will give upgrades to other passengers for one reason or another and under these extenuating circumstances, well, I don’t think I was asking for too much.
Unfortunately the supervisor on the phone did not see it this way. She offered us an insulting $25 voucher for use on our next flight. I’m going to assume that whoever is reading this has some kind of sense and that I don’t have to explain how this feels like a slap in the face.
Again, I am writing this email from my hotel room and the ordeal is not over yet. I am hoping that everything is being done to assure that there will be no further delays. And I pray that I don’t have to see that disappointed look in my wife’s eyes when we arrive back in our 5 star hotel, with our smelly, worn clothes, after a long day of anticipation to find that, once again, Delta has dropped the ball on our vacation of a lifetime. I know that this is not the end of this story and I will not rest until my wife and I get the satisfaction of just compensation for this travesty.
I’m sure you are aware, because you live in the same world as I, that every day is a struggle. Whether it’s the phone company, the internet, cable, healthcare, bills, one thing or the other, there is always a battle to be fought and those are the stresses of life that we try to get away from when we take a vacation. This vacation for us was a much needed holiday and it has been wasted on the same battles that we endure in our everyday lives. We trusted your company with our escape and you failed us miserably.

UPDATE: It is 5:30pm on Wednesday. Our bags are here. We went through the entire wine tour anxious about our bags. Thankfully, they have arrived… half way into our vacation. Looking forward to hearing back from Delta and finding out how you will handle this situation.

Regards,

Adrian Sanchez
UPDATE: It’s been a long trip. 24 hour total travel time. When we arrived in LA, we went through customs, picked up our luggage and had to check it back in. When checking them in, the Delta employee told me to just leave them in a pile with the other luggage and that the bags would be put on the flight to Atlanta and then Miami. I explained to her what had happened to us and I wanted to make sure that it didn’t happen again. She told me I had nothing to worry about. When we arrived in Miami at 9:30pm, we were exhausted. This had been a long trip and Delta had not made it any easier on us. We were glad it was over…. But actually, it was not. As my wife and I waited for our luggage to come out on the carousel, we couldn’t wait to get home. 3 of our bags made it this time. But the fourth was nowhere to be found. I could not believe this could happen to us again. We had to get in line at the lost baggage claim and didn’t get out of the airport till almost 2 hours after we landed. Are you kidding me? Our new claim number is MIADL43803. To this moment, I have yet to receive my last piece of luggage.

As for our compensation, I understand that Delta requires us to keep receipts for our unnecessary expenses. You will understand, however, that there are a number of variables that affect this process. Number one being, there were many times that we simply did not buy things and chose to take on the hardship of, i.e. wearing the same clothes for 3 days straight or cancelling reservations during our trip, simply because we preferred this option over buying things and spending a lot of money with the very real possibility that Delta might not cover our expenses.
Especially, considering that your policy is supposedly to cover only a ridiculous $25/day. Secondly, we often had to purchase things at the city market, where there were no receipts . This was a better option for us than spending double or triple for things we really did not need at the local shopping malls. Finally, the stress and anxiety that Delta caused us during what was supposed to be our wonderful vacation has no monetary replacement value. As I said earlier, I am interested in seeing how Delta plans on compensating us for all of this. I spent over $8,000 on this trip. Because of your negligence, my wife and I were not able to do a lot of the things we wanted to do. Many of the things we did do, we could not enjoy comfortably as we would have, had we had all our belongings. We had to take time out of our vacation to deal with this issue. We had to keep wasting time shopping for things that we had
already packed for, every time we realized we needed something. Now,
my wife and I are back home, with a mountain of work to do. She is an accountant, going to school to finish her masters and I am a Real Estate Broker in the middle of opening up my own office. We are very busy and who knows when we will have another opportunity to take a good vacation.
How will you compensate us for this?

UPDATE: This is unbelievable. It is 4:20pm. A delivery man just showed up at my doorstep with the missing bag. Despite having 3 FRAGILE stickers on the bag, it arrived torn to shreds. The item inside the bag (Which by the way, they would not let me take on the plane as a carry on, despite my numerous requests to do so, due to my concern for the content of the bag) was a one of a kind didgeridoo, which is an Australian musical instrument. It also arrived completely destroyed and unusable (See attached pictures). This is a nightmare. That was the most important item that I picked up in Australia. I purchased it from a store in the middle of nowhere in Australia for $700. No I do NOT HAVE A RECEIPT. It is an authentic piece of art work which I needed to take on that plane, but the check in girl at the counter insisted that it is considered a weapon and I could not carry it on and assured me that it would be safe. It is as if I were living a nightmare that never ends.
You have done my wife and I a terrible disservice and I will not give up until you pay for ALL of our damages, even if I have to hire an attorney. I am incredulous right now.

It’s a total farce and shake down when they try to charge you $20 for a copy of an itinerary from flights flown one month ago. Stating that the records are archived and this is a handling fee. What garbage and pathetic customer service that is directed to one of their most loyal customers (current Platinum medallion) and over 700K miles flown to date. Customer service refuse to escalate the response and are buffoons when it comes to treatment of their most coveted flyer. Oh well, I am sure other airlines will gladly accept my business.

OK this is long but I sent it to the President, Customer Care and mailed a hard copy to the Atlanta address…….
October 10, 2009
Delta Corporate Customer Service:
Having recovered from the worst airline delays, bumps and service in my forty years of flying, I am now able to finish a letter concerning your incompetence and lack of concern for passengers.
In May 2009, well in advance of my September/October trip to Florida, I booked flights through Delta from Bozeman, Montana to Orlando, Florida for myself and my two children.
Flash forward six months to September 29, 2009. At 5:00 a.m. I wake up and get the truck loaded; I wake up my six year old and four year old at 5:45 a.m. to get them ready for their much anticipated trip. My husband drives us forty miles one way to the Gallatin Field Airport in Bozeman, MT. We arrive at the airport at 6:35, park and are in line by 6:45 and then checking in (Confirmation number JJSCKZ). The agent has issues with the luggage we are checking explaining that the charge for my suitcase is $15 but the charge for each of my children’s bags (one each) is going to be $20 each – this because the tickets were likely booked at different times. After checking through the computer records to find this NOT to be the case because the tickets were all booked at the same time, she ends up reworking the charges she’s already assessed and winds up giving me $5 back (a large bonus in airline standards) because she miscalculated fees when she refunded the suitcase fees. This series of mistakes (one of the first of many for Delta) takes an additional ten minutes to resolve which in hindsight could have been my argument for arriving at the departure gate two minutes late! We then make our way to the security area at 7:15 a.m. and stand in a line that is backed up past the stairs leading to the restaurant.
After waiting several minutes in the security lines, we (seven passengers) arrive at our departure gate at 7:30 a.m. with a flight departure set for 7:42 a.m. This is when one of your more endearing employees (Josh W.) greeted us with a terse “You guys need to watch your clocks – you need to be here 15 minutes before the flight leaves. You’re late and I’ve already rebooked your seats!” With that, he slammed the door to the walkway leading to our awaiting flight, leaving all of us a bit bewildered. Twenty minutes later Josh reappeared at the door and now his first words to us were “You guys have got to be here twenty minutes before the scheduled flight departure.” One of the other passengers then asked, “What are we supposed to do now?”, to which Josh W. replied in a rather condescending tone, “It’s not our fault you guys were late to check in – you’ll have to rebook your flights.” At this point, because Josh is unwilling to assist in directions to get out of the area, we head to the doors leading down the stairs which we find are locked, with Josh watching, unconcerned from his post at his desk. Finally a security guard asks what we need and when we explain our situation, he escorts us downstairs, past Josh who is watching the interaction the entire time but still offering nothing more than a snide smirk.
Once downstairs we all get in line to rebook at which time we are told that because we were late to get to the boarding gate, we will all be charged a $50 rebooking fee per ticket. The female passenger that is in front of me doesn’t agree with this so she steps to the back of the line, as instructed, to wait to talk to the manager. Obviously the rest of us don’t agree with the charge either but when you’ve been waiting to go on vacation for over six months and you have two children that are wanting to go have some fun other than in the local airport, you bite the bullet and spend their Disney World ticket money on the fees. I rebook our tickets noting that all the other passengers that were bumped are able to get out that very day but myself and two anxious children will have to wait until tomorrow morning. I guess I picked one of the only days that Delta overbooks your flights because miraculously there is plenty of room on the next morning’s flight out. And also as impressive, even though we were all “late” to the gate and had designated seat assignments, our luggage is now making its way to Orlando.
During the midst of my rebooking, Josh W. shows up downstairs to lend a hand in the saga he has happily helped to create. While my friend from Livingston, Ed, is trying to rebook his flight to Las Vegas, Josh steps up and again reiterates the importance of being to the gate early – only this time he declares it is now 30 minutes prior to the departure time (first 15, then 20 and now 30 minutes). At this point I try to get a close look at his badge to get his name and he eagerly steps forward with a satisfied grin on his face and says very loudly “It’s Josh W.” Oh, the many companies that should be beating down his door for their next customer service employee of the year!
At this point I have to call several people to find a ride back to Livingston. I eventually reach my mother who has to drive over from Livingston to pick us up – my husband is already at work and in meetings. As I wait for her to come over (it’s a 45 minute drive one-way and she has to leave work for this), I see that the first female passenger is back in line, now in conversation with the manager. As my interest peaks, I head over and am joined by another young man that was also bumped from our flight. As we stand listening, she makes great points, explaining the essence of customer service, the times we all arrived, the security line problems and the lack of any assistance from Josh. As she makes the case for all eight of us that were bumped off a flight that Delta had oversold, the young man also begins to explain the rude behavior from Josh W. I also chime in that the manager should definitely talk with Josh as it is the worst customer service I have ever experienced and that the corporate offices of Delta will also hear about it. The manager assures us that Josh will be talked to and then reluctantly (after ten minutes of speeches from the passengers) tells Richard to refund our $50 rebooking fees.
When I finally get home I figure I better call about our luggage to find out where it might end up and if anything can be done with it so that the first loitering person who notices three bags circling the carousel for the 50th time doesn’t decide to walk off with them. When I call Delta and ask about the situation, the agent can’t find our records from the confirmation number given. I am then put on hold for close to five minutes to then be told that the bags are not on the flight and that they need to be claimed in Bozeman – the total opposite instructions from what I got from the Bozeman agent. At this point I once again let her know that I was told that they were on the flight out of Bozeman and give her the luggage receipt numbers. After two additional minutes, a new agent gets on the phone so I then have to explain the entire scenario once again. They then give me number to Gallatin Field and I talk with Richard who also needs the luggage receipt numbers. He finds out that they are on their way to Orlando and says he can leave their baggage service office a message about holding them but cannot guarantee that they will pick them up right away. So as an added bonus we have to now worry about having any kind of luggage when and if we ever arrive in Florida.

So, if you think this is the end of our misfortune, think again, there’s much more!
On September 30, we arise early again and arrive an hour and a half early to check in which takes no time since our luggage is most likely still circling the baggage claim carousel somewhere in the Orlando airport. We are up through security and to the boarding gate area one hour early just because, at this point within the last 24 hours, we have been told four different time requirements for arriving at the boarding gate. Our zone number gets called at 7:33 which is three minutes later than the time we arrived at the gate for the same flight the morning before! We get to our seats in a crowded setting at 7:39. About ten minutes later, and with every seat filled, we get word from a Delta agent that the plane will not be able to leave until they get volunteers to get off and take a later flight, as, surprise of all surprises, Delta has overloaded the flight and it weighs 1200 lbs. more than is allowed. After five people depart (and my guess on their combined weight with luggage cannot be more than 800 lbs), the pilots somehow feel secure with this new Delta diet plan and so they close up the doors. Then after another ten minutes of sitting on the runway, we are informed that we need to wait another ten minutes before takeoff. This ten minutes turns into forty minutes when we finally take off at 8:38 (nearly an hour after the scheduled time). Of course we arrive and are able to get ourselves into the SLC airport at 10:10, leaving us about twenty minutes late for our connecting Atlanta flight which left at 9:50 a.m. At 10:20 we find a Delta help desk phone (I set the kids up under the desk for some creative coloring) and we miraculously get moved to a flight arriving in Atlanta at 5:08 p.m. and then leaving Atlanta and arriving Orlando at 8:31. At this point I have booked a room near the airport because the ride that was supposed to pick us up originally in Orlando the night before can’t come to get us until Thursday morning, the 1st of October.
Now the fun part of the trip begins and ends in Florida as we finally get to make good on our shortened vacation plans and enjoy some fun in the sun.
But just when you thought there is no possible way anything more could go wrong on return flights back, think again!
On October 6th, I woke up at 5:00 a.m. (that’s 3:00 a.m. MST) to get the kids and myself ready for the return flight home. We arrive at Orlando International two hours ahead of the flight that is supposed to leave at 9:30 a.m. to Atlanta. We check in at the outside courtesy counter and once again get the word that my piece of luggage is a $15 charge but the two miniscule children’s suitcases will be $20 each. I tell the agent that we had that same problem in Bozeman and that all the tickets were booked at the same time and that Bozeman ended up just charging $15 per bag. So he goes inside and works with someone to get that resolved. It is at this point that I should have had one of those déjà vu feelings.
We then took some time to get to our gate as we had an extra 1 ½ hours to burn. Once on the plane, we were informed that we would be taking off a bit later than scheduled. This turns into a 45 minute delay so that when we arrive in Atlanta we again leave late for SLC. Since the flight finally leaves an hour late for SLC we arrive about twenty minutes after our connecting flight to Bozeman had left (again serious déjà vu). However, much to my delight, the gate agent tells me when I depart the plane that although the flight has left, they’ve rebooked us on the last flight into Bozeman leaving at 8:30 p.m.! Our only task is to go over to the nearby gate to get our new boarding passes. This is great news because even if we have to wait around the airport, at least Delta has actually tried to do something right for it’s passengers.
WOW!!! Was I ever optimistic and misinformed.
When I get to the desk with the other passengers that need to get their new boarding passes – I’m guessing there were anywhere from 15 to 20 of us – I get the wonderful news that actually the agent shouldn’t have told me we were booked on the last flight because now they have put myself and my two children on standby and booked us for the 11:20 a.m. flight out of SLC the next morning. At this point I am in tears knowing that standby to Bozeman, with the way Delta overbooks their flights on a regular basis, means we are stuck in SLC for the night. And the best part of this scenario is that Delta once again is more that over-the-top on their customer service offering us three $7 meal tickets for our entire afternoon, evening and next morning. No motel accommodations, no assistance with motel reservations, nothing, nada.
After composing myself and explaining to my kids for the umpteenth time why we are stuck in another airport, I decide to talk to an agent at the Delta desk. Jeff Bauman, certainly one of your more compassionate customer representatives, listens to my scenario, checks my tickets and then answers my big question, “If I wait at this airport for 6 hours with my children to try to get on the Bozeman flight as standby passengers, what are the odds that we will make it onto that flight?” Jeff is does some checking and tells me that it would be best to not wait around as there doesn’t look like any chance of getting on the last flight out to Bozeman. He assures us that it would be best to go spend our hard earned money at yet another motel not paid for by Delta and catch the morning flight into Bozeman. But, Jeff has what we in the customer service field call “initiative” and as he’s looking through his computer, asks how close Butte, MT is to Bozeman airport because there is room on that 8:30 flight. Before I can call anyone to come and pick us up there (it’s 110 miles from Livingston and at this point we will hitchhike home with the nicest interstate truck driver), I tell him we will take the tickets. Not thinking about it at the time, I will actually not be surprised if I get my credit card statement with a $50 charge per ticket to rebook to Butte, MT because it is likely that Delta can come up with an excuse as to why it was our fault that the plane got delayed out of Atlanta making us late into SLC.
And to make the story just a bit more interesting….
As Jeff works on rebooking us onto the Butte flight, a male passenger makes his way to the agent beside me and tells the agent he realizes he’s cutting it close for his flight but thinks he can make it up to the gate. Wesley, his customer service rep replies, “Well the flight leaves in ten minutes – do you think you can make it up there?” With a nod and a flurry of boarding passes (why would you need to check this man’s ID at this point), Delta somehow forgets the 15, 20 or is it 30 (?) minute get-to-your-boarding-gate rule and this guy makes it onto his flight with just two minutes left before the flight leaves. Now you might be interested in knowing how I was able to discover this vital tidbit of information. Because Jeff was working on our Butte tickets, I was able to overhear the phone calls taking place as I waited for my next destination boarding passes. Wesley was not only able to call ahead to the gate to let them know a passenger was on his way up but Wesley was also called back and told that the passenger made it with TWO minutes to spare. I hope you are beginning to see the correlation between this man’s scenario as compared to our circumstances when seven of us were turned away for arriving at the boarding gate 12 minutes (not 2!!!) before flight time!
So at this point it is my belief that the actual time you need to be at the gate before the flight leaves must change with airport location, customer service rep or perhaps the last four digits of your social security number as a multiple of what the outside temperature is divided by the number of bags you’ve ever checked on all flights you’ve ever flown! This man made it on board and they held the flight for him – outstanding !!! I wonder what they would have done for him had he already been jockeyed around by Delta on previous flights and had two young kids in tow!
Oh but all was not lost; we did actually make it back to our house!
We actually sat around the SLC airport for six hours, had a fine dining experience on your generous $21 worth of meal tickets (keep in mind this was your token to us for dinner, breakfast and an overnight stay in SLC). We arrived very early to our boarding gate and actually made it to Butte, MT (two hours away from our house) at 10:20. Then at the pleasant hour of 12:30 a.m., we were able to tuck the kids into bed so they could be up bright and early for school the next day. Had we been on the original flight that landed in Bozeman that previous afternoon, we would have actually been able to bathe them, read to them, have them brush their teeth, change into pajamas and get a decent night’s sleep before their next full day of school.
And here’s a bit of positive…
Three of your employees (two from the Gallatin Field and one from SLC Airport) that definitely deserve kudos are Richard Johnson and Charity (Gallatin Field) and Jeff Bauman (from SLC Airport). All three were as helpful as they could be under the circumstances and actually had a compassionate bone in their bodies to share with the very customers that help to create and preserve their jobs!
So, what I’ve Learned:
• It’s wonderful to have two very patient children.
• The $375,000 fine Delta received from DOT for ignoring federal laws that require airlines to offer bumped passengers adequate compensation and an explanation of their rights has quickly been forgotten by Delta.
• Having not had any problems with my Horizon or Southwest flights ever, these may be the only two airlines left to book future flights with.
• IF I had to fly Delta, for future flights, it may work better to send my children, one a time, to the desk agent to rebook flights as it appears that if you are a mother with two small children, you definitely are at the bottom of the good fortune list with flights. Maybe you have different rules when children are the ticket buyers.

And, if I were to be compensated for all of the mishaps that Delta infused into our vacation plan, here is how it would play out:
Description Amount
Four total unnecessary trips to or from the Gallatin Field to our house in Livingston (37 miles @ 4 trips @ $.55 per mile) $ 81.40
Unnecessary round trip to Butte from our house in Livingston (112 miles one way x 2 x $.55 per mile) $ 123.20
2 Hours for my mom to take off work to retrieve us at $50 per hour $ 100.00
12 hours total of lost work while waiting for rebooked flights and 4 hours of composing this letter; total of 16 hours at $65 per hour (this is what my clients are charged per hour) $1,040.00
Hotel room in Orlando to wait for our ride to show up a day later than originally planned (receipt attached) $ 230.00
3 meal tickets at $7 each (back at you with this joke of a “courtesy”) ( 21.00)

Total $1,553.60

I will be very interested in hearing and sharing your response with my friends, family and colleagues.

I just made a complaint to DELTA and this is what I got in my e-mail in seconds…Great customer service I may say…I also complained to the DOT customer care division…Thanks Elliot for your tips!!

Too bad some of you hadn’t know about “Rule 240″. Here is part of the ruling (check Delta “Rule 240″ for more info):
1.Delta Air Lines must confirm you on their next flight (on which space is available) at no additional cost.
2.If there is an alternate Delta Air flight that will arrive at your destination earlier than the alternate you have been offered, you have the right to be confirmed on this Delta Air Lines’ flight at no additional cost, even if first class space is all that is available.
3.If the alternate Delta Air Lines flight is not acceptable to you, you have the right to be confirmed on the flight of a different airline at no additional cost.
4.If there is an alternate “different airline” flight that will arrive at your destination earlier than any alternate flight you have been offered, you have the right to be confirmed on this flight at no additional cost, even if first class space is all that is available.
5.If no alternate flight (on Delta Air Lines or a “different airline”) is acceptable to you, Delta Air Lines must refund your money – even if you have a non-refundable ticket.
Rule 240 is something the airlines do not want you to know because it costs them a lot of money (and some service agents do not even know the rule completely). I carry a copy of it with me when I travel. So far I haven’t had to envoke the rule, but I’d like to see the look on their faces if I ever have too.

Hello. Here is story for you and your readers. My wife and I arranged a very expensive trip through Argentina Adventures out of Arizona with a nonstop flight with Delta out of JFK to Buenos Aires, reservations made months ago, with many actvities, tours, trips to Bariloche, the Patagonia, etc, all arranged. About a month ago we got a call from Delta stating that the non-stop was cancelled, and we were placed on a connecting set of flights for today. We had to argue hard and long to have charges for the non-stop flight reimbursed but that was resolved after about two hours. Yesterday we were informed by Delta that our flight today was cancelled and we were put on aflight for tomorrow out of LaGuardia, with another connecting flight from Atlanta to Buenos Aires. An automated message was sent to my blackberry, and we received email confirmations which we printed out. The customer service representative rewarded us for our trouble with five first class seats from New York to Atlanta for my wife, three children and me. Tonight my wife went online at the Delta site and she was stunned to see that we were switched to a flight on the 24th! We have been on the phone for over four hours this evening and have received no compassion or assistance. We have no chance to get reimbursement from Argentina Adventures, either, as their excuse is that our delays and failures to make connections were due to Delta Airlines. We requested supervisors to help us and were refused, and were told we could not be placed on another airline. We were not called at any time and asked if we would leave a day earlier due to foreseen snow conditions, and there are no excuses from my point of view why we can’t get on a flight sooner than the 24th. My wife just got off the phone. We were told there is little chance that going to the airport tomorrow will be frutiful. I emailed several of the executives at Delta, praying someone would do one of those things that happens only in the movies or in commercials, and help. I plan to write a letter to the NY Times and Newsday. Les Salwen MD