Airlines, ValuJet / Airtran terrible experience, late flights, poor communication

How NOT to get to Florida

ValuJet / Airtran

From: Chuck Ireton Email User

Date: Sunday, January 21, 2001 06:11 PM

_____________________

The road to Hell, or the Atlanta Airport in this case, is paved with good intentions.

I tried to get a mini brother/sister reunion together and take advantage of great prices advertised by AirTran from Dayton and Washington DC to Florida.

So much for good intentions.

My flight out of DC was delayed, delayed again, and delayed again until it seemed that I would not make my connection in Atlanta. We left Dulles airport three hours after we were supposed to depart. No problem, I was told, I would have just enough time to connect.

If only that had been true. Gate C2 in Atlanta turned out to be the second level of Dante's Hell. AirTran has 24 departure gates and staffed a total of two customer service representatives to assist with flight problems.

Flight times kept slipping and slipping until the flight crew reached their maximum flight time and cancelled their flights.

Everyone waited hours and hours only to find that the only available flight would be the next morning. AirTran offered nothing in terms of lodging, meals, or any other compensation for travelers stranded.

Passengers became extremely angry, many got drunk and belligerent, and one guy who had been waiting seven hours for a flight that eventually was cancelled became quite vocal about his problem and was escorted away from the customer service counter by security.

I can't even remember how many hours I spent in Atlanta before I waded through the crowds and talked with Customer Service. I gave up. I asked to be flown back to DC.

I don't know if the flight to Ft. Walton Beach ever got out that night, but I wasn't about to spend the night in the Atlanta airport, sleep away half of my trip in Florida and then try to fly AirTran back to DC the next day.

The Dulles flight was delayed over and over due to mechanical problems, but we finally left Atlanta and limped our way to Dulles.

27 hours after I left DC I made it back home to Maryland. I could have driven to Florida in that amount of time. My luggage (clothes, prescriptions, etc) made it to Ft. Walton Beach 30 hours after I should have arrived there, even though they were supposed to have been transferred to the Dulles flight I flew back on.

I got a call today from Ft. Walton Beach saying that my baggage had been found and would be sent on a midnight flight to Dulles, but four calls and messages today to the Dulles baggage center have gone unanswered. I can't find anyone to even answer the phone much less do anything for me.

My sister was lucky enough to not experience Atlanta. She was pulled off of the plane in Dayton just before taxiing out and told that she would not make her connecting flight in Atlanta and would have to either reschedule or spend the night in Atlanta.

It turns out she ended up spending four hours at the Dayton airport and the disappointment of being pulled from the flight.

My brother and sister-in-law spent the entire evening at Ft. Walton airport getting periodic updates about how late the flights were running.

They didn't get back home until the early hours Saturday morning. AirTran really did our family wrong.

I got home, slept for 14 hours, got something to eat, and then slept for another 10 hours. Lesson learned: Sometimes you don't even get what you pay for.

We were treated like cattle by AirTran and nobody in any position within the company was able or willing to do anything to help us.

I'm going to send a copy of this letter to the AirTran Corporate headquarters, but I can't imagine that I'll get any response from them beyond a boiler-plate letter stating their legal obligations and claims avoiding any responsibility.

I also intend to post this letter to Internet sites that deal with customer satisfaction.

Beyond that, all I can do is refuse to ever do any business with them in the future and let as many people as possible know about their service.

We're going to try to get together again sometime soon. We're going to talk, eat, and enjoy each other's company.

We're going to fly a real airline.