Sorry Atlanta, you are a fine city, but I can hardly refrain from recommending to anyone to avoid airplane connections at your airport. My 1:45 flight from Baltimore here landed an hour late, and despite Delta’s announcements that “connecting flights had been notified”, they did not relay this to my Austin connection, which left without me. So its an extra 4 hours stuck here, and being told I am “lucky” I did not have to stay overnight.
It has something to do here about runway construction. Is there an airport anywhere in the universes not under construction?
But my sentence here is confounded more. I found there is no way I can can to the Austin airport Friday in time to catch my flight home to Phoenix (thanks to Austin’s lovely traffic), so I began the process calling Expedia to get a flight change. Oops, because my trip is in progress, I have to call America West. This is where the fun began getting funnier. Not. I was transferred to 6 different “service” agents, repeating six times my confirmation number, flight number, last name, belly button diameter…. at AmericaWest/USAir/WhoKnowsWhoElseWorksHere and the last woman processing my request for a later flight returned after 8 minutes of hold music to let me know that nothing c an be done since I have not completed my flight to Austin. That was another 45 minutes of my life seeing washing in concentric circles going down the flush hole.
I am sure at Business School 101 there is all this grandiose fluff about treating customers right, but out here in Concourse D of Purgatory, it just ain’t washing.
Grrrrrr..
yes, I was there at the Atlanta airport this summer and got the same story about construction…at least you had your computer!!! We got to watch the World Cup at the bar near Air France…France beat Portugal….
I do like your blog and your attitude. I am preparing my thesis on Learning Objects at the University of Florence where I live…thus podcasting interests me as an LO…
ciao,
Susan
Hang in, big dog. It’s no fun to be caught in airport hell–I remember Bryan A.’s epic blog on his own time in the fifth circle, or maybe it was the sixth–and I do sympathize. My own Atlanta horrors don’t go much farther than waiting three hours on the tarmac for a thunderstorm to pass, but that was plenty for me. The world’s busiest airport needs better management, methinks.
P.S. Thanks a bunch for the shirt! Perfect.
Maybe the problem is Atlanta airport, but it could be choice of airline. In my personal flight experience, America West has sucked since the merge with US Airways. And Delta? I’m not flying with them any more. You are the third missed/cancelled flight I’ve heard about recently. You may find Ze Frank’s experience with Delta earlier this year amusing …
http://www.zefrank.com/theshow/archives/2006/05/051506.html
Oh, and here’s Ze’s documentation of the followup from Delta’s customer service. Priceless.
http://www.zefrank.com/theshow/archives/2006/06/062106.html