South by Northwest

(by Peter)...

It was supposed to be simple. The trip would begin with a direct flight from Memphis to New York. We would have fun seeing some very predictable shows, snap photos in Times Square and be the stereotypical tourists of which we and our very cool Northeastern friends used to make fun. The trip would end with a direct flight from New York to Memphis to rejoin our three darling children and our lives. Funny thing happened on the way back to the Bluff City…

Actually, the story is not funny. I have now been forced to recount it over thirty times to varying members of Northwest Airlines and American Airlines and I will assure you it is not funny at all. It is, in fact, quite annoying and all of my efforts to obtain any measure of satisfaction have fallen on deaf ears. So I am now writing it down, simply so that if anyone else asks me, I can forward a copy of this document and save my voice.

Let me begin by saying that Courtney and I are seasoned travelers. Courtney has traveled all over the world. Her mother is a former travel agent. I travel for work at least once per month and I routinely provide guidance for people in my office with complex travel requirements or when their reservation needs trend toward the exotic. Our oldest daughter flew over a dozen flights in her first year of life. We do this a lot and while this has never happened before, all of our previous bad experiences have also been with Northwest Airlines. So perhaps we should have known better.

December 21, 2008: A Perfect Storm at LaGuardia

After checking out at the Manhattan Hilton on Sunday at 1200 EST, Courtney and I attempted to check in on our returning flight to Memphis whereupon we were told that our flight had been cancelled. There was a link to rebook our tickets through the website but the link was apparently disabled or broken because pressing it yielded no results. LaGuardia had experienced numerous flight cancellations due to inclement weather on the two prior days and, knowing that alternate flights would be filling up quickly, we immediately called Northwest customer service. We waited on hold for over forty minutes before being told by a representative that our flight was cancelled due to a mechanical failure and that the soonest we could expect to get home was flying standby on Tuesday.

By this point (2:00 PM EST) we had arrived at LaGuardia. Our cab driver apparently did not understand the ramp system at LGA and after circling the airport twice—with the meter running—he instructed us to walk from the bus stop with all of our luggage. So we made our way across the sludge of the parking lot to the Northwest/Delta terminal. After explaining our situation to a Northwest employee, we were told to wait in the check-in line. After about thirty to forty-five minutes of waiting we reached the front and were told that we were in the wrong line and that we should now get in a different line.

Shortly after moving to the alternate line which had not moved for almost an hour, the two representatives who were working that area left leaving all of us in a small state of panic. Fortunately, another man in a Northwest uniform began handing out flier with a number on it. We were told that the number on the flier was a “special hotline” set up to handle our situation; however, when we called the number we were greeted with an automated message telling us that “Due to unusually high call volume, your call could not be answered at this time.” We were instructed to use nwa.com and the call was dropped. Apparently, this was to be Northwest’s strategy for solving the situation—rely on everyone who had booked reservations to use his/her own cell phone at his/her own expense to make alternate arrangements using a special hotline without anyone on the other end of the line. Those passengers without cell phones would simply be out of luck. Eventually a replacement agent appeared who promptly began complaining that she was not supposed to be working at this location. A resounding shout from our fellow passengers assured her that she was in the right place.

Throughout the latter half of our wait, Courtney was speaking to a member of the Northwest customer service “hotline” who first suggested that we take a cab to JFK airport to catch a flight on Continental which was leaving in an hour. After stepping out of line to follow this suggestion, we were told that those seats were no longer available. Our assisting agent then suggested that we fly to Charlotte via a US Airways flight leaving later in the day; however, she was unable to book the seats through the US Airways system because US Airways would not make the seats available except to agents at the airport. No explanation as to why was ever provided.

After arriving at the head of the line, we were again told that the earliest we could expect to fly into Memphis was “ in a couple of days.” It was not until Courtney asked that they get us as close to Memphis as possible that they explained alternative options. Courtney suggested that they fly us to either Nashville or Little Rock and rent then provide us with a one-way car rental to get the rest of the way. They insisted that they could not rent us a car because they did not have insurance for that. Personally, that sounded pretty ridiculous to me. After Courtney’s suggestion, the agent found a flight on American Airlines which would place us in Nashville for the night and fly us to Memphis at 6:15 AM CST Monday morning. This was much better than their previous offers which had us arriving later in the week. So we took it. We were given “priority assignments” on the American Airlines flight—which we later learned was a fancy way of saying that we didn’t really have a seat yet. So we trekked over to the bus stop to wait for the bus to convey us to American Airlines.

The parting instructions we were given by our Northwest agent was that we were to see the Northwest personnel in Nashville for our hotel and meal vouchers because the mechanical delay was the fault of Northwest. She specifically told us that American Airlines would be unable to help us. She also instructed us that we would not need to get our bags in Nashville as they would be “automatically” transferred to Northwest. The American Airlines ticketing agent confirmed this, as well. We dropped our bags and headed to the gate to receive our seating assignment. Around 6:30 PM EST we boarded our flight for Nashville and were on our way. As we boarded the flight, Courtney looked at me and said, “You know, I forgot to ask what time the last Northwest flight leaves Nashville.” I asked her why that was important. “Well, because if this flight gets in late, there won’t be any Northwest people there to give us those vouchers.” I laughed. Surely someone would let them know that they were transferring us to their location.

Upon arriving in Nashville, we discovered the Northwest ticket counters empty.

We made our way down to baggage claim to try to find somebody who worked for Northwest who might still be at work. We found a baggage claim agent who, upon hearing our story, informed us that she could not leave the baggage claim area. She also told us that our instructions from the Northwest agent at LaGuardia were incorrect. Because we had flown in on American Airlines, we were the responsibility of American Airlines. They would provide the vouchers. We insisted that this was incorrect to which she said, “Oh, we all just reimburse each other when these things happen.” So, to humor her, we walked upstairs to the American Airlines ticket counter which was—you guessed it—vacant. So we walked down to the American Airlines baggage claim office and laughed as we asked for our vouchers. Needless to say, we were sent back to the Northwest baggage claim office which was locked. We finally found our Northwest baggage claim agent who no had reinforcements who issued our vouchers after some initial protestations.

As we left the American Airlines baggage claim area for the final time, Courtney saw that one of our bags was sitting out by the conveyer belt. We and some of our fellow passengers inquired of the ladies at the American Airlines baggage claim desk if we should take those bags down to Northwest. Very sternly we were told that we may not even touch those bags. Doing so would result in the need to take those bags back through security. Now, the bag is sitting in a wide open area of the airport. No security personnel are watching the bag. The baggage claim agents cannot even see the bag from this vantage point. Anyone could walk up and steal the bag or worse, plant something in the bag undetected. It was at this moment that it occurred to me that there is a huge procedural gap in flight safety.

Courtney looked at me and said, “No way that bag is on our flight tomorrow,” to which the baggage claim agent responded “Oh we take all of the unclaimed luggage to a cage after everyone has claimed their stuff.”

“Or after someone has stolen my stuff,” I thought to myself.

“We will take your bag to Northwest for your flight in the morning.” OK. Off to the hotel. We arrive shortly before midnight and must be awake to ride back to the airport by 5AM. So we go to sleep.

December 22, 2008: A Comedy of Errors

Luckily, the staff at the Hotel Preston were more than accommodating. Our room was very clean and we enjoyed our four hours of sleep as much as anyone can enjoy just four hours of sleep. We rode back to the airport in plenty of time for our flight. The Northwest ticket line was extremely long and it was only after ten or fifteen minutes that it occurred to me that the First Class kiosk had been vacant the whole time. Since we had no bags to check, I popped into that line and printed our boarding passes and in seconds we were on our way through security.

Courtney asked, “What are the odds that our bag is there when we get there? 100 to 1? 1000 to 1?” I laughed. Surely Northwest will make extra efforts to get our bags to us on time after all of this mess. We arrived in Memphis and waited for our bags. The bag we had not seen the night before came through. The bag we had seen—shockingly—did not arrive. So its another visit to another baggage claim office where we indignantly filed a claim for our missing bag.

The Northwest baggage claim agent initially told us that she could not do anything without our baggage claim checks. The problem is that American had not provided us with said claim checks. She then sighed her disgust with us and asked to see our boarding passes which we provided. After a good bit of head shaking and sighing, we were told that the bag never made it to Northwest and that they would let us know when they found it. By this point, I had had it with the whole system. I asked to speak to a customer service manager.

Memphis, as I understood it, is a Northwest Airlines hub. Despite this fact, upon asking six different gate agents, the baggage claim agents, the Northwest lady working the wheelchair assistance waiting area in the lobby and the ticketing agents, I was uniformly told that there was no one in that location to address my complaint. In each situation, I was given a pamphlet with a phone number on the back and told to contact “these people.” It was the same number I had called the previous day only to receive an automated message and have my call disconnected.

Throughout the day, I made multiple attempts to contact Northwest and American’s baggage claim offices. Northwest continued to assert that they had no more news. American was even more hostile. Once of American’s agents even went so far as to tell Courtney that she “would not help [us]” and that it was “impossible for [us] to speak with American Airlines” about this “because no one is going to help you. We are in constant contact with Northwest. If we had your bag we would have already told Northwest.”

Courtney assured her that it was possible for us to talk to American “because we are on the phone with you right now!” The agent then told Courtney that she could “keep repeating yourself all you want; but it will not change the fact that no one is going to assist you.” Our bags had been transferred to Northwest and American was no longer involved.

I spent approximately eight hours on hold, waiting for assistance. I spoke with the baggage claim areas for Northwest and American in Nashville. I spoke with Northwest multiple times. Finally, and only because Courtney noticed an error in the lost baggage claim information, I reached perhaps the only competent member of the Northwest operation in this area who informed me that my bag had been routed though Chicago. (Which makes total sense!) She said that the note had been in the system for hours. She did not understand why I had not been told before. The note, in fact, said that my bag should have arrived in Memphis around noon.

In disbelief, I called the Memphis American Airlines baggage claim area and was told that my bag had arrived at their office around 5PM. They had made several attempts to contact Northwest but were unable to get them on the phone. They had assumed that someone from Northwest would eventually come and get it. I asked how late she would be there and drove back to the airport to get the bag. I have still never received a call from Northwest about my lost bag. No one has called to offer an apology for their complete lack of planning for these contingencies and lack of competence in managing through the situation.