Delta Obviously Doesn't Need Customers
 

About six weeks ago I wrote about how a $500 voucher for Delta Airlines (awarded to me when I was bumped from a flight) was accidentally thrown out as my husband rushed around looking for insurance paperwork when I was being admitted for unexpected surgery. People answered that they doubted Delta would be sympathetic, but to try to get them to replace the voucher.<BR><BR>Well, it's obvious Delta thinks they can afford to lose customers. I tried calling their customer service reps twice and a supervisor refused to even speak to me.<BR><BR>Then I wrote to "Customer Care" (now THERE'S an oxymoron!) and told them I'd been a loyal Delta customer for years (which is true) and I felt they needed to keep such loyal customers and thought it was reasonable to expect them to replace it. When the letter went unanswered, I sent an e-mail asking if I'd ever get an answer. Three days later, a short letter telling me "Too bad" arrived. It also wished me good travels on my future Delta flights!<BR><BR>Do you guys think all of these airlines are STILL so unreasonable? There's no doubt I will NEVER fly Delta again!

Delta cannot give out vouchers to everyone who claims to have lost one. You should have treated it as cash and kept up with it. If they had given you cash and you lost it, that would probably be their fault too.

Try this,can't hurt! <BR>write to Jocelyn Barrow<BR>c/o Customer Care<BR>1600 Smith Street 34th floor<BR>Houston Texas 77002<BR>Tell her that you were referred to her by someone in NY that she helped out last summer.Then just tell her not only what your problem is but how badly you have been dealt with by the people at Delta...she did a lot for us.Hope this helps.C

I'm still unclear as to why the rules don't apply to you.

Replacing vouchers is a very touchy subject with airlines. If you have had them before, you are usually aware that losing them is like losing cash and they go straight to the safe deposit box. From personal experience, I have seen some lost vouchers replaced and some not. I think it really depends on who is handling your customer service request. Another Delta rep may have been more sympathetic. In fact, you may want to keep trying. Airlines do get worn down in these cases and you may finally get lucky. But its an uphill battle. In the case of vouchers, there are definitely two sides of the issue: airlines can't simply replace vouchers as they don't really know if the vouchers in question really existed in the first place. On the other hand, they should believe you, the trustworthy customer. My suggestion is to keep trying. PS: Others who write to you here may not be so kind.

Only deal with the reps in Texas, that is how I was able to solve my dispute....and remember the squeaky wheel gets the grease! That is what I learned with Delta...Texas office only!!

Celeste, since you have the excuse of the hospital emergency, that should sway things a little in your favor.Do let us know how it goes,good luck,c

My husband, too, has the horrifying habit of "cleaning up". All the airlines pretend to be sympathetic, "Customer Care", yeah right. In actuality, you are at the behest of their policies, procedures, administrative guidelines, or whatever. In other words, they simply could not be less concerned, yet have all those "rules" to fall back on. Sadly, you're probably out of luck without your voucher. Delta could not care less about dissaatisfied customers, as each and every competitive airline has similarly dissatified customers. Truth is - ever since "deregulation" ALL the airlines have had us by the you know whats. They have rules, regulations, administrative policies, all supported by the US Government. The airlines continuously expect the US Government to get them out of tough situations, but when has the US Government ever once responded to the traveling public???

Yes, it's true that they should trust you, the worthy and loyal customer. Obviously if the certificate had been lost by a non worthy and non loyal customer, they would write Delta and say, "I've never flown with you before, but. . ." So of course, Delta should believe you over those other people. I once lost a whole stack of brand new $100 bills. So I marched right to my bank where I've been a loyal customer for years and told them what had happened. Of course, since I was a loyal customer they gave me a new stack immediately. It should be the same with the airlines.

Thank you for alerting me, Celeste, of this horrible situation. I will never fly Delta again. The very nerve of them, not issuing you a brand new voucher immediately when you threw out the old one.

Why do Terry & xxxx have such a bad attitude about this? Celeste has had difficulties with this matter and Delta, does she need to hear your opinions? nooooooo...I don't think so, did she ask for your opinions,noooooo.So if you havent got anything constructive to say, butt out.

How nice that these few posters have never had a problem that cost them money, whether it was their fault or not.How sad that these rude people cannot read on without leaving a little of their own bitterness towards other people.How sad that we have to share this site, meant for advice and travel questions, with people who have absolutely nothing to contribute.

I consider myself to be a generally sympathetic person. But I cannot figure out why Celeste needs our sympathy for throwing out a certificate. Sure it was an unfortunate accident, but what do you really expect Delta to do about it, anymore than the person above making fun about their bank replacing lost cash? How is one really any different from the other? Also, if I remember the original post, didn't this whole episode happen more than a year after the certificate was issued? If I remember right, Celeste was asked about the time limitation of the certificate which is usually one year. Did we ever get an answer? How loyal a Delta customer are you, Celeste, if more than a year passed before you even rebooked a Delta flight that you could use it for? A "loyal" or "frequent flyer" for an airline normally books up to one flight a month with an airline, not one every couple of years. Did Delta look at your record and see that you do many flights a year with them and still deny you a reissued certificate?

Come on Celeste, answer the questions! I guess you have to earn sympathy around here, even if you aren't asking for it.All you asked for was advice..sure got more than that didn't you? Delta should be a piece of cake after the responses you are getting here!

As someone said, since you have a medical excuse they should honor it. Yes, that makes a lot of sense. Anyone going into a hospital for surgery is likely to throw out all important papers for the last year, including cash and certificates equal to cash. It's only logical. Last year I had my gall bladder removed and I was so upset, I accidentally lost my car and cashed in my IRA from which I immediately misplaced all the cash. I'm still trying to get the stock broker to reissue the cash I've lost. And since I've bought four cars from the same dealer, I can't imagine why the dealer won't give me a new one. After all I'm a loyal customer and he should know I lost it by accident.

Celeste-the key word here is voucher! You did not spend any money for this voucher and the stories along with it are unfortunately, a dime a dozen. I work for an airline and you would be so surprised on how many stories like this have the same thread.Let it go and go on with your life! I know that even my airline would not have given you a new voucher.

Hey, I remember this story. If I remember correctly-your voucher was probably expired and you had surgery after the date and thought that you could convince them with that story,right? My question is: why would you be looking for insurance paperwork if it was unexpected surgery? If it was that precious-why would you have it just laying around instead of in a china cabinet or someplace important so it would not get thrown out.Don't bad mouth an airline because of your error!

Celeste I am sorry that your husband lost your voucher but it is the passenger's responsibility to be RESPONSIBLE. You clearly illustrate that you are above the rules. Do you call your bank if you lose money?<BR>I am sorry but I get tired of hearing people scream about situations they themselves have brought about. If I was Delta I would not want your business. Sorry but you need to grow up.

"Sorry but you need to grow up."<BR><BR>Best advice I've read in this entire thread.<BR>

The airlines have elaborate systems to refund lost and stolen tickets. For example, it requires sophisticated programing to detect attempted use of tickets that have been previously refunded.<BR><BR>It's too much to expect the airlines to establish a parallel system for bump vouchers. You must think of them as cash.

I remember the original post. Delta owes you nothing -- YOU LOST IT. Thrown out while looking for insurance paperwork; oh, so it's Delta's fault that your records are unorganized.<BR><BR>Look in the mirror ... accept the consequences ... choose another airline ... stop whining.<BR>

Celeste - I would like to know your answer to this question: what would you do if Delta replaced your lost voucher and subsequently you found the original. You thought it was thrown away but it showed up hidden somewhere. It is still worth $500 toward a flight. Would you now throw it away since it was replaced? The reason that this is an important question is that Delta is a for profit business and if they replaced every lost voucher, they would have a problem since lost items are sometimes found. The probability of you using the lost voucher is very high and Delta would lose $500. The amount is not important but the idea behind it.

Sorry--but on the vouchers it says "no refund if lost or stolen"...That means you and everyone else. <BR><BR>American, USair, Nw, Co and even SW would have all done the same thing. Surgery or not..no sympathy vote here. <BR><BR>

I remember first reading this post a while back and having no sympathy for Celeste. I read it again and still believe that the airline is doing the right thing - lost is lost and rules are rules, but...<BR><BR>Why do they need to issue some paper voucher? They have all of your info on a computer and if she is a loyal customer, I would expect that she has aSky Miles acct. It would be much more secure for them to just go on to their computer and type "$500 voucher" along with your Skymile acct. Also, this would bring the loyal customers back and people wouldn't be selling their vouchers on Ebay (I know Southwest vouchers are transferrable, I've sold them on before - assume same for Delta?)They maintain electronic accts of my Skymiles and as soon as I approach $25k, they send my name and address to MCI and Amex to try and get me to sign up with something to get more Skymiles so I get that bonus ticket!<BR><BR>Again, I think Celeste is SOL and she should have taken better care of the voucher, I keep mine in a fire box( tho one time my better half lost the key and I had to find a lockpicking web site to teach me to get the box open - hehe). But I hate having to hang on to papers when all of this stuff can be done electronically and once again, the airlines are behind the times.

If I were Delta, I wouldn't want this Celeste creature for a customer. I would say, "Good bye and good riddance!"

It's part of the problem with our society today...nothing is our fault. Take responsibility for your actions, learn from it, and move on. Don't blame it on your husband, as you could have kept it in a safe place. Don't use your surgery as a sympathy grab. From now on transfer all your valuable papers to a secure place. Quit letting this eat you up into a disgruntled bitter...Delta's not losing any sleep over it, and from the sounds of it either are other posters...

what is SOL?<BR><BR>Good luck Celeste,hope it works out.

S_ _T out of Luck!

Just like so many other aspects of society, people refuse to take responsibility for their own actions. It's always somebody else's fault. This is no different. Doesn't matter if the reason is medical or a Super Bowl party. The fact is, they didn't keep an eye on their voucher and it was lost. Delta is under no responsibility to replace it, no matter how intense the sob story.<BR><BR>Bottom line, people.

No further comments Celeste? You started the thread.

I lost my parking ticket at a mall today and had to pay $40 to get my car out of the garage. Should have cost $2 with validated parking. Should I scream at the mall or the parking company? I think not. I lost the ticket. It stinks, but I'm out $40.

I once wrote a complaint about a bad "airline" experience on the www.passengersrights.com web site and I got results! It is worth trying!

I meant www.passengerrights.com

Kathy - <BR><BR>I hope you were being facetious when you told Terry and xxx that Celeste didn't ask for their opinions - that's EXACTLY what she did.

It sure was a thrill to be able to get Fodors.com come up on my computer for the first time in two days and then see that my thread was the very first one.<BR><BR>I won't bother to reply to the majority of posters who are too chickens__t to use their actual e-mail addresses to write their asinine replies. But to the seven people who expressed concern, asked questions, AND identified themselves, I'll just let you know - the voucher was NOT expired, it was thrown out because my husband was just a little shook up over me having emergency surgery in which I almost died, the airlines could easily have checked and seen that I did not fly since the voucher was issued and it is not transferable, I wrote to the CEO of Delta and of course have not received an answer, I finally reached a Delta employee who verified that they can easily ascertain that the voucher hasn't been used and said I should keep trying, and thank you for the Houston address and I will try that next.<BR><BR>To the rest of you - it's obvious you live shallow, stupid lives and have nothing better to do than harass people on these boards requesting advice and information. I feel truly sorry for all of you. And if you had brains, you'd feel sorry for yourselves.<BR><BR>Yeah, that's my e-mail address up there, you losers. Write to me privately and see how many times I have to hit the delete key without opening the message!

OK, now I get it, Celeste. You never really wanted true opinions. You were simply asking for all those people who agreed that you had been screwed to speak up and support you. Now that the vast majority have made it clear that you were totally in the wrong, you are blocking out all their logical comments and simply looking at the people who said, "oh, poor baby, why are they treating you this way?" Yes, that's the way it should work. Let's only look at one side of the issue, not the logical conclusions. I am sorry you almost died, but that is no reason for all the clearly stated rules to be thrown out. Literally millions of people nearly die every day, in fact hundreds of thousands of them do. So we should suspend all the clearly stated rules for anyone who has some medical problem? You have never once explained why you feel that your carelessness should exempt you from the clearly stated rules. And just for the record, how many times in say, the last ten years have you flown on Delta to make you such a valued customer? 75? 100? 150? even that last figure is only 15 times a year, not much of a frequent flyer these days. I'm still trying to figure out why it took you over a year to use up this coupon if you are such a frequent Delta flyer. I still strongly suspect that Delta will not go bankrupt from the loss of your "valued" business.

You know, Celeste, I bet if you try real hard you could do a pretty good rendition of that woeful cry Lucy used to do so well. Go ahead - give it a try. You remember how it went don't you -- "WWWAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!".

Celeste,I hope the Houston address works..Keep trying,Good luck.

Dear Celeste:<BR>I do feel sorry for one person in this whole ordeal.<BR>Your husband.<BR>I'm sure that dealing with your whiny, no responsibility attitude 24/7 is the very definition of being tied to the whipping post.

Well, looks like everybody was able to rest after Fodors was down for a while and now they are all back, nice and nasty.Thick as flies on s***...buzzing around, full of themselves, self satisfied and mean....yikes...Fodors, take it away!