T-1 Day
Well, we got most of the way packed last night. We have plenty of WEIGHT available to us, but we're still having trouble with luggage distribution. Basically, we have two bags that are too large and two that are too small, and we're having a devil of a time getting enough heavy stuff into the small ones and light stuff into the big ones so that they all weigh at or below 50 lbs. But I have confidence we will get there. Thank God we actually bought a luggage scale. When the weight limit for checked luggage was 70lbs, it was hard to go overweight. Now it's almost impossible to pack without weighing your bags.
Crypto and P came back from the Tower of London to pick up their bags and have dinner in the evening. That was a very nice way to conclude the visit, though SB and I had to return from the nice conversation to pack until late at night.
Tonight after 8pm we hand over the key.
The drama about our airline tickets had another chapter. As with many things, I am bloody sick of stressing about this. The story goes like this:
- We bought two round-trip business class tickets on our way out. My ticket alone took two years' worth of frequent flier miles from our credit card and SB's business travel. SB's ticket was a couch class one, purchased by his grant, and upgraded with the miles *I* had accumulated on my AA account for much longer than two years.
- The tickets had to be scheduled for a May return date because AA's system didn't support scheduling flights more than a year from date of purchase. We were assured we could set our return date a couple of months from our departure.
- Unrelatedly, SB was denied ff miles for a huge business trip to Australia. The reason AA gave was one of these really irritating, "This ticket was bought under special circumstances that only we understand, and while we didn't tell you it was different and you could not have learned it on your own, we still will not honor our stated commitments," sort of thing that one seems to get from the airlines a lot these days. He was a frequent enough business traveler up until that point that he'd been holding Gold status. It didn't give a lot of perks, but it did allow us to board first, which was useful if I wanted to fly with my viola. He also had a large stack of upgrade-to-first-class vouchers that had so many restrictions that we'd never been able to use them. So, he lost Gold status over the denied miles, and AA offered to sell it back to him for $300. He refused. This comes up later.
- THEN, when the time came around for us to schedule our actual return dates to the States, all hell broke loose. The American Airlines US office told us that while HIS ticket could be rescheduled up to a year from *departure*, MY ticket could only be rescheduled a year from *purchase*. Therefore, my ticket expired in May, and we could not use it to return in July. To return in July, we would need to buy me a new ticket. Remember that our tickets are not linked because his base ticket was purchased under his grant, and apparently slightly different opaque airline fare rules apply. Shocked, we go back and compare the fine print on our ticket confirmations. Though the American rep said the opposite when we bought (and in her defense, she probably couldn't track this crap either), the fine print on *my* ticket really does say valid for one year from date of purchase, and *his* really does say valid one year from date of departure. Jesus H. Christ on a pogo stick
- Oh, and by the way, they could make this whole problem go away if Studentbane still had Gold status.
- By the end of an angry, contentious conversation where SB was escalated to a manager who kept saying over and over again, "What can I do to make this a positive experience?" and then refused every request we made, we just gave up and decided to buy a new ticket for me. At this point, we're both flying coach because my ticket is invalid and his business class upgrade has been denied.
- THEN, to add insult to injury, AA US refused to let us BUY the ticket because, you guessed it, our credit card has a London address. Even though it's an American credit card and we're trying to do a transaction regarding purchases that were made in the United States. We'll have to call the UK office in the morning (it is now midnight London time). No, they won't even put a hold on my ticket so we can sleep well. Oh, and what can they do to make this a positive experience?
- We sleep poorly and get up and call AA UK in the morning. We do not reference our conversation with AA US. We just say that we'd called AA US and that they'd referred us to AA UK because of the credit card. If they're going to treat us like crap, they're going to have to start from scratch.
- To our shock, the UK office is entirely different. They literally keep us on hold for about 45 minutes. Apparently, the fare rules on our tickets are so complex that nobody in the UK office can figure out what's going on. Finally, they come back and tell us there really is only one flight in the entire month of July that we can use, BUT they have no problem rescheduling my frequent flier miles ticket. They're terribly sorry that there are currently no business class seats available, but more will become available, and they will put us in for upgrades. In fact, they insist on refunding me $75 in taxes, since I'd already paid the taxes for a business class ticket.
- A month after all that drama, SB has never received a confirmation of his ticket, though I had (remember we're separate). He calls and is told that his ticket was just being held so that they could give him that business class upgrade. A whole bunch of business class slots were made available, and there's no problem for both of us to get one. SB reiterates for the umpteenth time, "Please don't upgrade one of us if you can't upgrade both." The rep says sure, it won't be a problem, and that he'll make a note on the file. SB received a ticket confirmation the same day. It is business class.
- Yesterday, we realized that *I* had never received that business class upgrade confirmation. We'd kind of let it slide because the last time everything was fine. However, a check online indicates that my ticket is still coach. This morning, SB called in AGAIN. The UK office tells him that there are no more business class seats available. SB expresses confusion -- my ticket was already paid for as business class; his ticket had to be upgraded for additional money. If they were going to upgrade one, why not upgrade mine? And what happened to his request that we only be upgraded together? AA puts him on hold. SB and I have a surge of fear, since we actually have read the real fine print that says my ticket is invalid. So we both half expect her to come back and tell us that they're sorry, but they can't honor my ticket, and the next available flight home is in December.
- Instead, the nice rep came back and said they'd released a business class slot for me. I now have a business class confirmation for the return flight. We have no idea if we're sitting together, but we are SO not tempting fate.
So, wow, we actually win! We're back exactly to the reservations we made when we departed, only with an order of magnitude more drama. I guess we had to pay something for the effortless way the cats got home.
And I am shocked by just how different the US and UK office experiences have been with the very same airline. I wish there were some way we could stick with AA and only do business with their UK office. We would pay more money to do business with AA UK. Not that AA US seems to want our money.
Crypto and P came back from the Tower of London to pick up their bags and have dinner in the evening. That was a very nice way to conclude the visit, though SB and I had to return from the nice conversation to pack until late at night.
Tonight after 8pm we hand over the key.
The drama about our airline tickets had another chapter. As with many things, I am bloody sick of stressing about this. The story goes like this:
- We bought two round-trip business class tickets on our way out. My ticket alone took two years' worth of frequent flier miles from our credit card and SB's business travel. SB's ticket was a couch class one, purchased by his grant, and upgraded with the miles *I* had accumulated on my AA account for much longer than two years.
- The tickets had to be scheduled for a May return date because AA's system didn't support scheduling flights more than a year from date of purchase. We were assured we could set our return date a couple of months from our departure.
- Unrelatedly, SB was denied ff miles for a huge business trip to Australia. The reason AA gave was one of these really irritating, "This ticket was bought under special circumstances that only we understand, and while we didn't tell you it was different and you could not have learned it on your own, we still will not honor our stated commitments," sort of thing that one seems to get from the airlines a lot these days. He was a frequent enough business traveler up until that point that he'd been holding Gold status. It didn't give a lot of perks, but it did allow us to board first, which was useful if I wanted to fly with my viola. He also had a large stack of upgrade-to-first-class vouchers that had so many restrictions that we'd never been able to use them. So, he lost Gold status over the denied miles, and AA offered to sell it back to him for $300. He refused. This comes up later.
- THEN, when the time came around for us to schedule our actual return dates to the States, all hell broke loose. The American Airlines US office told us that while HIS ticket could be rescheduled up to a year from *departure*, MY ticket could only be rescheduled a year from *purchase*. Therefore, my ticket expired in May, and we could not use it to return in July. To return in July, we would need to buy me a new ticket. Remember that our tickets are not linked because his base ticket was purchased under his grant, and apparently slightly different opaque airline fare rules apply. Shocked, we go back and compare the fine print on our ticket confirmations. Though the American rep said the opposite when we bought (and in her defense, she probably couldn't track this crap either), the fine print on *my* ticket really does say valid for one year from date of purchase, and *his* really does say valid one year from date of departure. Jesus H. Christ on a pogo stick
- Oh, and by the way, they could make this whole problem go away if Studentbane still had Gold status.
- By the end of an angry, contentious conversation where SB was escalated to a manager who kept saying over and over again, "What can I do to make this a positive experience?" and then refused every request we made, we just gave up and decided to buy a new ticket for me. At this point, we're both flying coach because my ticket is invalid and his business class upgrade has been denied.
- THEN, to add insult to injury, AA US refused to let us BUY the ticket because, you guessed it, our credit card has a London address. Even though it's an American credit card and we're trying to do a transaction regarding purchases that were made in the United States. We'll have to call the UK office in the morning (it is now midnight London time). No, they won't even put a hold on my ticket so we can sleep well. Oh, and what can they do to make this a positive experience?
- We sleep poorly and get up and call AA UK in the morning. We do not reference our conversation with AA US. We just say that we'd called AA US and that they'd referred us to AA UK because of the credit card. If they're going to treat us like crap, they're going to have to start from scratch.
- To our shock, the UK office is entirely different. They literally keep us on hold for about 45 minutes. Apparently, the fare rules on our tickets are so complex that nobody in the UK office can figure out what's going on. Finally, they come back and tell us there really is only one flight in the entire month of July that we can use, BUT they have no problem rescheduling my frequent flier miles ticket. They're terribly sorry that there are currently no business class seats available, but more will become available, and they will put us in for upgrades. In fact, they insist on refunding me $75 in taxes, since I'd already paid the taxes for a business class ticket.
- A month after all that drama, SB has never received a confirmation of his ticket, though I had (remember we're separate). He calls and is told that his ticket was just being held so that they could give him that business class upgrade. A whole bunch of business class slots were made available, and there's no problem for both of us to get one. SB reiterates for the umpteenth time, "Please don't upgrade one of us if you can't upgrade both." The rep says sure, it won't be a problem, and that he'll make a note on the file. SB received a ticket confirmation the same day. It is business class.
- Yesterday, we realized that *I* had never received that business class upgrade confirmation. We'd kind of let it slide because the last time everything was fine. However, a check online indicates that my ticket is still coach. This morning, SB called in AGAIN. The UK office tells him that there are no more business class seats available. SB expresses confusion -- my ticket was already paid for as business class; his ticket had to be upgraded for additional money. If they were going to upgrade one, why not upgrade mine? And what happened to his request that we only be upgraded together? AA puts him on hold. SB and I have a surge of fear, since we actually have read the real fine print that says my ticket is invalid. So we both half expect her to come back and tell us that they're sorry, but they can't honor my ticket, and the next available flight home is in December.
- Instead, the nice rep came back and said they'd released a business class slot for me. I now have a business class confirmation for the return flight. We have no idea if we're sitting together, but we are SO not tempting fate.
So, wow, we actually win! We're back exactly to the reservations we made when we departed, only with an order of magnitude more drama. I guess we had to pay something for the effortless way the cats got home.
And I am shocked by just how different the US and UK office experiences have been with the very same airline. I wish there were some way we could stick with AA and only do business with their UK office. We would pay more money to do business with AA UK. Not that AA US seems to want our money.