Location: Nearly equidistant from EWR and PHL. Stranger in a strange land - a Devils fan in Phlyers country.
Programs: PWP Chief of Les Clefs d':rolleyes:, Sarcasm Diamond, Stupidity Hater Titanium, CO Silver
Posts: 14,033
Quote:
Originally Posted by customer
Okay
I arrive here this morning 7AM for the 9AM flight
this time with the BP in my hand.
I get to the gate no problem.
feeling fresh and good.
Then the flight gets delayed,
some problem with the door.
It's delayed to 10AM.
and now to 1PM.
I go up to ask if they can do anything about my connecting flight in Honolulu.
But no,
I should've booked it in one ticket.
Nothing they can do except give me information on alternative flights.
But that I can find out by myself.
this sucks.
I just can't understand how I'm not allowed to board when I'm there one hour early but they can get away with delaying 4 hours with their own fault.
This trip has been just too difficult for me.
and thinking I could've just got on yesterday,
and be in Hawaii right now makes it worse.
Acutally some people said I should've told them I'd already checked in yesterday.
I have!!!
I went up to the re-booking agent and told her the situation just to be sent back to the line because there were people that have been waiting in line.
I complained to another agent nearby and he was going to go and check with the gate for me, and then was told by the first agent that he cannot let me jump in line because people are complaining.
I understand the principle
but if he had just printed out the BP then and let me through at that point.
that was at least thirty minutes prior and I would have been in Hawaii now.
I've given up all my plans now,
and I just want to get to my destination before the end of the day.
What use is the arrival time if you can't plan accordingly.
might as well just say you'll be there some random time within that day .
Is it my fault again that I didn't book all flights in one ticket?
It's like you need to get a degree to learn all these "flying rules" beforehand.
Sorry for all the ranting
but this sucks.
Honest question: Do you feel that the rules simply do not apply to you? No, I'm not attacking despite my earlier post in this thread bemoaning the OP. I just get that vibe from reading the posts. Also, how much air travel experience do you have? I'm not going to poke fun if you say "not that much", but I am truthfully curious. And on another (somewhat comical) note, do you feel that pressing Enter between thoughts is something that helps you? ()
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The UDU is an African drum originated by the Igbo people of Nigeria. An EUA is an upgrade.|My FM|Our FM
In your mind it might be absurd but if you find yourself in the same place then please remember where to place the blame... Yourself. As I have said before if you have a problem with the lines you need to wait on to clear security then by all means contact the TSA.
This thread has nothing to do with the lines to clear security. It has to do with the line to reprint a boarding pass for someone who has already checked-in. That has nothing to do with the TSA and everything to do with CO's staffing at LAX. If CO would just put three check-in kiosks at the entrance to its terminal in LAX the OP would have made his flight. It's absurd that CO doesn't have these kiosks at an airport as important as LAX.
If check-in lanes are long then so will the security lanes be long. In all reguards the OP still didn't have enough time. So far it seems like LAX has been working very well for many decades. If the company felt they needed more kiosk machines, then they'd be there. The OP could of avioded all these problems by getting to the airport earlier. It really is not that difficult of a thing to do... At all.
Programs: CO Platinum or Gold since the dark days, now MM
Posts: 95
I actually like CO......
Quote:
Originally Posted by COEWRFA
If check-in lanes are long then so will the security lanes be long. In all reguards the OP still didn't have enough time. So far it seems like LAX has been working very well for many decades. If the company felt they needed more kiosk machines, then they'd be there. The OP could of avioded all these problems by getting to the airport earlier. It really is not that difficult of a thing to do... At all.
......but what happenned to the OP was plain not right. If she was already checked-in, she should not have had to wait in line and miss her flight. I sense that you think that the onus is always on the passenger to get there earlier and not for CO to be more helpful. That comes from a large company attitude operating in an oligoploy with a slogan that is not genuine. "We know you have a choice of..." actually means "if you are flying from one of our hubs, we know you don't have that many choices..."
Hey "customer" - here's hoping that you have used up ALL of your bad luck for the whole year and that the rest of 2009 is filled with great travel experiences for you.
Be sure and keep hanging around Flyertalk and learn all kind of good tips for making future travel a little less insane!
Programs: AA Exec Plat, CO Plat, DL Plat, HH Diamond, Hyatt Diamond, *Wood Plat, Hertz President's Circle.
Posts: 17,382
Quote:
Originally Posted by COEWRFA
If check-in lanes are long then so will the security lanes be long. In all reguards the OP still didn't have enough time. So far it seems like LAX has been working very well for many decades. If the company felt they needed more kiosk machines, then they'd be there. The OP could of avioded all these problems by getting to the airport earlier. It really is not that difficult of a thing to do... At all.
I would take exception to a number of your comments. For example, if the OP had a boarding pass at LAX--or could get one quickly--he or she would have had more than enough time to get to the gate.
From the perspective of the passenger, check in at LAX hasn't worked well for the last decade. Over the past ten years, the level of service at the airport has declined; it simply doesn't compare with the experience a frequent flyer gets when flying out of LAX on AA.
It may be the case that if the company felt that more machines were needed, they'd be installed. However, machines may be needed and management is oblivious of that fact.
Finally, while it's fine to exhort people to spend more time at the airport, for a frequent flyer, there's one and only one reason to go to an airport; that is, to leave the airport. A carrier that helps process people through the airport and onto aircraft as quickly as possible will, all else being equal, garner more business than those that don't.
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Airline grades: AA B; AF B; DL B; B6 A; BA A-; CO D; NW F; NZ B+; UA D-; WN A
......but what happenned to the OP was plain not right. If she was already checked-in, she should not have had to wait in line and miss her flight. I sense that you think that the onus is always on the passenger to get there earlier and not for CO to be more helpful. That comes from a large company attitude operating in an oligoploy with a slogan that is not genuine. "We know you have a choice of..." actually means "if you are flying from one of our hubs, we know you don't have that many choices..."
I think an error occurred because the OP expressed the need to "check in" when in fact the OP could more accurately have said "reprint my boarding pass." It would have been helpful if the CO employee had read the OP's mind and seen the error, but given what was probably a hectic situation, the CO employee did not do so - all this having been compounded by the OP's last-minute arrival and the lack of front-line kiosks. It's an unfortunate case in which no one factor caused the problem, but all the contributing factors led to a significant travel disruption for the OP.
To bring that to what is (I hope) a more helpful conclusion, I would advise anyone traveling for any reason to aim to arrive at the airport at least 90 minutes before departure, adding time for possible traffic delays, an unfamiliar airport/airline, the number of queues to negotiate (more if returning a rental car, checking bags, clearing immigration, etc.). Such a margin of error allows at least a little time to correct any complications introduced by traffic congestion, full parking decks, reservation screw-ups, intra-airport transit malfunctions, long TSA lines/extra screening, and all the other little things that can delay a passenger before he/she even sees the plane. By following this rule (even at a big o/d airport like ATL or EWR), I've almost always found myself at the gate with plenty of time to spare.
None of the above is meant to excuse the lack of kiosks or understaffing or other errors on CO's part; it is meant, practically speaking, to give the OP more time to recover from those errors should they occur - and 90-120 minutes isn't THAT much time.
If check-in lanes are long then so will the security lanes be long. In all reguards the OP still didn't have enough time. So far it seems like LAX has been working very well for many decades. If the company felt they needed more kiosk machines, then they'd be there. The OP could of avioded all these problems by getting to the airport earlier. It really is not that difficult of a thing to do... At all.
This is wrong on a number of levels. First, 30 minutes is the longest security line I have ever experienced at any airport outside of LAS on certain Sundays and the immediate aftermath of 9/11. One hour is always enough time as long as the airline doesn't do anything to intervene.
Second, the fact that LAX "has been working well for decades" (whatever that means) is irrelevant. There is no reason such a major airport should not have something as simple as kiosks available for the passengers who keep the lights on at CO - frequent flyers who tend not to check luggage.
Third, getting to the airport more than an hour before a flight without bags is "that difficult" for many of us who need to work while on a trip. I realize the OP was going to HI, so it was probably leisure, but the problem experienced by the OP could happen to any of us.
Are you an FA? Do you get to the airport 90-120 minutes before your domestic flight departs?
This is wrong on a number of levels. First, 30 minutes is the longest security line I have ever experienced at any airport outside of LAS on certain Sundays and the immediate aftermath of 9/11. One hour is always enough time as long as the airline doesn't do anything to intervene.
Second, the fact that LAX "has been working well for decades" (whatever that means) is irrelevant. There is no reason such a major airport should not have something as simple as kiosks available for the passengers who keep the lights on at CO - frequent flyers who tend not to check luggage.
Third, getting to the airport more than an hour before a flight without bags is "that difficult" for many of us who need to work while on a trip. I realize the OP was going to HI, so it was probably leisure, but the problem experienced by the OP could happen to any of us.
Are you an FA? Do you get to the airport 90-120 minutes before your domestic flight departs?
Sorry, not a FA, just a OP., but I consistently either take the train to EWR from NYC or drive with the aim of hitting the rail station or the parking garage about 70 minutes before departure, figuring that I'll be at security with my pre-printed boarding pass and carry-on luggage about an hour before a flight. Typically, I'm thru security in 5-10 minutes and have time for a short trip to the PC club to get a newspaper, go to the bathroom, and have a quick coffee. I'm elite, so the lines at security usually are a little faster, but I doubt that many take more than 15 minutes. Unless you are checking luggage or need the attention of an agent at the checkin counter, there is absolutely no reason to arrive more than 60 minutes before a flight. One would also assume that when CO recommends 90 minutes, they're including checkin time and baggage check.
On the other hand, I arrive in BOS on a connecting flight this spring, went to Cape AIr to pick up my boarding pass and headed for security with about 45 minutes to go for my flight to Martha's VIneyard (in Terminal C) and the lines were backed up far into the terminal. I was about to panic because it looked like at least an hours line, when I heard someone behind me calling me by my first name. I turned around and it was the Cape Air agent that had checked me in chasing me down. I figured I had left something at the counter or she was going to tell me that the flight was cancelled. Instead she said "follow me, I'm going to take you through this mess," and she marched me up to the front and walked me through. Occasionally in SFO, I heard someone from the CO desk come over to security and yell out asking if there was anyone on line for a certain flight that was leaving soon, and then escort them thru at the head of the line.
If check-in lanes are long then so will the security lanes be long. In all reguards the OP still didn't have enough time. So far it seems like LAX has been working very well for many decades. If the company felt they needed more kiosk machines, then they'd be there. The OP could of avioded all these problems by getting to the airport earlier. It really is not that difficult of a thing to do... At all.
I can't think of the last time I've flown on NW or DL out of an airport with more than a couple flights per day where there wasn't at least one kiosk available outside of the agent/baggage check lines to print a boarding pass.
Now, I'm not saying the OP is not at fault at all for what happened. But if that kiosk had been available (and as a pretty darn frequent flyer I would expect it to be), the OP would have easily made it through a relatively long security line in under an hour and been in Hawaii that day.
If you work for CO, possibly you should listen to what customers here are saying about their experience instead of responding with an attitude that suggest to me that you know absolutely everything already. I've worked quite a few customer service jobs. If I responded with my job title apparent to a customer issue on a public forum like you did above—no matter how wrong the customer was—I would have been fired or severely disciplined from any of those jobs.
Last edited by SamOF; Jan 4, 09 at 8:04 pm.
Reason: grammir iz gud.
......but what happenned to the OP was plain not right. If she was already checked-in, she should not have had to wait in line and miss her flight. I sense that you think that the onus is always on the passenger to get there earlier and not for CO to be more helpful. That comes from a large company attitude operating in an oligoploy with a slogan that is not genuine. "We know you have a choice of..." actually means "if you are flying from one of our hubs, we know you don't have that many choices..."
+1
I had a similar experience flying from EWR to MCO on NW several years back. I take full responsibility for not anticipating that my car service driver would get lost on the way to EWR and thus getting me to EWR only 40 minutes before my flight. The NW kiosk rejected me and the agent was perplexed at why the gate agent had closed the flight early, but called the gate to see if he could still clear me since I was CO plat and in first. He told me that the gate had already given my seat away and that the flight was oversold. They rebooked me on a later flight.
That experience always left a bad taste in my mouth wrt NW despite the fact that it was caused my my initial error of not checking in online that day.
Back to the OP's problems. I agree that there are a lot of things that the OP could have done to avoid the problems, but the question remains - CO's customers have problems - some of their own making and some unavoidable. Is there anything that CO can do at LAX to help future customers out who were in the OP's situation? Aren't there any accessible automated kiosks at LAX? Or will the kiosk not reprint a boarding pass after the checkin cutoff?
To the OP, another bit of advice is that I think the cutoffs for flights to Hawaii are a bit earlier than regular domestic flights, so you'll want to take that into account in the future as well. The cutoff for international flights is even earlier - one hour, I believe.
+1
Back to the OP's problems. I agree that there are a lot of things that the OP could have done to avoid the problems, but the question remains - CO's customers have problems - some of their own making and some unavoidable. Is there anything that CO can do at LAX to help future customers out who were in the OP's situation? Aren't there any accessible automated kiosks at LAX? Or will the kiosk not reprint a boarding pass after the checkin cutoff?
To the OP, another bit of advice is that I think the cutoffs for flights to Hawaii are a bit earlier than regular domestic flights, so you'll want to take that into account in the future as well. The cutoff for international flights is even earlier - one hour, I believe.
Remember ... the OP incorrectly told the CO employee he wasn't checked in and needed to do so, and the CO employee took him at face value and (correctly) told him it was too late to check in.
If the OP had stated he merely needed a boarding pass, as was actually the case, we very likely wouldn't be having this discussion. I know that bends the traditional definition of checking-in, but that does seem to be what happened. As I said in my earlier post, it's a combination of the OP not printing his BP at the hotel AND showing up too close to the flight time AND giving incorrect information to a very busy agent AND CO not having kiosks at the front of the line AND the line being long because CO was understaffed ... and so on and so forth.
This is not a single point failure, or even a double or triple point failure.
Remember ... the OP incorrectly told the CO employee he wasn't checked in and needed to do so, and the CO employee took him at face value and (correctly) told him it was too late to check in.
If the OP had stated he merely needed a boarding pass, as was actually the case, we very likely wouldn't be having this discussion. I know that bends the traditional definition of checking-in, but that does seem to be what happened. As I said in my earlier post, it's a combination of the OP not printing his BP at the hotel AND showing up too close to the flight time AND giving incorrect information to a very busy agent AND CO not having kiosks at the front of the line AND the line being long because CO was understaffed ... and so on and so forth.
This is not a single point failure, or even a double or triple point failure.
See Post 31:
Quote:
Originally Posted by customer
Acutally some people said I should've told them I'd already checked in yesterday.
I have!!!
I went up to the re-booking agent and told her the situation just to be sent back to the line because there were people that have been waiting in line.
I complained to another agent nearby and he was going to go and check with the gate for me, and then was told by the first agent that he cannot let me jump in line because people are complaining.
I understand the principle
but if he had just printed out the BP then and let me through at that point.
that was at least thirty minutes prior and I would have been in Hawaii now.
the exact thing described in this thread has happened to me twice at LAX in the past two years. both times heavily-delayed or rescheduled flights (not mine) caused a backup at the kiosks and all i needed was a BP printed.
the first time i missed my flight and the second i was able to explain myself better & get a reprint.
after the second time (sad) i learned (finally) that LAX cannot be trusted, even as a Platinum Elite (lame).
)
