Big thumbs up to Continental, re: Rita reschdule
 

My cousin and wife are flying IAH-EWR-HKG on bulk "U" fare from a consolidator. They were supposed to fly out Sunday morning.

Just 10 minutes ago, I called the regular international line (they're not elites anymore, and I don't want to abuse the system). First call didn't go through probably due to high call volume out of Houston - a SBC problem, not CO. Hit redial, and in one minute was connected to a rep in SLC after punching "5" for international. No prolonged wait or anything.

Got the date they've wanted Wed 9/28 - same flight same everything. Changed within 45 seconds. I logged back on continental.com, and new flight is reflected and I chose new seats for them. Email confirmation also came through within 3 minutes.

Whole process took 5 minutes, everything went as smoothly as humanly and electronically possible.

I was expecting to be put on hold for half and hour or more, as I'm sure call volume must be humongous with IAH being CO's HQ and big hub. I was extremely surprised.

Man, that's cool. I really like Continental, and wish I could use them more often.

They have really great service, IMHO, and I like that they got the "frills" still when everyone else doesn't.

It's a shame they're not out on the West Coast more, otherwise I'd be flying with them home to Dallas alot more...and other places.

Good to hear good service is alive.

Glad to hear the good feedback, but not really surprised. I'm a regular CO customer in large part because they do such a good job of customer service. In situtations where I have to fly another carrier I constantly find myself comparing their (lack of) service to CO's.

I'm missing the "nice surprise" here? All the airlines have hurricane policy posted well before.
All airlines allow you to change flights without any fees if you are flying into/out of the hurricane areas. Also all airlines announced a full refund when and if your flight(s) got cancelled.

Sorry, CO is not that special in this case.

I should have said:

all airlines announced a full refund option(no fees) when and if your flight got cancelled. You do not have to take any other flight if that's your choice.

Sure, all airlines are being quite liberal about their cancellation/change policies. I think Continental is special here in that they would have the most difficult time in the Rita aftermath. Their hub is closed, something the other airlines don't have to contend with. And for them to come through so quickly and efficiently is the nice surprise. I'd fully have expected to be on hold for a long time and would have just chalked it up to the way things are.

Good for them. :)

Well, if you read Patty's other thread, she was put on hold for "300 minutes" on Thursday, but got through in only 200+.

rkkwan: Good for you. I love Continental. I've had some hurricane issues in the past. They agreed not to charge me the change fees, even though their own cutoff date had passed. Several tickets were involved. That's the way to keep customers coming back.
We (humans) tend to report complaints all the time but not the good stuff.
And when the good stuff is reported, it'd be nice if somebody didn't try to make it less than it is.