[Ronaldz]

This is the letter I wrote to Delta. I have received no response and it was, and still is, the worst I have ever been treated by any company. The really bad part is at the end but the other stuff is worthy of its own posts:




I think most people would agree that the flight experience has deteriorated over the past 10 years. Cost cuts due to competitive pricing online, rising fuel costs and discount airlines took away the luxuries of flying. This all seems like the evolution of an industry to me, which seems fine and I can understand and appreciate competitive business. My name is Ronald Rinker, SkyMiles #6409360242, and on Thursday, June 17th, my recent bride, Heather Gardner SkyMiles #9152253408, and I flew back to my hometown in Indiana to have our wedding reception. I want to lay out for you what it was like to fly on Delta Airlines. There were some problems that were unavoidable such as a mechanical problem which started the journey, but most were due to bad training, rudeness, lack of effort, and lack of caring. There were also a few good employees, which is why we want to give Delta another chance. This letter is a little lengthy, but all the events laid out are completely true and contain no exaggeration. The length is necessary to get all the details in. It all started on the Morning of June 17th:


We were scheduled to fly to Indianapolis at 7:00 am out of LAX via Detroit (DL1506). This is after our flight was changed a couple times over the previous month. The past 4 times I have flown on Delta, my flights have changed times and locations numerous times, which makes it impossible to plan events.


We were awoken at 4 AM on the 17th of June by an automated message telling us that our flight had been canceled due to a mechanical problem. We appreciate the safety of this. I am told that we will fly out at 11 pm that night and get into to Indianapolis at 9 AM the next day going through North Carolina. I was always told the policy was to get people in the same day. The message gives a number to call if there are any problems. We are going to our wedding reception and we need to get in that night. An unscheduled red eye for the same price is not going to work. I call the number and get an operator at a call center in India. I tell her my problems and she looks for another flight. After a few minutes she tells me she has solved my problem and found a flight that leaves LAX to New Orleans, to Atlanta and on to North Carolina. She did not take the time or effort to realize you had rebooked me through North Carolina, it was not my final destination; we were trying to get to Indianapolis 600 miles away. I realized that her lack of US geographical understanding was hurting and I needed to speak to a supervisor.


She transferred me to a man, Paul Smith, out of your Salt Lake City office. He informed me that there was nothing he could do. There was no flight at all available. I pleaded with him by telling him it was for our wedding reception. He told me he had worked there for 25 years and that he knew there was nothing that could be done. I proceeded to talk to him for 30 minutes at 4 am where he told me that this was no big deal, was rude to me, and I could tell he just wanted off the phone. I told him the last 4 times I had flown Delta, they had changed flight times and destinations and that it messed up my plans. I told him that in fact this very flight had been changed. He said it was not that big of deal and that it had only been changed 10 minutes from the original departure time, without even thinking to see that the arrival time in Indianapolis was changed as well as what cities we were flying though not to mention that this flight had been canceled and I was now scheduled to arrive 17 hours later in Indianapolis than I had scheduled. My wife heard how this was going and called the number as well. The person on her line heard me talking and asked if I was talking to delta as well. She told them that we were and the person immediately hung up the phone on her. We had to realize for ourselves that you couldn’t talk to two agents about the same flight so I got off the phone with Mr. Smith, who was not helping anyways.


The only help he gave me was that all they could offer was 100 dollars in travel vouchers or 5000 miles. Since flights are around 450 dollars and you need 25,000 miles for a free flight, this was offering us 1/4th of a flight in vouchers or 1/5th of a flight in miles respectively. This hardly seemed worth the troubles we were having. He then told me to write this letter if we wanted to receive more compensation, which we do.


My wife was now in tears at 4:30 AM. She called your customer service line after I got off the phone. She talked to a nice lady who got us on a flight leaving at 1pm heading to San Diego, then Phoenix and finally to Indianapolis over a 9 hour total flight time. This surprised me since Mr. Smith had told me there was nothing available. There was a little relief even though we were going to get in over 8 hours later than the ticket we originally purchased. We would at least make our wedding reception, even though we would be exhausted.


We then went back to sleep for a couple of hours, then headed to the airport. When we arrived we went to the self-help kiosk, since it is literally impossible to speak to someone until you have a problem. I entered our reference number, but my wife’s name was not highlighted so that I could check her in. I called over the Delta employee to look and he proceeded to tell me it was my fault without understanding the situation. We were then sent to the line for people having problems. The line had about 20 people in it and 3 customer service representatives. Everyone in line was there in some way because of a canceled flight. After 15 minutes of us not moving, and the line size not changing, one of the representatives decided to go on break. After 35-40 minutes in line we were finally helped. They looked though the reservation and obviously when we were rebooked someone made a mistake or your system is faulty because they could not check my wife in. After 15 minutes they gave her a pass and wrote her e-ticket number on the back.


We barely made our flight despite arriving 2 hours before departure and no security line. I knew we had limited time to switch planes in San Diego and you had booked us on US Airways. I asked the gate attendant if US Airways was in the same terminal as Delta wondering if we would have to go back through security and explained our situation. Her only response was, “I don’t know.” We did in fact have to go back though security and barely made our US Airways flight to Phoenix where we had a layover and finally on to Indianapolis arriving at 1 AM, 9 hours later than we were supposed to arrive and feeling exhausted. At this point I had decided we deserved free tickets for our compensation and I decided I was going to write a letter. Naively, I thought our troubles were behind us with Delta Airlines.


We had a beautiful wedding reception, but we were limited to only 2 days with my family instead of 3. I tried to check in the night before our flight, but again it would not let me click on my wife’s name; just like at LAX. We arrived at Indianapolis Airport 2 hours before our flight so we could talk to an agent there. After waiting 30 minutes with only 4 people in line, we talked to a woman and told her this had happened before. She tried for a while and could not get my wife checked in. She had to get her supervisor, so we waited for 5 minutes till he could come over. The supervisor, Anthony Gayden, then stepped in. He went through the computer for 5 minutes. He said you came here through Detroit right? We said no it had been rebooked, but apparently it was not updating our flights and it still showed the flight that was canceled 3 days ago had flown as scheduled. We thought if he knew we were rebooked it might help him find a solution. We tried to tell him what we had to do before and what the problem was in the rebooking but he seemed to not want to talk about that or hear anything we had to say. Then, while waiting for a call back about it, his boss showed up and he proceeded to make fun of a passenger flying to Australia that needed a visa. She told him he could help the customer in need get the visa. Mr. Gayden then laughed and made another comment about how he told the passenger he could go get it on his own since he was not nice to him. This was a customer service supervisor basically telling a customer to screw off because he did not like the way he was talked to and laughing about it in front of another customer.


After spending 25 minutes with Mr. Gayden, this is 45 minutes less time with my parents who are waiting behind us on a bench; he decided to write up a slip for us that would get my wife through security and on the plane. I then asked if he could check to see if our delta miles were applied on the way out since we had flown out on US Airways, but had purchased through Delta. He said go online to do it. I explained what had happened to us on the way out and how it would really make up for everything done if we could at least get that; it was a way out for your airline. He then said in one of the rudest, uncompassionate ways I have ever heard a customer service talk to me before say, “That was not me, I have nothing to do with that. Do I work in LA?” I said I realize you did not personally do anything but that you represent your company and we were treated badly, could you please help us with that? Mr. Gayden then said:

I helped you and if you want to keep standing here complaining, I will report you as an unruly customer, kick you off the flight, cancel your ticket and give you a refund. Is that what you want? You can find your own way to LA.

Keep in mind we did not yell at him about the miles, but asked him twice and explained our situation. I realized he did have the power to do so and that he knew this flexing of his power would end the conversation. This was in every way the definition of abuse of power. We did nothing wrong and he threatened us in the worst way. This is your company’s problem solver; your company’s supervising problem solver.


We have never had a company treat us this way. We are paying customers and deserve better than this whole experience. You have the only direct Sunday night flight from Indianapolis to LAX, which I use 4-5 times a year. This has always kept me coming back to Delta despite all the schedule changes and the fact that southwest has the same or lower prices, a better mileage program, less schedule changes and 2 free bags per passenger. My wife pleaded that we never fly Delta again. I said that in the past you were the top airline domestically. I want to give you another chance, but I will not pay for it. Please provide us with two free tickets as compensation. I have never written a letter like this in my life. If I do not hear back, I will never fly Delta Airlines again no matter the cost of flights. I would like to give your company and employees another chance to prove themselves to my wife and me. The one bright spot was the steward on our flight home (DL2789 on June 20th). He was the best steward I have ever seen. I wish I had his name for you and it let me know that some of your employees can be exceptional. I wish you would look up his name, because he is the only reason we are willing to give this airline another chance. I look forward to hearing your response.

Sincerely,

Ronald Rinker

[jimworcs]

Ronald,
The Delta that was so good "domestically" is long gone... sadly your experience is now more typical, particularly the attitude of the delightful Mr. Anthony Gayden and Paul Smith in Salt Lake City. If you read through the Delta thread in this, and on other sites, you will find that the Delta of old is gone. Your wife is right.. go to Southwest and abandon them. Delta are not worth it.

[Ronaldz]

Originally Posted by jimworcs

Ronald,
The Delta that was so good "domestically" is long gone... sadly your experience is now more typical, particularly the attitude of the delightful Mr. Anthony Gayden and Paul Smith in Salt Lake City. If you read through the Delta thread in this, and on other sites, you will find that the Delta of old is gone. Your wife is right.. go to Southwest and abandon them. Delta are not worth it.

Thanks for the response! Yeah I agree. I am finding out how bad it is by reading this forum and mostly by them not even responding to my letter. I sent it through email and to 5 different customer service addresses including the VP of customer relations. The sad part is we care so much and I am sure they don't even care that I will not be flying them anymore...

[jimworcs]

It is what happens when companies are rewarded for bankruptcy, with anti-trust immunity allowing them to emerge as the largest airline in the world. They become arrogant and the little guy counts for nothing.

[idahovandals1986]

Originally Posted by Ronaldz

Thanks for the response! Yeah I agree. I am finding out how bad it is by reading this forum and mostly by them not even responding to my letter. I sent it through email and to 5 different customer service addresses including the VP of customer relations. The sad part is we care so much and I am sure they don't even care that I will not be flying them anymore...

You are reading posts on a complaint forum. Think of it this way there are maybe 1000 or so posts tops here when there are millions of customers. So that is a very small percentage of poor experiences when flying with airlines. I think how your flight was handled was done poorly however if flights aren't available pleading with a customer service guy on the phone isn't going to magically open a flight.

[mars6423]

maybe there are 1000 posts/threads on here but you also have to realize that only a small percentage of complaints will be posted on here at teh same time