Tuesday, October 16, 2007

Either people are getting ruder and more thoughtless, or I’m getting less tolerant the more I travel. Here are two recent tales of fellow passengers who deserved to be bitch-slapped for their behavior with their seat backs.

You heard me. Seat backs.

Last week Michele and I were returning from England on a British Air 777 that was less than half full. There were completely empty rows of seats. In fact, there were rows of empty seats with rows of empty seats behind them.

In front of us, the lone passenger in the row moved to the middle seat, obviously relishing the ability to stretch his elbows to the left and the right without hitting a seatmate. But as soon as the pilot turned off the seat belt sign, a woman changed her seat to the aisle seat next to this poor guy, then reclined her seat all the way back, practically into Michele’s lap leaving her about as much room as a sardine has in a tightly packed can. She chose this seat despite the fact that there were at least six or seven rows where she could have had an aisle seat with nobody next to her and nobody behind her.

During the flight, any time I had to stand up, I couldn’t avoid jarring her seat back in my effort to squeeze by. Each time, she turned and gave me a nasty look for disturbing her. She kept the seat reclined for the entire 9-1/2-hour flight, including a good 10 minutes after the announcement asking all passengers to return their seats to the full and upright position.

Right now, I’m on a a US Air Airbus 320 from Phoenix to Kansas City. I’m in the second of three first-class rows, having been upgraded without asking for an upgrade. (This never happens on United, where I’m a million-mile flyer and where I have my miles, but US Air, United’s Star Alliance partner, does it routinely. But I digress.) As soon as the pilot asked flight attendants to take their seats for takeoff, the asshole in front of me reclined his seat as far as it would go; we were still a good seven or eight minutes from takeoff, but he clearly figured that if the flight attendants couldn’t see his seat reclined, then it was just fine to go ahead and recline it.

Update:On landing, Mr. High Regard for My Safety kept his set all the way back, and nobody from the cabin crew looked back to check.

Is it me? Am I getting cranky? Or am I right in thinking people wouldn’t behave to incredibly selfisly 25 years ago and that this kind of cavalier self-centeredness is a relatively new development among travellers?

Posted by Shel in • Planes
(9) Comments • Permalink

Sunday, October 14, 2007

I had just deplaned from my flight to Denver from Oakland and checked my email on my Treo. I was delighted to see a message from United confirming that I had been upgraded to first class on my flight from Denver to Washington, D.C. (A screen shot of the salient part of the email appears below).

I got to my gate and waited my turn, happily ready to exchange my coach boarding pass for one in first. I told the gate agent about the email. She shook her head, tapped a few keys, then shook her head again. “I have no idea what that’s about,” she said. “First class was booked full and has checked in full.”

Now, understand: Even though I’m a United million-mile flyer, I have no expectation of upgrades. I book my seats in coach and am happy to sit there. But sending me an email telling me my upgrade request has been fulfilled raised my expectations, only to have them dashed a short while later. It is, in my opinion, inexcusable.

How could such mixed messages happen? Is it that one system doesn’t talk to another?

In any case, I called Customer Relations when I got to my hotel, but they’re closed on weekends. (I guess nobody flies and needs customer relations if it isn’t Monday through Friday.) So I tried the Premiere Executive number, where I was told to wait until tomorrow to talk to Customer Relations.

So I’ve spoke today with a gate agent, a flight attendant, and the Premier Executive desk, each of whom passed the buck and none of whom offered an apology. We’ll see what happens tomorrow when I call Customer Relations to ask for (a) an explanation, (b) an apology, and (c) assurance that the system-wide upgrade certificate is put back into my account. I’m not hoping for much.

In any case, I have learned a couple lessons about United today:

• Never rely on or trust an email from United. They could be completely false.
• The loyalty involved in flying a million true miles with United doesn’t matter to United.
• When you get screwed over by United, nobody at United seems to care very much.

It’s true what they say: You have a choice of carriers when you fly. To be honest, I’ve been avoiding United for the last year or so when I can. Today’s experience only confirms that this is a good idea.

Special note to Craig Jolley: Yeah, yeah, I know, I know…

Posted by Shel in • Planes
(5) Comments • Permalink

Michele and I were on our way to San Francisco International when the programmed call came from Orbitz: “This is Orbitz calling with a flight cancellation alert.” Our early-morning flight to Dallas had been cancelled.

This was more of an issue than it usually is. We were on our way to the UK, primarily so I could speak at the annual meeting of the Society of American Travel Writers. Because the SATW negotiated ridiculously low air fares for attendees, there were a number of rules we had to follow, one of which was leaving from and returning to the same airport. Since I had to be in Dallas immediately after the SATW gig, we had to fly from Dallas in order to return there. Our British Air flight was set for fourish, so I had arranged the American flight to Dallas in order to ensure we had enough time to make the connection.

I called Orbitz first, which referred me to American, since this was the actual day of the flight. American told me the next flight to Dallas was oversold (a practice I despise, by the way); the next available flight was a connection through Orange County, arriving about 45 minutes before the UK flight departed. Any delay would cause us to miss our flight, and it would be iffy for our bags making the connection even if we did get there on time.

By the time we arrived at the airport, I was on the phone with British Air to find out what would happen if we missed the flight. Because the fare was so low, the answer was simple: The ticket would be cancelled. I called American again to see if they could put us on another carrier, but none got to Dallas any earlier than the one going first to Orange County.

Waiting in line at the American ticket counter, a thought struck me. I called American again and asked, “What about Oakland?” Oakland International Airport is just across the bay from SFO. Indeed, it turned out there was a flight that would get us there more than two hours early, and there were seats available. Why, I wondered, did I need to think of this?

I got to the counter where an American Airlines ticket agent very kindly helped make the change, ensuring we still had our return flight from Dallas to SFO. Then she handed me a taxi voucher, explaining that it was American’s fault the flight was cancelled (the plane had been removed from service) and that American would pick up the tab for the cab ride across the bay. That’s Michele holding the voucher below. (We had to leave our car at SFO for a couple reasons: We were returning to SFO and we had arranged 12 days of free parking at Park ‘N Fly using points earned from participating in the loyalty program...not transferable to Oakland.)

We got down to the cab line where not a single cabbie would honor the voucher. Each one had a different reason. There was no amount on it. They hadn’t seen one before. Their dispatcher wouldn’t let them. So it was $90 to get from SFO to Oakland.

We did make our flight to the UK, but it was no thanks to any of the travel providers involved. And if American ever gives you a taxi voucher, think twice before thanking them. It isn’t worth the paper on which it’s printed.

Posted by Shel in • Cabs • Online travel services • Planes
(0) Comments • Permalink

Saturday, June 23, 2007

I’m sitting at DFW biding my time. My flight from SFO was delayed with not one but two electrical problems. First, a battery failed, and it took 45 minutes to replace it. We then taxi’d out to the runway when the flight speed indicator failed, so it was back to the terminal for another 45 minutes to fix that. I missed my connection to New Orleans, so now I’ll fly at 7:55 p.m. and arrive at 9:30 or so. Assuming, of course, that the flight is on time.

I’m online with my Sprint wireless card and saw that Neville posted that he assumed I’d have something here about my recent travels, so I figured I’d better not make a liar out of him.

I got home yesterday from St. John’s, Newfoundland. That flight started at 6 a.m., which meant I had to be up at 3:30 a.m...which was 11 p.m. at home. (I can never get used to locales where the time change is in 30-minute increments instead of 60. I was also befuddled at having to go through customs upon arriving in Montreal from St. John’s; isn’t Newfoundland part of Canada?) I got home around 2 p.m. and spent the rest of the day preparing to leave again today. But that’s not the part you want to hear about. This is:

I flew to St. John’s last Wednesday from Toronto, where I’d been since Sunday. We got to St. John’s, went through two aborted landings due to heavy fog, then diverted to Halifax. From there, we flew back to Toronto. I rebooked on a later flight, and instead of arriving at 1:30 p.m., I got in at 12:30 a.m. How many people fly from Toronto to St. John’s in one day?

On our way to the gate in Toronto, the pilot came on the PA and asked passengers to contact their MPs about St. John’s’ airport. It is, according to the pilot, one of the few commercial airports in North America that is not equipped to handle instrument landings, even though the plane was so equipped. Considering it’s the first North American airport many flights originating in Europe encounter—where planes land in an emergency—and since St. John’s is often shrouded in fog, it seems to make sense to have it equipped to handle low-visibility landings. If I were Canadian, I’d write my MP.

Anyway, this month I’ve been in London, Chicago, Vegas, Toronto, Montreal, St. John’s, and now I’m off to New Orleans, then Dallas next Thursday. Enough!

Posted by Shel in • Planes
(0) Comments • Permalink

Monday, May 21, 2007

I got a courtesy email yesterday from United Airlines reminding me I could check in online for my flight this morning to Canada. So I clicked the link in the email and completed all the required information, got a screen asking me to confirm details (e.g., my passport number), then clicked to get my boarding pass but got this instead:

EasyCheck-in: Unavailable
Check-in is experiencing problems at this time which are preventing you from using the system. Please try again later. 

So I tried again later. And again later. And again even later. And again this morning. Same result. (Insanity, Einstein said, is repeating the same action over and over again while expecting a different result.)

I have two questions for United:

1. How long does it take a big company like yours to fix a website problem?
2. Why can’t you let us know the site isn’t working before we go through the hassle of entering all the information rather than making us input all the data in order to find out it’s all been an exercise in futility?

Posted by Shel in • Planes
(2) Comments • Permalink

Monday, September 18, 2006

Some companies get online technology. Others simply frustrate their customers with it. Air Canada definitely falls into the latter category.

I’m flying Air Canada tomorrow morning to Toronto from San Francisco, so tonight I logged on to print a boarding pass. I got through all the data input and the boarding pass screen appeared. Instead of a borading pass, though, was the browser icon indicating a graphic file could not be found. Since I’m using a beta of Internet Explorer 7, I figured it was a glitch in the software, so I undid the check-in, fired up Firefox, and tried again. Same result. Again I backed out of the check-in and switched to my Mac laptop using the default Apple browser Safari. Same result.

It doesn’t do much good to let you print out a boarding pass if the boarding pass doesn’t include the, um, boarding pass. Quite a contrast to Northwest Airlines. A few weeks ago, a colleague was able to check in for his flight from his hotel room and choose a fax option that included a field for his hotel room number. Mere moments after completing the online transaction, the hotel delivered his boarding pass to his room.

Now I have to go to the airport and stand in line to print the boarding pass I should have received when I took the time to check in online. Get a clue, AC.

Posted by Shel in • Planes
(0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

Thursday, August 24, 2006

My colleague, Tudor Williams, and I finished our work in a suburb of St. Paul and headed for the cab that was supposed to be waiting at 4:30 p.m. He showed up at 5:05 p.m., which worried me since it was raining and my US Airways flight to Phoenix (where I was connecting on to SFO) was scheduled to depart at 7 p.m. and my courtesy call from Orbitz indicated it was on time. Fortunately, there was no line at all at St. Paul security, and I got to my gate in time to find a weather delay had the flight rescheduled for 8:45 p.m.

I stood in line to find out about rebookings. I could get to Phoenix but no further, I was told; there were no later flights to San Francisco. What about through Vegas? I asked. Nope. How about flights to Oakland or San Jose? Nope. What about a Northwest flight to SFO? All oversold. Could I get my boarding pass for my new 7:05 a.m. flight the next day? Nope, you’ll have to get that in Phoenix.

So I booked a room at the Phoenix Airport Hampton Inn and headed back to a restaurant to have a beer with Tudor. Later, we strolled over to the Northwest lounge (my Priority Pass card got us in). I was able to relax a few minutes before heading back to my gate, where the new departure time was 9:45 p.m. I shrugged and headed back to the Northwest lounge, sat with Tudor (whose Northwest flight to Vancouver was scheduled to leave after midnight), then wandered back to the gate.

I decided to try one more time to get my boarding pass for Friday morning, which would let me get to the hotel as quickly as possible and get an extra 20 or 30 minutes of sleep. As I waited, I heard the agent working out a flight for the passenger in front of me—to SFO via Vegas! I asked if I could do the same and noted that I had been told no such flight was available. the agent said nothing. I thought it might be that the Vegas-SFO flight was delayed, but that wasn’t the case—it was due to depart at about midnight, so I had plenty of time to get there and make that flight.

I was lucky to get on the Vegas flight, since both computers at the gate froze up and the agent couldn’t print me a ticket. However, a ticket was awaiting me in Vegas, where the flight was (of course) delayed from Chicago. I’m sitting in the terminal now, waiting for a flight that is now due to depart at 1:50 a.m. It’ll be 5 a.m. earliest before I walk through my front door.

I should have just stayed in the hotel in Phoenix; I would have gotten home only four hours later.

Who ever said business travel is glamorous?

Posted by Shel in • Cabs • Planes
(1) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

Wednesday, August 23, 2006

My flight from SFO to Minneapolis-St. Paul yesterday—connecting in Phoenix—included two delayed flights, one delayed at both the departure and arrival end.

I arrived at SFO at 6:30 a.m. for a 9 a.m. flight. It was my first flight since the terrorist arrests in the UK, and having heard tales of long security lines and multiple checkpoints, I decided not to take any chances. As a result, I cleared security in about 20 minutes. The only difference I could see was that TSA agents were yelling, “No gels or liquids” in addition to their usual patter. I couldn’t understand why I was able to buy bottled water at a vendor inside the terminal. Agents for boarding flights were announcing, “If you’ve purchased food or beverages in the terminal, you’ll need to finish them before boarding; they’re not allowed on the plane.” However, nobody checked. It would have been ridiculously easy to slip a bottle of water in a bag and carry it on.

Anyway, had a lot of time to kill before my flight on America West...or is it US Airways...or is it America West? All the signs and announcements proclaim “America West is now US Airways,” but Orbitz pulled up America West fares, I printed my boarding pass from the America West website, and the planes are still America West-branded. The gates all say US Airways, the fllight attendants wear US Airways uniforms, and the video safety announcement is from US Airways. The merger appears to be half-assed.

In any case, at about 8:40, with the plane at the gate, no agents had arrived to board the flight. I toddled on over to another gate and asked. “Oh,” the flight attendant said, “I heard on the radio that flight is delayed, so there are no agents at the gate.”

“Nobody has said anything to the passengers,” I noted.

“Well, that’s because the agents haven’t come to the gate,” she replied. I just stared at her until she said, “I guess we ought to change the time on the board and make an announcement.”

“I guess,” I said.

Fortunately (funny how that makes perfect sense), my flight from Phoenix to Minneapolis was also delayed half an hour. So when we arrived in Minnesota, our gate was occupied. By the time the gate cleared and we could taxi, though, we found we had to spend another 45 minutes sitting there because President Bush, who was in town for some political something-or-other, was ready to leave and Air Force One was getting geared up for departure.

This is my first business trip in a few months. I’d nearly forgotten how much fun it is.

Posted by Shel in • Airports • Planes
(5) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

Tuesday, April 18, 2006

Note: This post contains some material that appeared in the last post!

Somebody needs to be fired. No; firing isn’t enough. Somebody needs to be hurt.

I’m writing from the Bloomington Marriott Hotel (across the street from the Mall of the Americas, but I’m not here to shop; I have a meeting down the road with a client tomorrow.) I booked my flight here on Orbitz; the ticket was booked by USAir. The trip involved a connection in Vegas. So far, so good.

I was unable to get my boarding pass online; the system told me to check in at the airport at the terminal of the airline operating the flight to Vegas. That was United (actually Ted, which I’m surprised is still flying); it was a codeshare flight with USAir. I got to the United terminal and used the kiosk to print my boarding passes. I should have known what kind of day I was in for when only one boarding pass printed out—the one for the SFO-Vegas leg.

I visited the Red Carpet Club, where a concierge made a heroic effort to get my Vegas-Minneapolis boarding pass, but he was thwarted at every turn. I shrugged and figured it would be a minor hassle to get the boarding pass at the gate in Vegas. I should’ve known better. We arrived in Vegas at the D gates. The only way to the B gates, where I needed to be to make my connecting flight, was to exit into the concourse. In other words, I had to get my boarding pass at the ticket counter and go through security a second time.

The kicker: I had less than an hour to make my connection.

The kicker to the kicker: None of the kiosks were working at the USAir/AmericaWest counter. I had to stand in line. By the time I got to the counter, the ticket agent was pessimistic about my chances of making the flight. “My flight was not late,” I said. “Somebody authorized this as a legal connection.”

The ticket agent’s response was to shrug. She did call the gate and let me talk to the gate agent, who suggested I run. If I didn’t make it, the next flight was four hours later, and it connected through Phoenix. Oh, and by the way, she said, we only have middle seats left.

I booked this flight some time ago. I wasn’t assigned a seat then? And even if, for some mysterious reason, that wasn’t possible, if I could have gotten my boarding pass online last night or at SFO this morning, I probably could have avoided the middle seat.

I grabbed my boarding pass and ran. Of course, my suspenders that did not set off the alarm in San Francisco did in Vegas, so I had to go through the whole wand/pat-down scene. From there, I ran to the gate. According to my watch, I had missed the flight. When I got there, I found the door hadn’t even been opened yet. Turns out the maintenance crew was running late cleaning the plane!

Somebody might tell me that this whole scenario happened because of the United codeshare leg of the flight. However, a few weeks ago I had the exact same situation: I flew from College Station, Texas to Houston on American (a codeshare with USAir), then flew USAir to Philadelphia. In College Station, the American Airlines kiosk printed both my boarding passes.

Somebody might also tell me that this only happens in Vegas. (More than one official at the airport told me that.) But whoever authorized the 58-minute connection knew I’d be in Vegas and kniew I’d have to get from the D gates to the B gates in under an hour. Whoever authorized the connection, that’s the person who needs to suffer.

I wish I knew whom to blame. My money’s on United. Whoever’s actually at fault, though, I am still furious seven hours later. 

Posted by Shel in • Planes
(2) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

I’m flying this morning from SFO to Minneapolis, connecting in Las Vegas. I booked it all through Orbitz and am flying on a USAir ticket. The first leg is a codeshare on United’s TED to Vegas, and the Orbitz documentation told me to check in at the United terminal (specifically, the terminal where the carrier of the airline flying the first leg is located). So I did—and got only one boarding pass for the first leg. At the Red Carpet Club, the concierge tried valiantly to get me the second boarding pass, but the system wouldn’t let him. So with an hour to connect to a flight in a different terminal, I have to stand in line at the counter and get a second boarding pass.

A few weeks ago, I had the same situation, flying American from College Station and connecting to a USAir flight in Houston. At College Station, I was able to get both boarding passes, even though it was an American terminal printing out a USAir boarding pass. Not today. Just another example of how the paying traveler just doesn’t matter to the travel industry as long as they get your money.

Posted by Shel in • Planes
(1) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

Friday, March 24, 2006

As I mentioned, I’m on a flight from Philly to Los Angeles. I thought I was lucky, getting a seat in the exit row. Sadly, I’m just across the aisle from a guy in a suit who has removed his shoes and socks and propped his feet on the magazine pocket on back of seat in front of him. Every time he yawns, he groans at decibels that overwhelm my iPod and the Shure earbuds jammed into my ears.

This year, I will surpass 1 million true miles on United, and United is hardly the only airline I fly. Yet I have simply not grown accustomed to the notion that there are people who don’t give a damn about the impact of their inappropriate behavior on the fellow passengers who are forced to spend hours in close quarters with them.

The guy in the middle seat next to me (I’m in the aisle) is huge and snores, but he’s done everything possible to leave me room. I don’t mind him. But Mr. Noisy Smellyfeet across the aisle? That’s another story.

Posted by Shel in • Planes
(8) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

I’m on a United flight from Philadelphia to Los Angeles, the final leg of my current week-long business trip. (I’m meeting my wife in LA; we’ll attend the wedding of a friend’s son on Sunday, then drive back to the Bay Area on Monday.) This 5-1/2-hour flight is my first opportunity to make a few notes about the trip.

Wednesday was the hellish day. I awoke at 3:45 a.m. Mountain Time in Denver to make a 6 a.m. flight to Dallas, connecting from there to College Station, Texas (home of Texas A&M University). I was delivering a talk from 2:45 to 4 p.m. and then catching a 4:50 a.m. flight from College Station to Houston and then from there to Philadelphia. By the time I got to Philadelphia and my hotel room, I’d been awake 22 hours and taken four flights for a total of about eight hours.

Most of it was uneventful, but the flight on American Eagle from Dallas to College Station included an incident that concerns me. I’ve been through it before, and it has always concerned me, but this is the first time it happened since I’ve started this blog.

We were about to take off when an American Airlines mechanic boarded the plane, took the microphone, and announced that the plane was overweight. Four passengers would have to get off. This on a Saab commuter jet that was not completely full. There was one volunteer with “flexible travel plans” who was willing to take a later flight and earn a $200 travel voucher, but everybody else had to be in College Station. Their need to be there was the reason, after all, they had bought a ticket on this flight. American sold them the ticket without overselling the flight.

Since three more people had to deplane in order to bring the plane down to its required weight, the mechanic came back on and read off three names. These three were forced to get off with no consideration for the hardship they might face by not getting to their destination. One of the trio was on the plane with two colleagues who all had to be at a meeting at the same time. The other two opted to get off the plane and rent a car. By that time, the check-in process, security screening, and boarding cost them two hours they could have spent on the road. I wonder if they made it.

Of course, if weather or mechanical issues led to a delay or a cancellation, none of us would have gotten there. That’s the risk we all take when we fly. But that wasn’t the case. Fortunately, I wasn’t one of the three. But what would it have meant if I had been? I would have missed my speaking engagement, which would have cost me my speaking fee and my reputation as I put the conference organizers—who charged for the session—in a bind. I would have missed my flight to Houston connecting to Philadelphia, and if that kept me from Philadelphia, it would have cost me a consulting engagement. Would American have compensated me for the hardship? Hardly.

I understand the plane couldn’t take off at its original weight, but why couldn’t the airline know that in advance and deal with it by limiting the number of tickets available, leaving those who couldn’t get tickets to find alternative transportation well in advance? At the very least, they should have chartered a bus to get those passengers to College Station in the 3-1/2 hours it takes to drive from Dallas. They didn’t, as far as I know.

I despise the airlines, a troubling situation considering how much business I give them.

Posted by Shel in • Planes
(0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

Tuesday, March 21, 2006

I’m in Denver on the first leg of a five-day trip. I fly tomorrow morning to College Station, Texas, then tomorrow evening from there to Philadelphia. On Friday, I was scheduled to fly home to San Francisco. However, it turns out I need to go to Los Angeles instead, where my mother and other family live (and where I lived until 11 years ago); some family demands arose that require my presence back in LA.

I booked this entire series of flights on Travelocity, so I started there. I talked to two people—and was put on hold twice—before I was told I could make the change. To do so, though, I had to be transferred to the Reissue Desk. It was while I was reading my trip ID number to the Reissue Desk rep that the call was cut off. I had to start over. This time I was told by the Reissue Desk rep that I couldn’t make the change because I was already on the trip. He offered no advice about what I could do to accommodate my need to get to LA.

The flight to LA is on US Airways. It took three transfers at US Air to get to somebody who spent 20 minutes looking at my reservation before telling me United had booked the reservation so they would need to make the change. So I called United (where I have Premier Exec status). That was a 25-minute call. Fortunately, they were able to get me onto a United flight to LA and use the money I’d spent on the original ticket to pay for the new one. In fact, the United-LAX flight was $137 less than the US Air-SFO flight, so after the $100 change fee was factored in, I’m still getting a $37 refund.

So in the end, after nearly two hours on the phone, I was able to change my final destination. But it shouldn’t have been that hard. If my plans change, why can’t the people who shuttle you (supposedly) to where you want to go accommodate that need? I came this close to arriving in SFO at 10 p.m., going home, getting up at 6 a.m. and going back to the airport for a Southwest flight to Burbank.  Even though the outcome was what I wanted, it was aggravating getting there.

Posted by Shel in • Planes
(1) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

Thursday, March 09, 2006

Among the airlines I fly a lot, Southwest is near the top. For jaunts up and down the west coast, as well as trips to Phoenix and Vegas, Southwest’s schedule and prices are hard to beat. Because I stand in the Southwest boarding queue so frequently, I can state with certainty that the gate agent always reminds passengers before starting the boarding process that Southwest has open seating.

So yesterday I take a window seat on a flight from Portland back to Oakland. Moments later, another passenger takes the aisle seat. We’re both sitting comfortably, relaxing, when somebody else boarding the plane stops at our row, looks down at his boarding pass, and says to the guy in the aisle seat: “You’re in my seat.”

“What?” my rowmate says.

“Right here,” he says, tapping his ticket. “I’m in 14C.”

The seated passenger is befuddled. Behind us, another passenger says, “Our gate is C14. On Southwest, you just sit anywhere.”

The guy holding the boarding pass appears dazed for a couple seconds, then says, “Really? Cool!” and bounces on toward the back of the plane.

I only note this because it was a first: A Southwest passenger insisting that somebody was in his seat.

Posted by Shel in • Planes
(0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink

Friday, February 24, 2006

In San Francisco, if you dial 511 from your cell phone, you can get traffic reports. Nifty idea. Too bad it doesn’t work.

I was driving home from San Francisco International Airport this morning. I was already later than I had anticipated; flight delays at O’Hare. (Just imagine; flight delays at O’Hare!) I was also already aggravated. I had run from gate C4 at O’Hare with only minutes before my connecting flight was due to depart at 10:10 p.m.—that’s what it said on the monitor. When I got to gate C23, there wasn’t even a plane at the gate. I asked one of my fellow travelers what the United gate agent had announced. His voice dripping with sarcasm, he said, “They’ve been uncharacteristically quiet.”

It was more than an hour before we left. So I was in fine mood when we landed at 1:02 a.m. I took the shuttle to Park ‘N Fly. That’s another story. I called from inside the terminal for a pickup. “I’ll be there in five to six minutes,” the driver told me. Fifteen minutes later, I called again. “I’m four minutes away,” he said. I watched the shuttles of every off-airport parking service swing by before Park ‘N Fly showed up. It seems this happens every time I park with them. Why don’t I park elsewhere? Hell, that’s where all my affinity points are.

Anyway, it’s nearly 2 a.m. before I get out of the parking lot. I dial 511 and ask for traffic between SFO and the East Bay. “Driving time is 32 minutes,” the 511 voice told me. “There are no delays.”

Great! I drive toward the Bay Bridge, get to Fourth Street and am diverted off the freeway. The skyway is closed for repairs. The delay is an hour long as we snake along surface streets to get back on Highway 80 at First Street. How can 511 miss planned construction? Beats me, but it’s the last time I use this worthless service. Sure, I could have listened to the radio—which I will do henceforth—but with the 511 service in effect, I figured I could relax to some music and take advantage of the service to plot my route home. Fool me once…

Posted by Shel in • General • Planes
(0) Comments • (0) Trackbacks • Permalink