It's now 1:51 am and I've done it! I called Northwest airlines 5 hrs ago and have been on the phone ever since. I originally paid $600 each for tickets to Calgary. I found an open flight with FOUR stops leaving at 5:25 pm today but they wanted $1464 for each ticket since I wasn't waiting 7 days (then it would be $994). The agent said they would not change the price under any circumstances. I was then told to go to Expedia.com where Karen's secretary booked the tickets thru. It get even better...........we started this fiasco last September 06 when Mercedes Benz was having an international conference and we thought we could mix business with a second honeymoon. When the hurricane totalled Cancun a week before we were to go, everything was cancelled..........our resort hotel was demolished...........we had to reschedule/rebook somewhere else before February 07 to gat any credit for the NON REFUNDABLE TICKETS the assistant had gotten............I got the brilliant idea to come to Calgary/Banff where hurricanes were rare..lol.......that's where you guys came into our lives..........you know the rest.............today I was told that my application as well as thousands of others were delayed. I even asked it I paid the extra $62 over the normal fee which is SUPPOSED to get it to me in 14 days would, if and only if, I applied in the next five days, most likely get to me by the LAST week in August.
Calling expedia I'm now in the Phillipines talking to six different people who even get Northwest Air in the mix and inform me you only get ONE change and the computor won't ever let anyone overide that policy BUT...............they did get me my $600 credit for both Tickets and could use that to book another flight.....this got me to 12:34am and I was right back where I started because Northwest had no problem with giving me the credit at 8:45!except that the fare grew to the $1400+each and could get on a Tuesday plane. I then said to myself since I'm so punch drunk already lets have some fun with Northwest again. This time I'm in Baltimore talking to a gentleman who adamently stated five times that there was nothing they could do and that they did not negotiate!!!!I'm smiling at this point like an idiot and ask to speak to a supervisor who could tell me to pound sand also. He said they would and I said I need the abuse......find them! Fourteen minutes later this sharp gal gets on and I tell her the whole story for the sixth time (I really started to get good stating my case by then with so much practice with the notion that We all have to look at these times as different and steadfast rules have to be newly interpreted for these changing situations that are not your or my fault. I stated I was willing to bend and drive seven hours in a rented car to get where I originally planned to be and someone needs to step up and bend a little themselves in these uncharted times and make a management decision and overide their cemented in stone rules. She made the decision (charging me another $100 for each ticket change) and we are on our way. Leaving Knoxville to Memphis to Minneapolis to Great Falls to Kalispell,Montana. We will be arriving there at 11:54pm and crashing. Sunday morning we will then drive the seven hrs(312 miles) to Canmore for that COLD BEER!!!!!!!!!!!! After all this I hope some will be at the Grizzly Paw(7:00pm Sunday) to CELEBRATE our arrival! GO CJA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
2,409 MILES - I bet I win the distance trophy,lol!