[swzarsa]

On 19 November 2007, my daughter, was denied boarding her Oakland to Honolulu leg (ATA flt 4517) booked through Southwest airlines. According to the ATA ground personnel at the gate, my daughters ticket was "expired" and should have been used a day earlier. My daughter tried to explain to the individual that her ticket was modified on 15 December to reflect a 19 December flight date. However, the ground personnel told my daughter that she still could not board the aircraft since the computer does not reflect the right dates for travel (though her luggage were already onboard) and that she should try coming back the following day at which time she could "attempt" to get on one of the flights to honolulu. The ATA person then told my daughter that she had to leave for her "break" and left her stranded at the gate. My daughter called me immediately and I had to spend hours with both airline customer service representatives to straighten out the situation. Both airlines (Southwest and ATA) are now passing the proverbial buck as to whose fault was..regardless, poor customer service was shown by Southwest and ATA. I followed the situation helplessly as my daughter stayed on the phone line with me during her attempts to get on the flight. I could overhear the rude remarks by ATA personnel as to how they couldn't help my daughter, that tone changed when I finally got on the line with the customer service rep who finally recognized that ATA had failed to recognized the change in flight dates during an online rebooking on 15 December, (booking changed to the 19th from the 18th). My daughter was finally booked for a confirmed flight the following day.

Since lodging a formal complaint, I'm sure ATA ground personnel at Oakland airport will have concocted an appropriate response to cover their tracks, however, I do know for a fact that they failed miserably to offer a modicum of customer service to help my diminuitive daughter mainly because she was not "forceful" enough to explain her situation. They merely brushed her off to go on a break!! They even went so far as to "LIE" to me saying that they tried their best to book her on the flight, saying that they called her to the podium to board! I was on the phone with my daughter at that time and listened to every announcement (names called) for 30 minutes until the gate closed, not once did they call her name.

I am forwarding my detailed formal complaint to a news agency here in Hawaii and also to my congressman. I am hoping that someone out there will listen to
"powerless" customers like me with regards to monster airlines like Southwest and ATA.

SWZARSA

[swzarsa]

All,
Less than 24-hours from this posting, I received a phone call from ATA official (Lisa Evans). She sincerely apologized for ATA and ironically, also for Southwest airlines. I'm pleased with steps taken/to be taken to rectify and ameliorate my complaint. Fly ATA, but not Southwest!!!

swzarsa