Welcome to FT !

So, after rebooking, you didn't check your itinerary on the airline's webpage to make sure you had a valid one? That may have prevented your problems in the first place.

It's not clear from your post, but I am assuming you didn't do OLCI 24 hours before your flight, because that also would have alerted you to the fact that there was a problem.

I am confused as to why you had to drive back home to call this company, or how a 40 minute drive turned into 1.5 hours.

I agree that third party bookings can be problematic.