Continental Kicks Us Out of First Class
 

I need some advice—thanks in advance to all who respond. On February 22, 2009, my wife and I were flying on Continental from Ontario, CA to Baltimore. My wife had purchased 2 round trip first class seats using 200,000 NWA World Perks miles. Our outbound flight from BWI to ONT went fine; on the return there was a problem. Our flight from Ontario to Houston to catch our connection was 40 minutes late. When we landed, we had 15 minutes before our next departure, and, of course, a long hike to our connecting gate. There were no carts available for transport. We arrived at our gate 5 minutes prior to departure. At that time an unsympathetic gate agent informed us that, “...your seats have been given away, and you have to take any available seat in coach.” When I complained, she basically said, “That’s how it has to be (citing the ‘10-minute rule’).” I said that I would take the later flight to Baltimore if I could keep the seats in first. She indicated the flight was full. I believe that statement was untrue. We accepted our fate and sat in coach (15 more minutes elapsed before the plane actually departed), but we later realized that we should have tried to claim our seats when we boarded the aircraft. We had been fooled and suckered in by the phony authority of the gate agent. The bottom line is that two other people got to sit in first on our nickel, while we were crammed in middle seats in the back. Both my wife and I are pretty angry about it, and have sworn off Continental. My questions are: 1. What should we have done when we boarded the plane? And, 2: What are our options with Continental now? We feel cheated by being denied a product we had paid for, and we believe that Continental owes us something if only a rebate of my wife’s FF miles.

Your flight was late so you were involuntarily downgraded.

You should be able to request the difference in miles between the economy class and the First Class ticket for the one-way trip (which should come to 12,500 miles per passenger).

In other words, Continental should give you back 25K miles.**

Contact Customer Care (1-800-WECARE2). You might find that they are unhelpful. Hang up and try again if thats the case. Also email [email protected] stating your request for reimbursement.

If both are unsuccessful, PM CoInsider. He's a CO employee on this thread. He may help.

Let us know how it goes.


**The First Class upgrade is 25K per ticket per way. Since you indicated that there were two segments on the return, I'm saying that each First Class upgrade (there were 2) on the return was worth 12.5K per person. So you are owed 25K. If that was the only segment in First Class on the return you may be owed more. If that flight was shorter than the previous flight in First Class on the return, you may be owed slightly less.

That may be harder than it looks since it was purchased with NW miles.
btw, 100,000 miles for a domestic ticket :eek::eek::eek:

Thats a good point. I still say CO should fix it because they're the one's that downgraded you. They can probably find a way to push 25K miles back to your accounts.

Also I corrected my original statement -- they are not owed 50K. Each ticket if in economy would be 50K miles, but since it was in First, each ticket was 100K. Since there was a total of 4 one-ways (two outgoings, two returns), each outgoing and each return's First Class "UPGRADE" was worth 25K miles. Since 1/2 of one return was downgraded, each passenger is owed 12.5K

So each passenger here is owed approximately 12.5K miles, totaling 25K.

Is anyone else shocked by spending 100k miles per person for this flight? I can almost go to Asia in business class for that!

yes, hence my three :eek:s
100k can also get 2 people to Europe in Y

Claiming "your" seats while having accepted seats in coach would not have been a good idea, and probably would have caused an incident.
However, you should ve been more firm on requesting F seats you paid for, whether on CO or another carrier, especially if your connecting flight was late due to CO's fault.

CO foolishly does not hold a couple F seats on every flight for last minute purchases and irrops. Insane policy, IMHO.

That's pretty rough. Given that you were on a CO flight, connecting to a CO flight, they should have been able to see you were coming in a little late and hold your seats up front until the doors closed. And the attitude upon your arrival was definitely unnecessary.

You did the reasonable thing taking the flight and sitting in coach. Once your seats are given away, I think there is little that the crew can do that wouldn't be embarrassing and uncomfortable all the way around.

Sounds like you have a legitimate claim to get some miles reimbursed. Given your frustration, a friendly (and smart) rep may even go the extra mile for you. I've always found a positive attitude to be helpful when speaking with the folks at CO, trying to get something.

OK its me , but I dont see why the OP should get any miles back.Since they arrived at the Gate after T-15 CO gave their seats away figuring they wouldnt make the flight. Had CO not given them away and the seats went out empty plenty of people would be complaining 'Why did CO allow a flight to go out with empty FC seats'.

Had the ONT-IAH flight also for some reason not been in FC then maybe something could have been done, but once they flew the ONT-IAH segment that should close the case.

doesnt hurt for the OP to try and get something but I wouldnt expect much, especially not 25k as a poster mentioned above.

It could be argued that CO didnt get the pax it involuntarily downgraded, to their connecting gate in time. Shouldn't they be made whole for not being accommodated in the class of service they paid for (with miles)?

I'm with craz on this one.

The poster did not choose to arrive late into IAH, the airline made them late by 40 minutes. Since they were made late due to the arriving aircraft being late, they should be given the miles for the segment that they sat in Y, since that's what they paid for.

It's not that people want CO to give away seats, we just want things handled consistently. Different GAs handle the battlefield process differently.

I don't understand why flying the ONT-IAH segment should "close the case".

I've had F seats taken a number of times as I often try to make tight connections through IAH or EWR. Mine are typically upgrades so it isn't a big deal but it always surprises me that they don't know I have checked in at my original destination and am in the airport on my way.

If CO (and others, mind you) had 2 bits of brains... this is how they would do it:

Upgrade px to open seats from px on planes that are definitely late - NOT tight connecting px.

CLOSE THE FLIGHT. Then, go on board, and upgrade preferred passengers from list to F for any remaining F seats from those px that didn't make the cnx.

HTSC

Why can't battlefield upgrades be done in the air after take off? The GA could tell the FA which two (or whatever) passengers are to be upgraded if the flight takes off with empty seats. If not in the air, then at least after the door closes.