Posted on 09/20/2016 7:52:03 PM PDT by nickcarraway
Michael Mellion says he was left stranded at the airport after an email from the airline changed the flight time—one that turned out to be wrong.
Mellion was heading back home to Fort Lauderdale from Pensacola when he got an email from Silver Airways.
"I never have gotten an email from an airline telling me they’re going to be late,” said Mellion.
At first, he says he was grateful to learn of the delay.
"I think anybody who’s a traveler doesn’t want to spend any more time at the airport than they have to," said Mellion.
But when he showed up at the airport in Pensacola to check in for his flight later that day, he got a surprise.
“The flight left. It left early,” said Mellion. “I thought I was really stuck.”
Stuck because he says airline staff only offered to put him on a flight the following day and pay for his hotel room.
“That was just impossible for me because I had something pressing that I had to be back for early in the morning.”
That’s why he says he eagerly joined another stranded passenger and bought a last minute ticket on a Delta flight.
“I’m sure we’ll work this out because it’s very clear the mistake was not mine. It was theirs,” said Mellion.
He wrote to Silver Airways, asking to be reimbursed for both the missed flight as well as the $220 he paid Delta. The request was denied.
“There’s no doubt it’s unfair,” said Mellion. “And they want to sand bag and stick me for their mistake. “
Silver Airways declined our request for an on-camera interview but told us by email “We do our best to update customers if there are changes in flight schedules. It appears according to Mr. Mellion that there could have been a delay in him receiving flight updates. We apologize if this is the case. This is why we offered to book him on another airline and provide a credit for his missed flight, which are above and beyond what is required by our contract of carriage.
We did not agree to pay for the Delta flight because we offered him an option (at no charge to him) that would have gotten him to his needed destination in time to make his next flight with another airline.”
Mellion says they never offered to book him on another flight at no charge.
“I think he’s asking a bit too much,” said George Hobica the founder of Airfare Watchdog, a flight comparison website. “When a carrier makes a mistake like this there is no federal requirement, no D-O-T law or rule that they owe you anything in compensation. And that’s quite unfair but that’s the way it is.”
Hobica says airlines aren’t required to meet passengers’ sky high requests – even if the carrier is at fault. The only thing they will do for you and according to the contracts of carriage is to put you on their next available flight.”
Mellion is holding firm to his point of view. Silver Airways’ voucher for a one-way flight wasn’t enough for him to give the airline another shot, so he turned it down. Hobica says while airlines aren’t legally required to get you on a competitor’s flight, he still recommends trying.
He says you should ask the airline staff nicely and present a compelling case as to why you need to get on the flight. Hobica says airlines compromise every day.
Silver Airways?????????????????
Yikes.
.
United did this to me. I was at the gate and they told me it would be an hour late. So I went to the lounge. Half an hour later I come back, and the flight is gone. I was in the gate then their lounge and they never said anything about leaving on time after telling everyone they would be an hour late. I was ticked off. But there was another flight an hour later so I was not as mad as I could have been.
I recently got off a train that was continuing to Munich. The train left the station just as the elevator opened and it was painfully obvious the two people coming out of it just missed their train.
On the out trip I actually miss read the bus times to the train and had to call a cab. That was nerve wracking but still made it by ten minutes. We may get a car again.
Public Transportation is antithetical to personal liberty. It’s sometimes OK in high density areas run by ‘Rats, but
those places are to be eschewed by anybody wanting to live Free.
I was the only one that had not checked in on a United international flight. I was early but they decided to leave.
The put me up in a hotel and upgraded me to first class for the 13 hour flight. Not a bad deal.
Still, I can’t believe they just decided to leave early. It was not even a close call. I was there at least an hour and a half ahead of departure time.
Never heard of Silver Airlines. I fly almost exclusively Delta. They have always fixed things when they occur.
You missed something big there about personal liberty and Freedom.
Airlines screw people every chance they get.
As far as I know, airlines are THE WORST when it comes to getting value for your money. I don’t know of any other place where they keep your money with so little provocation and absolve themselves of any responsibility when something goes wrong.
Your chances of getting any satisfaction from them are zero to none.
You miss your flight for ANY reason, even when it’s their fault, and your money is gone.
It almost happened to me on my way home from the Cleveland Convention. Southwest was having computer issues. Got a text the flight was delayed. Then another one it was delayed more. Went to a airport restaurant for lunch. Got a text that it was leaving in five minutes! Ran to check the board and it was still giving the delayed time. SO I just decided to make my way back to the gate when I passed a DIFFERENT GATE announcing the final boarding for MY FLIGHT. I was really lucky because it was the only flight leaving for Las Vegas that day.
United is funny that way. When I checked the monitor for a connecting flight, the flight status showed a two-hour delay. Luckily I double-checked 30 minutes later to find it was now ontime at a different gate.
He never ever received an email notification in the past that a flight was going to be late? He’s never flown much.
I had a flight cancelled by U.S. Air from Tallahassee to Tampa years ago, but only after all the other carriers had left. The airline knew it would be cancelled because the plane was still sitting on the ground in Miami with mechanical problems. They had intentionally waited to prevent the pax from being able to fly on the other carriers by not announcing the cancellation. This po’d me so much that I refused their next flight out offer for the next day and took the $100 offer plus the free flight offer. I used the $100 to rent a car and drove back to Tampa, but chucked the free flight voucher. I never flew U.S. Air again.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.