Have You Ever Had One of Those Days

Have You Ever Had One of Those Days?

My friends, there are times when I wonder why it is that I do what I do. I pause to ponder where I might be instead of where I am. Why am I in Atlanta at the Fire Rescue International Conference when literally of thousands and thousands of you are not? More than that my friends, there are thousands of our fellow citizens who could care less that many of us labor every day in the trenches of the fire service in our great nation.

This thought crossed my mind once again the other day as my buddy Jack Peltier and I enjoyed yet another delicious Hampton Inn breakfast, this time in Atlanta, Georgia. As you know, the Hampton Inn chain is my travel residence of choice when I am on the road engaged in either business or pleasure. Our day was cast in concrete. We were going to head on out to the airport and catch our respective flights to Newark and Boston. That was that, or so we thought.

As I finished my breakfast, I excused myself and headed off to the business center to download and print my Continental Airline’s on-line boarding pass. After many tries on the computer I discovered that no boarding was there for me. That was worrisome to say the least.

I then did what I thought to be the right thing and called their domestic reservation center. Lo and behold a kindly man by the name of Mark informed me that I was not due to return to Newarkfrom Atlanta until September 26. Since this was August 26 I begin to sweat.

Wow! That was not what I had hoped to hear. However, I owned up to the fact that since I had ordered my ticket on line, I must have hit the wrong key when I was ordering my ticket. I had made a mistake and now hoped that someone could help me. I asked Mark if there was anything he could do to help me out. He indicated that he had unraveled far tougher problems in his career with Continental. His cheery voice literally exuded confidence from my cell phone.

In what seemed like a really short period of time he had me on the same flight I thought I had been on to begin with. More than that he also managed to place me into the exact same seat that I thought I had in the first place. Let me tell you that I would call the results of my interaction with Continental outstanding.

Talk about excellent customer service. Wow. I went from mistake to solution in less than five minutes. All of this was thanks to the diligence of a total stranger who labored in the trenches for Continental Airlines. I guess it pays to stay with the same firm when they take such fine care of their customers.

When I went back to the dining room table to share my human hiccup with Jack we both took a moment to share a chuckle about my latest journey in the land of the dumb-ass. He then said that maybe he should check his reservations to Boston which were made with a competing airline. His lovely wife Sue informed him that he was all set for the 27th of August. That was of course the next day.

I could see the color drain from his face as the situation began to dawn upon his craggy visage. Here we were, all ready to head on out to the airport and he had no reservation. I suggested that he place a call to his airline and see if there was a flight to which he could transfer his reservation.

Let me begin his part of this story by saying that as good as my example with Continental was, his was just as equally not good. They told him they would see what they could do. Unfortunately there were no seats on the flight he thought he was traveling out on. However they stated that they could get him on a later flight for a fee of $100. Not wanting to stay another night in Atlanta, he told the reservations agent to go ahead and make the change.

Here is where the story gets even better. The next moment the agent for this competing airline told him that there would be a $600 fee in addition to the $100 change fee. Heck, his original ticket was less than $400 round trip. Needless to say he told them that this was not good and told them to keep the flight as it was the following day. He figured staying another night at the Hampton Inn would be much cheaper than paying the difference in ticket costs.

Being the kindly soul that I always try to be, I did not want to abandon my buddy. I placed a call to my favorite airline and attempt to make alternative arrangements to get Jack home. It was here that I ran into another great Continental agent by the name of Bill.

When I shared the horror story with him about the other airline he assured me that he could do better than that. He informed me that I had the option of using my frequent flier points to get Jack home. Then he told me that he would first check the one-way fare to Boston to see what he could do for Jack.

Wonder of wonders Bill was able to get Jack on a Continental flight at just about the same time as me. The total cost for a fresh one-way ticket with a change in Cleveland was well over half of what the change to the other airline’s ticket would have been. So I got the ticket and in less than ten minutes was able to download his boarding passes for Atlanta and Cleveland.

As I began typing the words of this article, Jack and I were enjoying the ambiance at the President’s Club at the AtlantaAirport. Needless to say he is moving his base of operations from that competing airline to the comfortable corner of the world populated by Continental.

There is a further funny thing about this whole story. When he went to the front desk at the club to open a frequent flier membership with them, the kindly lady checked the airline system and discovered that he had an old account with them and that the account still had points in it.

What is the morale of this story? In my case the answer is simple. Pay attention to what you are doing. Do not rush and be a dummy. There is an old saying which goes something like this: Sin in haste and repent in leisure. It is also important to check things before you go on a trip. Jack and I thought we had done that. However, we did not do it well enough. It is equally important to pay attention to detail when you are doing your normal daily duties.

In this case I have aptly demonstrated that when working on line you must be sure that that you are actually ordering what you really mean to order. It is also important that when working with other people, you need to be sure to select the right words for the moment at hand. You need to understand an extremely important point. Words are like toothpaste in a tube. Once they leave the container, you can never get them back in.

Jack and I were most fortunate indeed. Given how often things can go wrong in the world of airline travel, we were lucky. We got home on time and on target. The use of the wrong words can create problems that will never go away. The can create one of those days: a day that can go on for many months and years to come. Take care and stay safe.