Comments on: Forced to buy another airline ticket

By: Martin Smith

Martin Smith — Fri, 07 May 2010 13:32:00 +0000

You will find a post from me and an email to you from about three years ago when my girlfriend missed a flight from Prague to Amsterdam as part of a round trip to Buenos Aires. We called Expedia and they said talk to someone at the airport where there were no personnel. They cancelled her entire ticket and we had to buy another one roundtrip from scratch. No credit for previous over $3,700 we had paid out, nothing, nada, zilch. Where was the service then. You didn’t even try to help either. It is embarrassing but I am beginning to think you are in the pocket of other than hotel chains where you stay free.

By: David Z

David Z — Wed, 25 Mar 2009 11:31:55 +0000

you should have been issued an electronic ticket.

I’ve had few and rare situations where this just wasn’t possible due to a variety of details. I notice, though, this especially happens with international flights with multiple airlines having little to no agreements with one another.

Unless I’m mistaken, travel agencies like Expedia don’t exactly change a customer’s flight schedule at whim. The airlines do since they have full control over them, but they’ll notify the travel agent/cy it was booked with who, in turn, would try to notify its customer.

Also, I’ve read a few maybe isolated cases online where Expedia actually called the customer regarding a flight schedule change. Some were accomodated, others refunded.

Not that people care about those details, anyway, and vendors will deal with them nonetheless. It’s certainly disappointing if vendors like Expedia don’t fix these things, but it’s rather hard to quantify what one can and can’t do since it depends on the situation at hand.

Everyone can start pointing fingers about whose responsibility it is or should be. I guess the one who’ll take the issue head-on sorta wins.

My point is, don’t wait until you’re home to resolve a complaint. There’s no time like the present.

I partly agree with this, but that, again, depends on the situation at hand. I’ve solved some issues on the spot, while fixed those after they happened.

By: Allan Jayne

Allan Jayne — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 14:14:47 +0000

About contacting [Expedia] while the [Iberia] agent stood at the counter with an outstretched hand — you would have to walk away, over to the wall where the pay phones were because you’re out of range of your cell phone carrier. Wouldn’t we now begin another topic, about ultra high priced long distance phone calls?

By: Dave

Dave — Wed, 18 Mar 2009 01:12:32 +0000

Wait a minute….Expedia made the schedule change, you were inconvenienced and had to pony up more cash to get home, and all they do is refund the price of the extra ticket? That’s it? How about some compensation for all the hassle they caused?

By: Zain Jeewanjee

Zain Jeewanjee — Sun, 15 Mar 2009 01:26:09 +0000

The best solution in these times is to Buy a “Change Your Mind Insurance Policy” because if your plans change, or you miss your flight, you can get a full refund quickly.

Zain Jeewanjee