A bankrupt airline ruined my honeymoon

ataQuestion: I’ve been trying to get this issue resolved with Travelocity for more than six months, with no luck. We booked our honeymoon flight to Hawaii on ATA Airlines, but 10 days before our trip we got a call saying that the airline had gone out of business.

A Travelocity representative assured us we had been rebooked on new flights and that everything was taken care of. Needless to say, on the morning of our honeymoon, we had no tickets. The airline we were supposed to have been rebooked on, Delta Air Lines, was adamant that it wasn’t giving us any tickets. And a Travelocity representative kept telling us everything would be fine and they were “working it out.”

Nothing was worked out. We had to buy another set of tickets to keep our trip.

I’ve tried calling Travelocity customer service and was promised over and over that someone is looking into it, that they will call. They don’t. They keep asking for more time and keep telling me my request is on “urgent” status. I’ve sent them more than 65 pages of documentation by mail and fax. We’re out more than $4,000 for the airline tickets and an extra night’s accommodations and transportation expenses. Enough is enough. Can you please help us? — Kim Ryan, Phoenixville, Pa.

Answer: Travelocity should have issued a prompt refund for the new airline tickets you had to buy. Actually, it shouldn’t have come to this at all. As your online travel agent, it should have ensured you were rebooked on another flight — just like it promised.

There’s no excuse for keeping you waiting this long for your money. If I didn’t know any better, I’d say the requests for additional documentation were nothing more than a delay tactic meant to wear you down until you give up.

But I know better. As it turns out, Travelocity had issued paper tickets for your first flight, and when ATA went belly-up, it created a bureaucratic nightmare for your agent. Delta wasn’t offering free flights to displaced ATA customers, but standby flights for $100 per person. If you wanted a confirmed space, the airline allowed a modest 20 percent discount off a new ticket.

If Travelocity offered to rebook you at no additional expense, then it was being beyond generous. It almost certainly wouldn’t have access to the money it paid ATA on your behalf, since ATA was in the process of being liquidated. So Travelocity appeared to be offering you new tickets to Hawaii. How nice.

But that didn’t happen, and the resulting confusion is every bride’s worst nightmare: A honeymoon gone bad.

Let me hit “pause” for a second. Why did you book the most important vacation of your life through an online travel agency? This is a trip of a lifetime, and you really should consider entrusting it to a competent travel professional — preferably, someone who specializes in honeymoons.

When you learned of ATA’s bankruptcy, you should have verified that your flights were rebooked. Yes, Travelocity offers a “guarantee” that “everything about your booking will be right,” but when thousands of passengers are displaced, it’s possible that some of them will be overlooked. I wouldn’t have relied on Travelocity’s word, and rather than phoning the company, I would have contacted it through its Website. A written record of your problem might have expedited your refund, if not prevented it from happening.

I contacted Travelocity on your behalf. It reviewed your case and determined that you had been “incorrectly advised” by its agents that your Delta flights were confirmed. Delta later notified Travelocity that it wasn’t paying for the ATA flights, and would charge you and your husband for full-fare tickets. You were never notified of that change.

Travelocity has refunded your replacement tickets, plus the cost of an extra night in Hawaii, to the tune of $4,078.

(Photo: Kevin Boydston/Flickr Creative Commons)

  • Carver

    I realize that airlines operate in their own fantasy world, but if the OP pays Travelocity for a ticket the travelocity needs to rebook the OPs at its own expense.

  • Justin

    Without sounding like a “Know it all” or trying to put you out of business per say, don’t the people who email in for help use common sense? I would bet half of all those who email could have simplified their problems WITHOUT ever contacting you for help to begin with. How? Use a credit card. Had this woman paid with one and been given a cold shoulder, she could have disputed the charge later. Obviously, she had to pay twice, and MOST if not all credit cards will reverse charges for services not rendered. Obviously, if Travelocity refused to play ball, she would then at least had another option. I WILL ALWAYS use a credit card on major purchases, ALWAYS. At least that way if the company fails when all outlets are exhausted, I have one more to try. Is it a sure fire guarantee that I will win? No, but at least I have more options than those who throw their brains out the door and pay cash / check. Who in their right mind pays the full amount for a service before it is rendered. Once someone takes your money, you are then at their mercy!!!

    Justin

  • http://www.cutcat.com Regina

    I have heard too many negative stories (most of them on this Website) about Travelocity and Orbitz to ever entrust my plans to them. And I am glad that Chris has placed some responsibility on the customer. Travelocity did screw up, but always remember you get what you pay for. If you want to save money, fine–who doesn’t?–but booking through an online third party does carry risks. And if Travelocity told this customer that her tickets were booked, why didn’t she ensure that she had tickets in hand (either electronic or paper) before her trip? Frankly, showing up at the airport on the morning of your honeymoon without tickets is just boneheaded. If Travelocity’s “word” isn’t worth anything—and it obviously isn’t–why are we continuing to give them our money? If people stopped using them maybe they’d get their act together.

  • Robert Davis

    Why, why, why does anyone use these online travel agencies? Is the price that much better than direct booking with an airline?

  • Bob

    Why is it travelocity’s problem that ATA went bankrupt?

  • http://www.journeysbysteve.com Steve Cousino, ACC

    Bob, it’s not Travelocity’s fault that ATA went bankrupt. A third-party agent of a travel supplier can never be at fault when something like this occurs, whether an online agency or a professional travel consultant like myself. Where Travelocity went wrong is telling the client, Kim, that her airfare to Hawaii had been re-booked and that “everything was taken care of.” From that, other issues arose and contributed to the situation at large.

    Had myself or many of my colleagues booked this bride’s honeymoon flights, it was our responsibility to ensure her flights were protected on another carrier in some fashion – and that’s exactly what happened industry-wide. Travel consultants and travel agents (yes, there’s a difference!) spent many, many hours re-booking clients’ flights to Hawaii in the wake of the ATA bankruptcy – same with Aloha Airlines, which happened around the same time, if I recall right. It was a crazy and chaotic time, and it sounds like the Travelocity agent said whatever Kim wanted to hear to get her off the line and out of their hair.

    I’m glad she was able to get restitution. Chris is right, though – booking “special event” travel like a honeymoon without the aid of a professional travel consultant isn’t a good idea. It’s a special time in life, and obviously you’d want nothing to go wrong, or as little to go wrong as possible. That’s the value of a professional consultant.

  • http://www.travelocity.com Joel

    Hello from Travelocity. There’s no doubt we could have handled this better, but we are glad that we were able to resolve it. When ATA and Aloha went bankrupt in April 2008 it set in motion many similar cases like the one described above. In many of those instances we were able to head problems off to the delight of a bunch of worried customers. Of course, Chris doesn’t hear from those people, but, believe it or not, we do appreciate the nature of his work – overly dramatic headlines notwithstanding – because it gives us a chance to review problems and, ultimately, get better.

    Regina, as a faithful reader of Chris’s blog, I understand your opinion, but I will politely disagree with you: our word does mean something. In fact, you have my word that if you’d like a promo code for use on a future hotel stay or vacation package booked through us, drop me a line. Cheers.

  • Carver

    @Bob

    Because travelocity is arguably the agent for ATA and as such is liable for ATAs failure to perform.

  • David Z

    Travel consultants and travel agents (yes, there’s a difference!) spent many, many hours re-booking clients’ flights to Hawaii in the wake of the ATA bankruptcy – same with Aloha Airlines, which happened around the same time, if I recall right.

    One after another, actually. And boy, did that cause lots of issues back then.

    True story: one of my ex-fellow travel agents got a customer whose Aloha Airlines flights were cancelled because of their bankruptcy. One of our feasible options that time was to rebook them into…ATA Airlines.

    The agent rebooked the customer into ATA at no cost to both of us, the customer greatly thanked that agent, and he was highly praised among his peers. A few days later, that agent got rather distraught when he was told that ATA Airlines went bankrupt too.

    Very few, if any, travel agents/agencies are willing to shoulder the costs of rebooking their customers’ flights on another airline whenever this exact scenario happens. No doubt some people believe the travel agent or so should’ve, while obviously the travel agent disagrees and can only do so much while keeping costs to the barest minimum.

    Each travel agency will decide on their own which course of action to take. Same with the customer.

    Whether the agent’s liable or not, well…that’s up to the judge.

  • Sara

    As a professional meeting & event planner, I tend to book my own (personal, not business) trips direct with the airlines. I did book our honeymoon cruise through Cruise.com, but paid with a credit card and followed up well in advance of the departure date with both Cruise.com and the operator to ensure that my reservation was correct and fully paid for as promised by Cruise.com. I just think that so many people are booking through online agencies and then putting 100% of their trust in those agencies without following up. I don’t care what Travelocity or Orbitz or anyone else says – follow up directly with the airline, hotel etc and then go back via email (so that there is a record) to the online agent if everything isn’t 100% perfect. What’s that old saying about an ounce of prevention being worth a pound of cure – why can’t travelers remember that?

  • Keith

    Chris,

    What exactly would a “competent travel professional” have done for these people. You mentioned in your previous posting about apple vacations that a brick and morter travel agent has no responsiblity when the third party it booked through goes belly up. What is different in this situation? Seems to me that these honeymooners would have still been stuck having to purchase new airline tickets weather they purchased through travelocity or a brick and morter place. The only difference appears that by writing to you, the large online places like travelocity are more likely to cave and give refunds.

  • Kevin M

    @Justin: The problem in this case wouldn’t have been helped much (if at all) by paying for the original ATA tickets with a credit card – which in fact she may have done. First, with this being a honeymoon trip, she may well have booked and paid for the tickets far enough in advance that the time for disputing the charge could have passed. Even so, the most she could have “gotten back” is the price on the original tickets, which was likely an advance-purchase discount rate. The problem was that due to the ATA bankruptcy, she had to purchase new tickets at a walk-up fare on Delta. Delta delivered, so there was no way she was getting that amount back. So tickets that might have cost her, say, $1,200 on the first round were now $4,000+.

    @Keith: the difference between a “competent travel professional” in a local office and the big online sites is that they’re smaller and you can deal directly with a single agent, over and over if necessary. You can walk in, sit down, and stay planted in the seat till they figure out a solution. With Travelocity/Orbitz/etc., you call in, you give them an account or incident number, you wait while yet another CSA reads the history of the case in the form of whatever notes the last CSA entered… frankly, if I were an agent who got one of those complicated cases and I knew, deep down, that this was going to take forever to fix… I’d want to give them the company line too and assure them it was being taken care of, and let the next agent who took a call from that customer deal with it.

  • Joel Wechsler

    @Keith What a “competent travel professional” would have done is the following:
    1. Make sure that all payments were by credit card.
    2. See to it that new tickets were issued on a timely basis, thus probably reducing the cost.
    3. Advised the purchase of travel insurance which would have covered the ATA default.

  • Geoff

    Never pay with an airline ticket with anything less than a credit card. NEVER! You have far more protection from your rights as a credit card holder.

  • ed

    I have to agree with Chris on this one as well…why didn’t you use a travel agent for the most important trip in your life? I can understand if you were going to some obscure place like the Laplands for a cross country llama hike, but you were going to Hawaii! The most touristy place on the planet (next to Las Vegas of course). There are hundreds of service companies that all they do is book travel to Hawaii! I travel to Hawaii on a regular basis but two years ago when I was booking a complicated family vacation with travelers from three different locations, I didn’t hesitate to use a booking agent. I worked with Patti at the Hawaii Visitor’s center months in advance and the vacation was perfect! Not only that, but we had a surprise waiting for us in our rooms at the Sheraton on Waikiki…In the course of our booking arrangements, I made the mention that this was a “second honeymoon” for me and my wife…15 year anniversary. We had chocolates (with macadamia nuts of course) and champagne chilling in our rooms…what a nice touch! could I have booked the same vacation without an agent? Probably, but the one hundred or two hundred bucks or so that I paid were well worth it! in fact, I don’t even know how much she made on this vacation…but I *do* know that she really worked for the money…she really earned it!
    Ed