[ksgross64]

I'll try to keep this as brief as possible. I was in kidney failure and my cousin graciously offered to donate her kidney to me. I live in Michigan, and she lives in Seattle, so she would have to make the trip here for the surgery. As we were making travel plans, I encouraged her to ask Delta if there were discounts for this type of thing and she was told that there was nothing available. I then asked Delta if I could give her my skymiles to use toward her flight. I had just shy of enough for a full flight, but was told by the customer service agent that she could still use them. When she tried, of course, she was told that she couldn't because there weren't enough for a full flight. She was able to fly back to Seattle, 2 weeks following the surgery. She had a middle seat and was concerned that it wouldn't be comfortable for her, plus she needed easy access to the bathroom. I called customer service and explained the situation. I asked if there was anything that they could do to try to make her trip more comfortable...give her an aisle seat, or and exit row, or a first class seat if available. I was told that no, they couldn't do anything for her and that she could upgrade to first class, but we would have to pay extra or use skymiles. I then asked to speak to her supervisor, who told me the same thing. I then asked to speak to her supervisor and was told that she was as high as I could go in customer service. I asked if she owned Delta, which of course she responded that no she didn't, then I said there must be someone with whom I could speak. She told me that there wasn't. I ended up using 12,500 skymiles to upgrade my cousin to first class, which I was alright about because I wanted her flight to be comfortable. I was just amazed that there is no humanitarian effort to assist people with this type of travel. I wasn't asking for a free ride, just some assistance for someone doing something that was life saving and life changing for me. I would like to encourage all people to consider organ donation, and if companies like Delta could assist, maybe it would make the process easier for the donor. In the past, I have always flown with Northwest/Delta, I now will reconsider the next time that I need to fly anywhere. I will add, Delta did, upon my request, have a wheelchair waiting at the ticket counter to take my cousin from there to her gate.