If You Build it...

So I decided to use my flight voucher to go out and visit my sister who is going to dental school out in Iowa. She has been out there for more than three years now, I figured it was high time I got on out there to see her new home. She lives by a pretty small airport, so flights out there are usually not exactly the cheapest. Lately though, for whatever reason, United Airlines has had flights for a little over $200.


Thursday evening, I decided to bite the bullet and buy a ticket for the next day. The plan was to to the early evening flight out, and use all the extra hours I had accumulated from working the huge event I was in charge of to take Friday afternoon and Monday morning.


Sadly, the internet at my apartment wasn't really working, and I had to head up the canyon for a ward activity. My sister, being so excited to see me, offered to purchase the ticket for me. I emailed all the voucher information I had and headed off to the activity. As we headed back down the canyon and back into cell reception, my phone started buzzing with voicemails and texts. Apparently, the confirmation number United gave me didn't work. My sister and brother-in-law spent an hour on the phone with them, but they just kept saying I had to have more information (which I did not, they only gave me the one number).


I went to my office to try and buy the ticket, but wasn't able to do it online. I called and spoke to a representative and was informed that United changed their voucher numbers from a 15 digit to 18 digit number. Apparently people were hacking in and guessing the 15 digit numbers, so in order to protect their customers, they changed all the numbers. In theory, this is a great thing to do, but they forgot to tell their customers about it. Apparently they issued everyone a new 18 digit number, but the only way to find out what about the new number was to call and get it. After explaining this, they assured me the office who could help me was indeed still open (it was about 11:30 p.m. at this point) and transferred me to a voicemail saying office hours were until 5.

The next morning I spent an additional hour on the phone getting everything figured out and my flight booked. During this hour, I complained about the hours I spent on the phone the night before and not being informed of my new number. After some coaxing, she offerred me a $25 flight voucher (that I couldn't use for my flight to Iowa). I nicely told her that was very gracious, seeing how it was enough to cover the new baggage fee they instated and then asked to speak to her supervisor so I could file a complaint. She told me, "I would be happy to have you speak to my supervisor, but I can assure you, he can't issue any additional vouchers than the $25 I already gave to you." I told her that was just fine, I didn't care about the vouchers, I just wanted to file a formal complaint about the fact that United is trying to cheat their customers out of vouchers. She transferred me, and after being put on hold, her supervisor got on the phone and without me even saying a word told me they were issuing me an additional $100 voucher. I thanked him and said I still wanted to file a written complaint. To that, he gave me $25 more. This cycle went on for a little while longer until he finally realized I wasn't going to give up on the formal complaint.

I hung up the phone with them at 2:45 p.m., left my office at 3 and was on my way to the airport by 3:20. Talk about last minute trip!

So, now I have additional flight vouchers. I'm pretty excited that I'm getting multiple trips out of this, but pretty bugged that their customer service is so horrible (not to mention the fact that they outright lied in an attempt to get me to not speak with a supervisor). Who knows, with their track record,maybe i'll be flying United for free for the rest of my life (Is is worth the horrible service?!).

My Iowa travelogue will be coming shortly. For a sneak preview and Erin's thoughts on it, visit here!