The family and I are on our way to Kuala Lumpur for a quick getaway. Learning from past experience we make sure we are at the airport early. Our last experience with Air Asia had us getting to the airport two hours early and being chastised by the director for arriving too early. It was our fault that we had to wait almost five hours in the Penang airport since their was a 2.5 hour delay on the plane. What the hell were we thinking arriving early? This would not have sent my blood boiling had they simply provided us with some dinner coupons. But, according to policy, only a delay of three hours or more would result in a dinner coupon. The two hours, thirty five minute delay was non-negotiable. All I could think about was the scene in 'Scent of a Woman' where Al Pacino would "....take a flamethrower to this place!!"
Anyway, we arrive early to our KL flight with the hopes of grabbing some lunch before departure. All systems go. We saddle into a little sandwich place, order a little something-something and lo and behold, there is some mold on our bread. Not a big deal. Send it back.
Waiting......
....waiting...
...waiting...
I go and inquire as to what happened to our sandwich. I see the cook in the back eating our sandwich. The employees (there must have been 10 of them) look to default to the one english speaker amongst them and then scatter like flies. I ask about our sandwich, explaining that we are still hungry and would like to have another sandwich. This is somehow a magical concept to the staff that we may still need to be fed. It never dawned on them that we may need to have our order filled.
This is a country, though, where KFC runs out of chicken and Pizza Hut runs out of dough. In fact, a couple of months ago, Marni and I ordered the last two beers in a bar. I was willing to run to the supermarket downstairs to get some. I fail to see the business sense in running out of items on a menu.
I digress....
Thinking that these types of stories are only in Indonesia we arrive at the KL airport (early, again.....we want to make sure we get proper notification of a delayed flight). Again, we want to have some lunch in the airport. Marni orders a pizza for her and Zoe, Caden and I get some sandwiches sans mold. Caden and I thoroughly enjoy our sandwiches, Marni and Zoe wait for thier pizza......
waiting.....
.....waiting...
Marni goes to inquire and learns that they accidentally delivered their pizza to the wrong table (of which there are eight- three have guests). So Marni asks if they could get another one. She learns that they have run our of chicken pizza. Marni then asks if she was ever going to hear of this little problem.
Today, I booked plane tickets to some secluded little island. After booking the tickets with my credit card I realize that the website had defaulted back to the current date and I had booked the wrong return flight. No problem.....we head to the head office of the airline. In my hand, I have a booking number, reference number and my payment number.
To make a long story short, I am able to change the dates of my flight but learn that I had not actually had the authorized payment go through on the credit card. The staff there did some digging and find out that the payment was not made. I did have the confirmation number.....but it was not actually confirmed. So, I pay a second time, knowing I will need to check my card balance. I then get an email notice - 7HOURS LATER- that my credit card had not been charged. I could have realistically shown up at the airport with printed tickets that had never been paid for. "I am sorry, Meester."
The sad part about all of this is that the staff members do not have the authority to make any changes to policy. There is no ability on their part to wave some charges or bend a rule to give the staff some satisfaction. All they can do is apologize while screwing you over. It is similar to when the dentist says "This will hurt a little....."
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