[Carey934]

I haven't flown Delta years and now I regret coming back to Delta. My flight to Palm Beach, Florida from Phoenix, AZ was delayed 5 hours in Atlanta because the planes landing gear 'locked' light was not functional. This was flight #1412 on Tue Jan 29. They attempted to repair it and have us in the air in no time, which turned into a full blown repair, which turned into unrepairable and put us on the next flight out. I lost 5 hours, but these things happen. A week later, I arrive at PBI airport, board my flight back to Phoenix. This is flight 1578 on Mon Feb 4 scheduled to leave at 7pm. They hold the plane on the ground for 40 minutes, filling up the empty seats with passengers from a cancelled flight to LGA. Now, my connecting flight to Phoenix is at 9:30, flight 1605 Gate E06, and we land and I rush off the plane and race to my gate only to discover the gate has been changed and is now A19, so I rush to that gate, I see the plane is still on the ground, I present my ticket, I am out of breath, my arms and legs hurt from hauling my luggage for a half mile across the atlanta airport and they tell me the plane door is closed and I cannot board. In the mean time, the new yorkers, who my plane was delayed for, have a flight leaving at 9:40 at the gate right next door to where we arrived. They all make their connection. I was told to go to the ticket counter to get a ticket to the next flight out of Phoenix, which I am told is 12 hours away.
This is unacceptable as I have a dentist appointment that I will be billed for if I do not appear. I am given a discount coupon to stay at a local hotel. I am not prepared to stay over night. I am a businessman and I have work to get done and now Delta is stealing 12 more hours of my time on top of the five they already took without my permission.
Delta could have held the connecting flight to phoenix for five minutes, just as they held my initial flight for the passengers of the cancelled Delta flight to LGA. Clearly this is discrimination. Those on the cancelled flight were given preferential treatment and caused an artificial delay created by Delta which has turned my schedule updside down and is costing me more than you can imagine! The lady 'Nicole', a large black woman, started to tell me my flight was delayed due to weather. I explained to her the flight was held so Delta could fill all the seats with passengers from the cancelled flight and the weather was fine. She says Delta never holds flights for other passengers. I explained I was on the plane and I saw beautiful weather and saw passengers board after the doors of the plane were scheduled to be closed for a full forty minutes. She continued to provoke me and suggest I write in if I don't like and insited weather was the cause of the delay. I asked for a supervisor immediatly. Eventually I was given a complimentary hotel room, but I am still not in Phoenix. I can understand a delay of a couple hours once in a while, but this has effected me on each leg of my trip coming and going. How will Delta reimburse me for the 17 hours I have now wasted because Delta did not keep their commitment with me? I am requesing reimbursement also for my missed appointment, which was scheduled a FULL DAY after I was to arrive in Phoenix.

They replied:
Thank you for your e-mail describing the problem you experienced.
Your time is valuable, and operating on schedule is equally important to us. However, in the process of operating scheduled service over many different routes each day, occasional mechanical malfunctions, adverse weather, and other interruptions to routine performance plans are unavoidable. These are situations faced by all airlines and no air carrier can guarantee that all flights will depart or arrive on schedule. Nevertheless, we are sorry you were inconvenienced.
We regret we did not meet your expectations on this occasion, and I can understand your frustration and disappointment. However, we hope you will understand that we do not reimburse the expenses you requested and must respectfully decline your request.
Please accept our apology for the unfavorable impression you received in this instance. We appreciate your selection of Delta and will always consider it a privilege to be of service.
Sincerely,
Daniel Tancak
Online Customer Support Desk
http://www.delta.com

Then I replied:

I find your response unacceptable and will be sharing this story with the listeners of my radio talk show each weekday throughout the rest of this month. I'll be sure that all of our nationwide and worldwide listeners know that it took Delta 33 hours to get me from Phoenix to Palm Beach and did not offer an explanation as to why new york passengers were given preferential treatment that caused an excessive delay.
Please cancel my Sky Miles account immediately, as I will never fly Delta again. I am also going to share this story everyday this month on my nationwide radio broadcast so my listeners can decide for themselves if they want to risk repeating my experience should they choose to fly Delta.
Please forward this message on to your superiors and I will forward it on to your PR company personally.
Delta Air Lines Corporate Communications
Richard H Anderson, Chief Executive Officer
Kent Landers
Director External Communications (US)
Betsy Talton
General Manager National Media Relations
Anthony Black
Senior Manager Regional Media Relations
Susan Chana Elliott
Senior Manager Regional Media Relations
Katie Connell
Senior Manager Lifestyle/Leisure Media Relations

And they repied:

We are very concerned about the unfortunate situation you described.
Flying with Delta should be enjoyable, and I am sorry for any role we may have played which caused your travel experience to be otherwise. The inconvenience you experienced does not support our goal of providing a high level of service and value to our customers. Customer service is very important to us, and we are working hard to transform our company.

According to the rules of the program, the credit earned in your SkyMiles account will remain active until December 31, 2010. SkyMiles will not expire as long as there is qualifying activity at least once every two years. Within two years of inactivity with a zero balance the account will be closed.
We value the relationship you have with Delta Air Lines and would be delighted to have another chance to restore your trust and confidence in our service.
Sincerely,
Loren Byers
Online Customer Support Desk
http://www.delta.com

And I replied:

Please be aware that I am reporting this abusive cancellation and delay of planes to the FAA. The four flights I booked were all about half-full.
But
after Delta manipulated the planes, 3 of the 4 planes were packed without a single seat. The financial reasons for this are obvious, but on the 3rd flight, it was reported in the Delta computer system that the flight was delayed due to weather, rather then the truth that the flight was delayed to make room for other passengers. That delayed the plane by more than 40 minutes and resulted with me arguing with a Delta Customer Service rep named Nicole who insisted the flight was delayed due to weather because that’s what her computer said. When I corrected her why the flight was delayed, her response was "I'm just telling you what my computer says." And my response was "I'm just telling you the real reason" and her response was "Well, that's my computer says" and my response was "well, I was actually on the plane and I know exactly why it was delayed" at which point another customer service rep offered to step in and Nicole said to her, "Oh no, I got this one." As if I was challenging her to fisticuffs! I asked to speak with a supervisor before the computer system mis-information was recognized.
Clearly the FAA has rules about this and I am going to do my best to ensure these questionable business practices of cancelling and delaying fights by 12 hours just to fill a plane to capacity at the inconvenience of the passengers are brought to the attention of the FAA and my entire listening audience.
I have a cancelled dental appointment and an extra day of covered parking and a full day of lost work, all resulting from this artificially created delay practiced by your company to fill planes to capacity.
I know Delta will never do this to me again, because I will never fly Delta again. Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.
I look forward to your next boilerplate reply.

Final response from Delta:

Thank you for your most recent e-mail. We regret your continued displeasure with our previous "boilerplate" responses.
However, we appreciate your feedback and encourage you to forward any additional comments to our corporate offices at the address below:
Delta Air Lines
Customer Care
P.O. Box 20980
Atlanta, GA 30320-2980
Thank you for the opportunity to give this matter our final review. Any additional correspondence via e-mail will be kept on file.
Sincerely,

Joy Blessing
Online Customer Support Desk
http://www.delta.com

[ChrisH]

Obviously, delays are going to happen, no matter what airline you fly. Maintenance will occur, weather will occur, etc. It is unfortunate that Delta delayed the other flight by 40 mins to accomodate passengers, but refuses to let you board an airplane for 5 mins, that was still sitting at the gate. Unfortunately, however, things, with any company, are not always uniform. Technically, flights are closed for boarding at least 10 minutes prior to departure, which means the agent refusing to let you board, in ATL, was technically in the right, but the agents at your first flight, which was delayed 40 mins, to allow customers to board, were in the wrong, which led to that agent in ATL having to deny you boarding, in the first place.

Keep in mind that agents can only go by what is in the computer. If it says "weather", whether it was, or not, they have to go by that. The type of delay determines what they can or cannot offer you, such as hotel rooms, vouchers, refunds, etc. Agents are only given so much authority, so if her computer says "weather", then there really is nothing she can do, except get a supervisor to approve something further. She shouldn't have argued with you, and should have turned the situation over the a supervisor in the first place. Keep in mind that agents just work for the airline. They are told what they can, and cannot do, and ultimately, do not have much authority, or control over the situations that passengers like to blame them for, and take out on them.

It is your choice not to fly Delta again. Keep in mind, however, that it is a cycle. For every person, like yourself, who has a problem with an airline, there is someone else having that same exact problem, with another airline. You will not fly Delta again, so you go fly that other airline, while that person will not fly that airline again, so they go fly Delta. This is why the airlines do not care much, and you get those type of responses from them. Because, ultimately, you flying them, or not, isn't going to hurt them, because there will be somebody else, who normally doesn't fly Delta, who will now, because they had this experience on some other airline, and will not fly that airline. It is a cycle, and one that keeps the airlines in business, not to mention that many of those airlines are, in fact, partners. So, you stop flying Delta, but end up flying one of their partners, who is operating a code share flight, thus Delta shares in the profits anway. Only way for things to change, is for people to stop flying altogether, period.