xxx

Guy screwed up his family's vacation and wants USAir to make it up to him. No way.

danna

USAir has very recently relaxed the "missed flight" rules. You now have until midnight on the night of your flight to resched.

USAir has the right to make whatever rules they want. And their customers have the right to complain bitterly about them (which I did...and apparently many others did too.) The newly relaxed rules seem fair to me and are a great example of the free market in action.

Unlucky Guy got caught after the first rule change and before the recent one.

Debi

One thing I would recommend - is if you see that you could potentially have an issue - why wouldn't you call the airlines then, and ask them what your options are? Non-refundable is exactly what it says - but we have called in advance and been able to change the flights (with the $100 change fee - of course). That way, you would have either a) known in advance you were out of luck or b) gotten confirmed on a later flight.

Chuck

Guy may in fact be a troll but what about the "flat tire rule" that most airlines have for this sort of thing. Maybe that was what Guy was referring to when he said if he had been there within 2 hours of his original flight time he would have been okay. Did I miss it or did no one else know about "flat tire" and are all the negative posters just quick to say tough luck don't get lost or get a flat tire.

xxx

No, most of those posting "bad luck" don't begin a normal 2 hour drive only allowing 2 hours and don't plan to arrive at an airport only 30 minutes before flight time -- assuming that there are absolutely no delays. I always plan to be at the airport at least one and a half hours before flight. And if I had a 2 hour drive, I'd allow an extra hour just in case. If Guy had done just that, there wouldn't have been a problem. Only an idiot would cut it so close.

topper

To the top

kay

Well, folks, you ain't gonna believe this. My mother-in-law had a ticket in hand, nonrefundable, deeply discounted, the whole bit. She decided that twelve days at Christmas weren't enough to spend with her son and daughter-in-law, me. (HA HA, it was more than plenty for me.) She's had some family tragedies so my husband said can we ask her to come earlier and she won't end up coming earlier because she will have to pay a fee to change and she won't do that.

So, she checked with her travel agent, who said the fee to change the ticket would be $250 Canadian (she lives in Ontario). My 82-year-old mother-in-law decided that was outrageous and said she was going to call US Air herself to see if she could get them to wave the fee to change the ticket. Her travel agent said, ha, good luck.

LONG story short, my mother-in-law is now staying with us EIGHTEEN days because US Air waved the change fee!!!! so that she could come down to Texas to visit her last close remaining relative, my husband. Wasn't she lucky!!??!!

Just when you think you can count on companies to fulfill their images, they change on you. I think this is an incredible story and I swear to you it is true true true. Go figure.

Lynn

Had non-refundable SWA ticket Sacramento to Los Angeles
Hazardous waste spill on Freeway==closed !!!!for 5 hrs..The only alternate road was totally grid-lock. Usually 1 hour drive took
us4 hrs. (we always allow 3 hr. to get there) We called ahead on cell phone..They put us on next flight out without extra charge. IF it was necessary to wait until next day it would have been $ 25 for each ticket.
One issue to consider in this type of case...There were a LOT of people that missed flights and I think this was one reason they were so accomodating--not wanting to deal with a lots of upset customers....

Craig

Well, apparently Guy has disappeared. After reading all 48 posts above, I am wondering why he didn't call the airline as soon as he knew he was going to miss his flight. I know that I would want the peace-of-mind of knowing that a flight would be available when I eventually arrived at the airport.

TvlPro

One more thing... If you bought your ticket PRIOR to the rules change, you may be able to argue that they cannot impose new rules on a ticket you purchased prior to.
AA let me fly stand by last week. When I asked them if they were breaking the rules for little 'ol me, they said NO... the new rules start 1/1/03 on tickets NOT purchased through Priceline or Hotwire, etc...
I'm sorry this happened to you but everyone is just going to have to face the fact that these are the rules. Leave early... VERY early if necessary.
Ask yourself if you can still make it to the a/p if you have a flat on the way or hit back traffic. If you have to cross a bridge to get to the a/p leave even earlier!

McNally

Guy should have read a map, asked directions, left earlier, apologized to his family, called the airline from the road BEFORE take-off time, and either taken the kids on some other vacation or bought new tickets.

Rocky

Re Lynn's Post above...SouthWest Airlines is a TOTALLY different case and set of rules.Like all the low fare carriers ,JetBlue/AirTrans/Spirit/etc etc they have different rules and policies.Generally speaking,I have seen fellow travellers have better luck in a difficult situation when a rule needed stretching.