Put on a bus by USAir!
Flying from Flagstaff to Phoenix on July 2, and after boarding the plane on time for a 9:30 flight, pilot told us that we would need more gas since they were rerouting us on the half hour flight to phoenix! Then after waiting for fueling, 15 minutes go by and we are then told that the plane is 3000 pounds too heavy and that some of us will have to get off. An offer was made that those who voluntarily got off would receive a $325 voucher. SInce we had missed our connection in Phoenix to Philadelphia, anyhow, we were among the first to volunteer and then exit the plane to get rebooked.
An hour late....20 out of 37 passengers were pulled from the plane...had to wait for all of those people to get rebooked and then found out that we were being DRIVEN to Phoenix on a bus (2.5 hour ride with no bathroom).
En route by bus, another passenger told us that for passengers who did not leave voluntarily, they received a reimbursement (a check, not a voucher) for 2.5 times the value of their original ticket! He showed us the $900 check!
We arrived in Phoenix at 2:25 and we barely made our flight to PHL which had been rebooked to 2:45. When we asked for assistance expediting our route to the departure terminal, we were told NO by at least 3 US AIR employees and the bus driver refused to drop us off at the nearest terminal. We had to run through the airport without shoes (no time to put them on , and we are 63 and 53 years old). My partner pulled a groin muscle in the process.
To top this all off, I wrote to US Air to complain, and I was responded to, shockingly, with an offer to accept a check in the amount of $1300 (2.5 times the value of my ticket) in lieu of the voucher, but when I replied accepting the offer, and despite repeated attempts to connect with that customer service rep, no one has followed up. My wife also filed a complaint and was told that US Air planned to do nothing for her, and were using the usual events in Flagstaff as a "learning experience" for the airline.
This will not be over for me until my wife and I are reimbursed for our flight tickets, since we were never flown to Phoenix. I didn't pay all of that money for a bus. The voucher is sufficient to make up for the inconvenience of missing my original connection, but that is it. We have been traveling for 30 years and have never had a experience like this nor felt the need to earn recompense from an airline. We have certainly missed connections (almost always) when flying US Air, but this whole thing was insane.
Does anyone know how I can pursue this further?
|