Glen Thomas, from Memphis Light, Gas, and Water, attended a workshop I taught in New York a few weeks back. He shared this tale by email and gave me permission to post it here.—Shel

I had reservations for Super Shuttle to pick me up. My flight had been delayed getting into La Guardia and I got in three hours later than expected. I called Super Shuttle at 9:30 and they said it would be about 25 minutes. About 35 minutes later, a Super Shuttle employee came in and said “Thomas” and moments later I was on my way. A few others were in the shuttle as well, so I didn’t think anything of it when the driver pulled up to an address in the 84th or 85th street. He then looked at me and said, “Thomas, Talia Thomas?” I told him no and proceeded to tell him at least four times that I was staying on 45th street. He called dispatch and gave them my name and they said they had no record of me. When I produced my confirmation number, they suddenly found my name but said I hadn’t called that night. They didn’t have much to say when I told them the dispatching employee’s name. At 11:30, two hours after I called, I finally got to my hotel, Club Quarters in Midtown.

The Club Quarters price is very good for a location that’s so close to Times Square. That’s all the positive comments I can provide. When I got there, the wi-fi that they advertised was not working. I
called the desk and was advised to “go out into the hall” to try it. I took this advice, and it still didn’t work. Over the course of the next five days, I asked the hotel staff six different times about
the internet access. Each time, they promised to check into it and get back to me. They never did. Luckily, our conference was at the Hilton, and I was able to take my laptop there and quickly get
online.

We requested that the hotel schedule a cab pickup for us the day of our departure. They instead called a pricier car service. We were 10 minutes late getting back, which was completely our fault, but then we waited for another 20 minutes for our luggage to be brought down. When we asked about the length of time it was taking, the indifferent concierge said, “It takes 15 minutes!”

When the employee kept coming down with partial or incorrect luggage, I asked if I could go up to help him identify our bags. They agreed and sent me to...get this...our room! That’s where they were keeping the luggage. Instead of 15 minutes, it was a short walk up the stars on the 2nd floor. The car service tacked on $25 for their wait, and the total cost was $75 to get to La Guardia. With little time to spare, we felt that we no choice but to pay the cost in order to make our flights. Terrible, terrible service.

Every now and then, a client books my hotel room for me, and occasionally, one of them actually pays for the room. Such was the case tonight, when I checked into the Westin Providence. I was surprised, though, when I handed the desk clerk my Starwood Preferred card and was told that I would not be credited with any points because somebody else was paying for the room.

I’ve been a business road warrior for nigh on 12 years, and this is the first time I have ever had my affinity card rejected because the client was picking up the tab. Of course, there would have been no question about getting points if my stay was going on my corporate American Express card. Never mind that I’d turn around and invoice my client that cost.

Frankly, I didn’t know until I got here that my client had already picked up the hotel tab. If the fact that I’m spending the night here—me, a member of the rewards program—isn’t enough to credit me with the points (my client isn’t going to get them after all), then I’ll make a point of staying in other hotels that don’t have such absurd policies. That would include—let me see now—all of them except Westin. Way to lose a customer, Starwood.

The service is apparently provided by Nomadix. I can tell because a small browser window that remains open all the time I’m online tells me so:

This graphic refreshes every couple of minutes with a very audible “click.” If the laptop volume is on, this click becomes part of what you’re listening to. Since I’m about to record my podcast over Skype with my co-host, that click will become part of the show.

Was nobody using their brains when configuring this service?

My wife and I landed on time (thanks, Southwest) and got our baggage. Then I headed over to the Alamo Rental Car desk; I’d booked an online reservation with Alamo. The line was 10 people long and not moving. There was not one other person at any of the other rental counters. Only one employee was working the Alamo desk and, as it turned out, was also handling the National desk. Everyone in line, as far as I could tell, had made a reservation that included information on when their flights were landing. Alamo knew there would be a surge of customers at that time, yet made no plans for additional personnel to handle the load. I stood in line for 30 minutes—during which two customers completed their transactions—before deciding to pay an extra $100 for our four-day trip and got a car from Budget.

Question for Alamo: Have you ever heard of this concept called “customer service?”

This time around, the meeting was in Atlanta. It was a lock, a set date. I even coordinated a presentation with another participant. Then, last minute—that being today, with the meeting on Friday—the meeting was postponed. Too many people canceled due to illness or work or personal emergencies.

Rescheduling my flight was one nightmare, costing me about $500 in change fees and fare differences, but that was offset by the unused portion of my original itinerary being put in a bank for my use any time during the next year. With my schedule, I’ll probably use it within the next week. The real killer was the hotel. I booked with the Hilton Suites Atlanta Perimeter. Since I’m using my own money, no reimbursement, I opted for the special non-refundable web rate, pre-charged to my credit card. I called to cancel and found there was no accommodation at all. No putting the money in a bank for another night. No points to my Hilton Honors account (I’m a Silver HHonors VIP, whatever the hell that’s good for), no nothing.

I’m not blaming Hilton, mind you. It was clear when I booked it that it was non-refundable. But I will never, ever, avail myself of that option again. This meeting was a sure thing and yet it isn’t happening, and I’m out $250.80, just because I wanted to save $20 or $30 over a refundable rate. I’d rather pay the higher rate and be able to cancel than risk losing it all. My advice: Stay away from these offers. Under the circumstances, I have to question why the hotels even offer them.

I arrived at O’Hare from SFO and was pleased to find out that the gate for my connecting flight was very close. The gate was announced by the purser. I checked it again with the gate agent. And it was on the departure video screen. So I planted myself at the departure gate, powered up my laptop, and started answering email.

A plane arrived, but boarding didn’t start. The boarding time came and went. I finally went to the desk...and found another flight listed there. I rushed to the video monitor to find my flight had moved to another terminal...and it was already boarding. I ran to the gate and asked if an announcement had been made at the original gate. The gate agent shrugged. The person behind me, panting, said she had been at the other gate, too, and no announcement had been made. Again, the gate agent shrugged.

If other companies treated their customers the way the airlines do, they’d be out of business.

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?

The Net connection was so bad, so slow, that we could not hear each other over Skype, and we finally gave up. Then I tried to get my email. The connection was so slow that I couldn’t get one message. I disconnected from the hotel line and popped in my Sprint wireless broadband card and got my email with no problem.

When I checked out later, I told the clerk at the front desk how awful the connection was. “I’ve heard that,” he said. “Sorry.” He did not offer to refund the $10.95.

The Hilton Anatole is a nice hotel. I won’t be staying there again.

And can somebody explain why the pricier hotels charge for Internet access while the cheaper ones (like Fairfield Inns) do not? Especially when they’re managed by the same groups (Hilton, Marriott, etc.)?

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…