What's the book corporate America doesn't want you to read? Find out now -- or you could get scammed.

Ticked off about lost tickets

July 7, 2005

Q: I recently bought two plane tickets from New York to Florence, Italy, through Hotwire. After I entered my payment information and finalized my order, Hotwire said that it could not issue e-tickets but that it would send paper tickets by overnight delivery. But I never got the tickets.

The customer service representatives I spoke with were amazingly unhelpful — when they weren’t being downright antagonistic. A Hotwire agent insinuated, among other things, that I had lost the tickets and was trying to make Hotwire pay for my mistake, and that I live in a bad neighborhood (for the record, I didn’t lose the tickets, and I don’t live in a bad neighborhood).

Hotwire told me to contact Federal Express. FedEx claimed that it had left the package on my doorstep. I asked why they didn’t ask for a signature, and FedEx said Hotwire had not required one. I can’t believe Hotwire would send me $2,000 worth of plane tickets and not require a signature. Ultimately, I had to file a missing-ticket report with the airline. This required that my wife and I go to the airport, in person, and pay an additional fee of $100 per ticket.

I think Hotwire should apologize and reimburse me the $200. What do you think?

– Tom Murray
New York

A: I think you’re right. Hotwire should have taken more responsibility for the failed ticket delivery.

I asked Hotwire about its paper-ticket policy. Amy Bohutinsky, a company spokeswoman, said that for “customer convenience and ease of delivery,” a signature isn’t required (it is also cheaper, since FedEx charges extra for a proof of delivery).

If a paper ticket is lost, Hotwire asks a customer to pay any reissue fee directly to the airline. But if a ticket is lost during delivery, Hotwire refunds the fee. “All the customer must do is show verification in the form of a receipt that they paid this reissue fee,” she told me. Accusing the customer of living in a rough neighborhood or of losing a ticket is not standard operating procedure at Hotwire, as far as I can tell.

Something over at Hotwire clearly short-circuited. The company’s records show that it asked you for a receipt of the reticketing fee. But apparently you did not get that message. Its representatives were apparently also having some customer-service challenges when you called. They should have offered to contact FedEx on your behalf to track the lost package. After its confirmed loss, they should have explained that you’d be reimbursed.

How to avoid a situation like this? Buy an electronic ticket (sites like Hotwire deal mostly in e-tickets, so ticket loss is a relatively rare problem). If you have no choice but to use paper tickets, be extra vigilant about tracking them. Your best bet may be to call your travel agency and ask for a signature-required delivery; this will ensure that the tickets reach you.

Hotwire has already contacted you and is refunding the $200 you spent. To make up for any “perceived miscommunication,” the company has also offered you a $50 credit toward your next purchase.

Christopher Elliott is the author of Scammed: How to Save Your Money and Find Better Service in a World of Schemes, Swindles, and Shady Deals. Critics have called it “eye-opening” and “inspiring” — it’ll “grab your attention and won’t let go.” Order your copy now on Amazon, Barnes & Noble or iTunes.

2 comments

  • Kurt Francis

    Mr. Elliot –

    While what I want to report isn’t limited to travel, it is relevant, I think, and may be something you want to mention, especially for your readers outside the U.S. (like me).

    I live in Bangkok, and some years ago my U.S. accountant (I’m American, so still have to deal with taxes there) sent my tax return to my then-work address with a signature required via FedEx.

    About ten days later the return still hadn’t arrived, and I had resolved that very day to call my accountant that night to ask what was going on. I happened to want to talk to a colleague down the breezeway in her bull-pen style office with about ten people in it. No one was there, and I happened to notice a FedEx envelope on one desk. Curious, I looked — and it was mine.

    One of the office’s occupants came in and saw me holding the envelope and said something like “Good! You got the package the FedEx guy left with me for you a few days ago.” Never mind that she should have brought it to my office — two doors away.

    The point is that when I contacted my accountant to ask why he was charging me for the FedEx signature-required fee, he was surprised at my story.

    He followed up with FedEx, but to no avail. FedEx-U.S.A. basically told him they had no real control over FedEx-Thailand. (Yes, this is only my accountant’s version, but he’s been my family’s accountant for 50 years, and mine directly for 30 or so, so I do tend to believe him.)

    While people booking travel through a U.S.-based provider from abroad can’t do much about FedEx themselves, this might be useful information for travel agents to know, so they can lean on FedEx and any courier company for not providing the paid-for service.

    At least that wasn’t as bad as the time my Sister sent me something via DHL — and when I FINALLY got it, I did so only after printing out DHL’s own tracking record showing the package had been delivered to the Bangkok DHL office nearly a week before and physically presenting it to personnel in their office. And they didn’t even bother to apologize. They claimed a delivery man had tried to deliver it three times, but I lived in a building where access was tightly contgrolled — and I do mean *tightly* — and the manager and guards told me no DHL person had been there for months and months, let alone in the past few days.

    So, there are two cautionary tales.

  • Jennifer Hanuschak

    I understand that FedEx charges extra for a signature, but it is a fixed fee, and why couldn’t that be simply added to the price you’re already paying for your tickets? At least then, you’re guaranteed a safer delivery method and that might be worth the extra bucks (even though I bet the airline could as easily absorb the extra cost itself).

Previous post:

Next post: