Unfortunately if you travel in the 21st century, you will also have to deal with trips that turn out differently than you had planned. This just happened to me this Valentine’s Day weekend...which made me feel a bit like this:
I found my car completely snowed in earlier yesterday morning, which made me scramble to find an alternative option to get to my home airport, Newark Liberty International. A few clicks on the internet provided me with a great solution: A special GoBus from my town to the airport terminals for only $2.35 one way. Now that’s a great deal in this area! I got to the airport with plenty of time to spare, so I used my last United Airlines Lounge pass (2 of those are complimentary each year if you have the Chase United Airlines Mastercard) to go wait away from the usual hustle and bustle at the gate (and of course get free wine and snacks).
Soon enough, I am watching the Olympics and am chatting with fellow travelers who all had horror stories of this week’s cancelled flights. And then it started happening to me: I got a marathon session of flight delay notifications on my phone from United. The United Airlines app is definitely working…ugh, every 20 minutes I would get more and more delayed. After delay notification number 6, I got up and made my way to Customer Service and waited for 45 minutes in line to speak to someone. I was going to get a credit if I no longer wanted to get on a flight that was now delayed 3,5 hours and with no guarantee that it would actually get to Chicago. It made no sense anymore to get to Chicago and I left the airport with the same bus to get back home.My checked bag however did eventually make it to Chicago and is now en route to come back. I can check the status on wheresmysuitcase.com, which I must admit is a handy website. It even sends you email notifications and shows a photo of the driver your bag is assigned to for delivery and of his/her car.
Soon enough, I am watching the Olympics and am chatting with fellow travelers who all had horror stories of this week’s cancelled flights. And then it started happening to me: I got a marathon session of flight delay notifications on my phone from United. The United Airlines app is definitely working…ugh, every 20 minutes I would get more and more delayed. After delay notification number 6, I got up and made my way to Customer Service and waited for 45 minutes in line to speak to someone. I was going to get a credit if I no longer wanted to get on a flight that was now delayed 3,5 hours and with no guarantee that it would actually get to Chicago. It made no sense anymore to get to Chicago and I left the airport with the same bus to get back home.My checked bag however did eventually make it to Chicago and is now en route to come back. I can check the status on wheresmysuitcase.com, which I must admit is a handy website. It even sends you email notifications and shows a photo of the driver your bag is assigned to for delivery and of his/her car.
I was also able to cancel my hotel reservation at no charge last minute, a perk for having Gold status with a hotel chain. You see: customer loyalty does pay!
These are the apps/websites I used to get myself through this experience:
FlightAware - to check the live flight status of my inbound flight
United Airlines app – to receive push notifications on my UA flight
SPG app - to cancel my hotel reservation
wheresmysuitcase.com – to get updates on the status of my luggage.
And after a 45 min wait on the phone with United Airlines, they told me I would either get a full refund or a credit to use for a later ticket…sounds great to me. However, I first have to get my baggage in order, THEN I have to call back and get the refund/credit processed…they couldn’t process that the first time, of course not :)
Next weekend I am flying to Puerto Rico, fingers crossed for smooth sailing this time around!
