Trying to leave New York

On Sunday, I called a car to take me to Laguardia Airport so that I could meet up with Heather and fly back to Indiana. I had a very pleasant ride over in unseasonably warm weather for the beginning of February. My driver was very nice, and interesting to converse with. I had plenty of time to spare before my flight left. What I did not have was the sense to realize that these were all warning signs that something was going to go horribly wrong.

I got to the United terminal and went to the self check in machine. Usually these machines are not a problem for me, but there is always the rare occasion when they are problematic. This was one of these occasions. So I went to the ticket counter to speak with an agent. After some thorough research, I was told that I no longer had a valid ticket.

At this point, I should provide a little background information. I booked this flight back in December thinking that I would be flying to New York with Heather on Wednesday of that week. Well since our last city before layoff was Scranton, PA, they just bused us up to Laguardia for everyone's flight home. Well since I was already in New York it did not make sense that I would fly home to Indiana for two days then fly back. Therefore I just stayed and did not use the first leg of my ticket.

That was the fatal flaw. Because I did not use the first half of my roundtrip, United saw fit to just completely cancel my ticket. Not only that they would not reinstate my flight home under any circumstance. No penalties, no body cavity level security screening, nothing! I was told that I had to buy a completely new ticket.

Needless to say, at that point there was not a chance that I would purchase another ticket from United. (I really have to marvel at the stupidity of the airlines and their hateful customer service given the fact that most of them are on the verge of going out of business. It staggers the mind!!) So I went to the food court, called Heather to let her know the situation, and got on my computer. Well I would have except that I could not get the WiFi to work so I had to use my iPod Touch. Thankfully that worked, and I was able to find a reasonable flight on US Airways for that day. I did misspell my name because the iPod Touch keyboard is much too tiny for my fat fingers. Mercifully security let me through, and I eventually made it back to Chicago.

So what was the lesson that I learned from this ordeal? United Airlines can lick my butt!!