[redbridge]

I had to cancel a flight. As if the $150 punishment fee weren't horrible enough (and I cancelled MONTHS before the flight, there's NO WAY it cost Continental even a penny for me to reschedule) - then when I tried to re-book, the website gave what was clearly an incorrectly generated error message and said I had to call the 800 number.

The message I got on the "change reservation" page had said there were no flights on the days I was requesting. Yet, on their REGULAR booking page, there were MANY flights for that route, on those days.

I was on hold almost 40 minutes just for customer service. During this time, they play advertisements for Continental - over, and over, and over, and over, and over again.

When she answered, I was polite but did mention the long hold. By that time of course, I'd been doing other things and it took a few SECONDS for me to bring back up the confirmation number to give her. She then intimated that it was the fault of people "like me" that the wait time had been so long.

So she found the flights I'd wanted and told me the fare, giving me a figure that was over $100 more than what the website said. She said I could talk to tech support and try to "get that price back," but that she couldn't change the price.

So she switched me over to that line - and now I've been on the phone for an hour and thirteen minutes - and I'm still holding. In the meantime, I again looked up the flights on the website and the price has NOT changed in the meantime, it still says the lower price.

I will NEVER fly Continental again and I encourage everyone else to boycott companies like this that provide virtually no customer service while still charging you absolutely outrageous re-schedule fees.