Originally Posted by
NotHamSarnie
It's 2014. It should be possible to plan a lunch meeting with little lead time, little cushion, and proper recourse when it doesn't work out. After all, our time is valuable, and DL has been doing this a long time. When delays happen, for whatever reason, it should be possible to be told there are delays, the likely extent of the delays, and plan accordingly i.e., cancel the trip and proceed directly home, as the OP stated he wanted to do. Is this really too much to ask, instead of being led on a merry-go-round of lies and incompetence that stranded OP instead of getting him back to NYC?
Well, I have flown a lot so far in 2014. I have seen the rolling effect of thunderstorms in the northeast on the entire system, I have seen planes break, I have seen passengers get sick, I have seen 2-hour delays turn into on-time departures, I have seen on-time departures turn into two hour delays. I have seen airlines able to swap aircraft and "make up" a lot of time. I am a traveler. I am a well-educated, well-spoken, (most-importantly) well-behaved traveler. As a traveler, I know anything is possible. I am also responsible enough to know that if I book something so tight that an hour delay can ruin it, I do so at my own risk.