A question re T&C's

[Cochise]

We have had ANOTHER flight ammendment to our schedule when we go in 5 and a bit weeks but i am miffed with the way this has been done. We have had our Chicago to Orlando Int flight pushed 1hr and 5 mins later on the 7th October. Now as i have said to the travel agent there is not alot they can do about this BUT....

They did not advise us of this change which happened about a week before both my sister and me made separate calls to pay off the balances for the holiday.

We always went for seat back TV's for the transatlantic leg hence our decision to fly BMI but this was a fair trade off at booking arriving at 7.30pm in Orlando as opposed to 6pm with Delta via JFK.

Since then we have had to return to Chicago via Tampa rather than Orlando Int due to flight changes and now this.

I think at this last flight change the trade off seat back tv against flying with delta and not having to travel to Tampa and getting in 2 n half hours earlier has tipped in favour of Delta but we have paid off the holiday and apparently tickets have been booked (even though the manager of the agents mentioned there may be alternatives)

Not sure where we stand with this, the agents have made a tiny offer of goodwill but it was exactly that tiny

Anyone have any advice to progress?

p.s. They did manage to ruin my 8th wedding anniversary with all the stress they caused me for which i politely thanked them.

 

[carolfoy]

I'm pretty certain ther's absolutely nothing you can do, its a hard job unfortunately. ailines can do pretty much what they want. Their CAA states they only have to get you from one place to another and there are no promises re timings, changes, delays or facilities on board. Did the agents actually have the schedule change before you paid the balance? if they did its just bad manners not to inform you but they may not have been informed them selves.
Its fairly unusual to have a lot of schedule changes on a transatlantic flight but the internal flights there are always chopping and changing.

 

[rosiejo]

Have you asked what the penalty would be to cancel the flights and book you on to the Delta ones? Assuming there are seats available on the other flights of course. Could you then ask the TA to pay the difference?

This would only work if the flights changed BEFORE you paid off your holiday and they didn't tell you.

 

[Cochise]

Carol,

Thanks for replying. Yes they did have the updated schedule when we paid the holiday off. I do realise the issues with the amount of changes over in the States but i dont expect the agent to neglect advising us when they know we have 4 young children in the party. As i said we would have gone for the Delta flights.

 

[Cochise]

Rosiejo,

I am giving them a little breathing space and letting them have a look at this before getting back to me. Not sure if i am entitled to ask for that but i have considered it

 

[carolfoy]

Carol,

Thanks for replying. Yes they did have the updated schedule when we paid the holiday off. I do realise the issues with the amount of changes over in the States but i dont expect the agent to neglect advising us when they know we have 4 young children in the party. As i said we would have gone for the Delta flights.

thats real bad luck Rob, hopefully your TA will feel really guilty and do something a bit better to make it up to you

 

[rosiejo]

I always say there's no harm in asking. Just be nice about it.

We had a lot of trouble booking our wedding trip and I was really not happy with the hotel arrangements, so I wrote to the head office of the TA with my "sob story" about how my dream wedding didn't feel like it was going to be a dream wedding... all of a sudden they gave me what I had asked for in the first place! In that instance it didn't actually cost them anything, but they had to take a bit of time to set everything up.

Most TAs have an amount per customer that they are allowed to give as discounts, and they could use this allowance towards the change, even if you paid some and they paid some maybe.

Good luck - I hope it all works out for you.