As a background, I see myself as an expert when it comes to travel. With many years of AA Executive Platinum, Delta Platinum, Hyatt Globalist, Hilton Diamond, Hallmark Crown Rewards Platinum Member, Hotels.com Gold Member, AMC Stubs Premiere Member, SamsungPay Platinum Member, and Long Island Rail Road Loyalty Member, I always thought I was the "big deal" when it came to traveling.


On that particular trip, I was booked on a really good fare to Zurich from New York City. I remember paying around $500 to celebrate the 4th of July weekend in the Swiss Alps. And what do you know? Despite my travel occurring in one of the most busiest travel seasons of the year, my AA systemwide upgrade cleared for both of us, for each direction.

Round-trip confirmed business class seats to Europe for $500 each – sounds pretty sweet right?


Going back to my travel habits, let’s say I’ve been getting a little cocky with arriving at the airport as close to the departure time as I could. Sometimes, I arrived right at the boarding time to fly through the security using my TSA Pre Check or Flagship Check-in (for JFK). But many other times, hearing "PAGING PASSENGER SAMWISE6222. THIS IS YOUR FINAL BOARDING CALL" became something I hear on my every flight.

I hated spending time in the airports and in the plane, so that's how I coped with it.


For years and years, it worked fine. Despite many many close encounters, missing your flight was something that only happened to other people.


Until they didn't.



It typically takes about 45 minutes to the airport from my home in Queens, NY but I gave myself an extra 30 minutes (scheduled to arrive 30 minutes before check-in cut off) as the online check-in system told me to SEE CHECK IN AGENT. On that fateful day, something was wrong with Grand Central Park on my way to JFK. There was a pile up on the way to the airport and my google map showed another accident on Van Wyck Expressway.


Different city, but this is how I felt in the traffic.

After agonizing 1.5 hours in the car, I missed my check-in deadline by 15 minutes.


But there is a flat-tire rule where the airline will try to get you on the next flight, right?

NOPE

It didn’t work for us as (1) JFK-ZRH flight runs once a day and (2) the flights were sold out at least for the following three days. As you can imagine, it was the 4th of July weekend: one of the busiest travel times of the year.

At that point, my options were (1) to forget about the trip altogether and forfeit any non-refundable bookings I’ve made in Switzerland or (2) buy a walk-up fare ticket to another city in Europe and try to find my way to Switzerland. I thought real hard about cancelling the trip altogether and move on with my life. But I couldn't. So I called AA EXP line and asked us to rebook to London.



(that’s an additional $2,153 per person)
OK. It's ok. Breath in and breath out. That's extra $4,306 I didn't plan on spending but look on the bright side. I used American Express Platinum Card and earned 21,530 Membership Rewards Points!

I try to cheer myself up with all this MR points I am earning on top of AA Miles I will be earning, but... it didn't help.

But it's ok. We can still salvage this trip. We can still have an awesome time in Switzerland. I just need to find tickets from London to Switzerland. That should be simple, right?


(to be continued)